Petro Georgiou (Kooyong, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I wish to support the condolence motion for the Hon. Don Leslie Chipp. I first met Don Chipp some 30 years ago, when he was shadow minister for social security, and I was privileged to work with him on the social security policy that he took to the 1975 election. I recollect that he was very gratified at the positive response to that policy at that stage, despite the fact that 1975 was not really an election fought on policy grounds. Despite his progressive estrangement and eventual departure from the Liberal Party to form the Australian Democrats, we did keep in touch over the years on a variety of issues, and I particularly appreciated the very moving comments Don’s daughter Debbie Reid passed on to me earlier this week.

The diversity and depth of Don Chipp’s contribution to Australian politics is quite remarkable. He was a backbencher, a minister in the Holt, Gorton, McMahon and Fraser governments, a backbencher again and then a senator and the founder and leader of a new political party. In this last role Don achieved what is rare in Australian politics; not to put too fine a point on it, it was almost unique. I do not think that anyone who has been involved in the business of managing a well-established political party can fully appreciate the demands of setting up a new one from scratch: the motivation of people to join a new party, the need to put the nuts and bolts into place, and the effort to imbue a new body with a sense of ethos and mission. Don Chipp attended to all that and, to the surprise of many people, he did it superlatively. He formed the Democrats just after he left the Liberal Party in 1977. In November of that year the Democrats fought their first election, winning two Senate positions, which increased to seven by 1985. That was the year before Don Chipp retired from the Senate.

This is not a time for an analysis of the Australian Democrats or of their current standing, but it is worth noting that the party he founded held the balance of power in the Senate for 15 years from 1981. Don Chipp was a man of many talents and of passion and commitment. He was not a conventional politician; he was a reformer and a traditionalist, a rebel and a creator. He made a difference to the causes he advanced—to civil liberties, the environment and Indigenous affairs, to name just a few. He made a significant contribution to Australia. Don endured the vicissitudes of politics and a debilitating disease and still managed to maintain his passion, his enthusiasm, his humanity and his sense of humour. He will be missed by people of all political persuasions.

On a personal note, having worked with both Don Chipp and Malcolm Fraser, whose relationship was sometimes, to put it diplomatically, attenuated, I am glad that Malcolm and Tamie Fraser were at Don’s service last Saturday to be part of what Malcolm quite properly described as ‘a great send-off for Don’. I wish to put on the record my appreciation of Don’s contribution to Australian politics and give my condolences to his wife, Idun, his brother, Frank, and his children, Debbie, John, Greg, Melissa, Juliet and Laura. I commend the motion to the House.

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