Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

On behalf of the opposition I support the Prime Minister’s motion and I offer our thoughts and prayers for the Australian families and the Indonesian families who have lost loved ones in the Garuda Airlines accident two weeks ago. Words cannot fully describe the impact of these events on the families suffering bereavement. We can never appropriate their grief; grief is a deeply personal thing.

The five Australians who lost their lives—Australian embassy official Liz O’Neill, AusAID’s Allison Sudradjat, Australian Federal Police agent Brice Steele, Australian Federal Police agent Mark Scott and Australian Financial Review journalist Morgan Mellish—all dedicated themselves to public service. Beyond the grief felt by their families, they have left gaps in the lives of many who have had the privilege of working with them, of knowing them as colleagues and as friends. Whether it was in diplomacy, in humanitarian assistance, in security or in journalism, they chose to work in the service of others. They chose to work in public service, and public service is a good thing. They were all devoted to their work, and through their work they were all connected. So it is fitting that in this spirit and in this place, in this place of the nation’s work, we honour their lives and their work in the service of others.

On Wednesday, 7 March, shortly before 8 am in Yogyakarta, these Australians met an untimely death—well before their time. They still had much more to give. Together with the Acting Prime Minister, the foreign minister and others and, most importantly, their families, we welcomed home their bodies at Fairbairn RAAF Base last week. In the stillness of the wind that day and with the sound of muffled drums, and with the five Australian flags draped over their caskets, they were met with sorrow and mourning by their loved ones and they were met with deep respect by their colleagues.

Liz O’Neill was a humanitarian whose life was filled with love and compassion and service for others. Liz worked at the Jesuit Social Justice Centre in Sydney. She joined the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade in 1994, then worked for the Sydney 2000 Olympics and was awarded an Order of Australia for her work with the team dealing with the Bali bombings. In 2003 Liz was posted to Jakarta and was soon faced with another tragedy, the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami. These were horrific tasks. It has been said that Liz demonstrated an inner equilibrium beyond her years. Bishop Greg Kelly said the other day that Liz was a woman of humour, competence, devotion and large-heartedness. All these sentiments certainly reflect the Liz O’Neill that I encountered over many visits to Jakarta. Her challenge was to meet, I remember, the formidable competing media requirements of a visiting foreign minister and a visiting shadow foreign minister at the same time. The fact that she was able to discharge those responsibilities with grace, with humour and with aplomb was itself worthy of some award. She did it with great effect and with great style. The world desperately needs more people like Liz O’Neill. As Liz’s husband, Wayne Adams, said:

The world is a lesser place. The grief and desolation we feel will not soon fade but her memory will live with us forever.

Our thoughts go to Wayne, their beautiful baby daughter, Lucinda, and their families.

Allison Sudradjat was known to many in this place through her role as the Indonesian head of AusAID. Allison played an integral role in coordinating the emergency relief effort in response to devastation wrought by the Boxing Day tsunami in 2004. As Deborah Cameron wrote, for Allison:

... a diplomat, aid worker and humanitarian—it was time to shine.

And in helping direct the $1 billion aid effort, Allison was deeply and completely committed to improving the lives of others as best she could. Allison loved Indonesia. She studied there. She learnt the language. She married in Jakarta. She was a great Australian humanitarian in the great tradition of Australian humanitarianism stretching back across the decades. She was a true friend of Indonesia, something recognised by the Indonesian President, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who wrote to the Prime Minister saying:

... we will forever appreciate her compassion and her good work for Australia-Indonesia relations.

In this difficult time our thoughts go to her husband, Ris, and their four children, Jamila, Imran, Zaini and Yasmin.

Brice Steele was the head of the Australian Federal Police operation in Jakarta. He had risen fast through the AFP ranks. Tributes for Brice have come from colleagues across the spectrum, from drivers and tea ladies, from ambassadors and departmental secretaries. He was a formidable man. They all paid tribute to his professionalism, integrity, intellect, kindness, generosity, humour and humility. The work of the AFP in Jakarta has been of critical importance in the Australia-Indonesia relationship. In combating people smuggling, terrorism and the narcotics trade, the AFP have been front and centre to that operation, and Brice was front and centre to that operation. Brice had met his wife, Kellie, when she was 14 years old and then again when she was in year 10, while he was studying in his first year of university. They dated briefly and then parted, only to be joined again a few years later, and married in November 1996. There have been many tributes to Brice and to his love for Kellie. As Catherine Armitage has reported, the many tributes have recounted how Brice established instant rapport with everyone he met, how he was largely teetotal yet always managed to be the life of the party and how at the embassy in Beijing he was adored by all the children. We extend our sincere condolences to Kellie and to Brice’s family.

Mark Scott had been a Federal Police officer since 1987 and had served in Burma, where he was posted in 2002, and in Indonesia, where he had been since last year. Mark also worked as a policeman in the ACT before being posted abroad. Mark’s work for the AFP in Indonesia was of the highest order—always able to cooperate effectively with his Indonesian counterparts, always serving the Australian interest, always building brick by brick the Australia-Indonesia security relationship. At a memorial service last week at the Federal Police offices in Canberra, Mark’s colleagues recalled his patience, his dedication, his kindness, his broad smile and his unique sense of humour. As Detective Sergeant Daryl Neit recalled:

We deal with the dead and the dying all the time, but this is one of those occasions for our family of police officers that has rattled the whole team.

His loss is also deeply felt. Our thoughts and our prayers are with Mark’s wife, Sally, and their three children.

Morgan Mellish was an award-winning journalist who had worked for the Sydney Morning Herald and most recently for the Australian Financial Review, for which he was the Jakarta based correspondent. Morgan was a fun, larrikin Aussie who revelled in being and excelled as a journalist. Geoff Thompson described him as a ‘handsome, sandy-haired grinning surfer charmer’. The Sydney Morning Herald’s Ian Verrender said that his colleagues and friends ‘will sorely miss his dry wit and permanent smile’. Morgan’s sister Caroline said:

“I don’t think there was ever a dull moment and he loved everything he did.”

She said:

“He had two goals in life and one was to be a foreign correspondent and one was to win a Walkley award. He did both of those in 2006 …

Morgan won a 2006 Walkley award for his investigative report into Robert Gerard. Our thoughts and our prayers and condolences go to his family, his friends and his many colleagues in this place.

In the middle of all the horrible carnage and wreckage and suffering and loss, there has also been a ray of hope, and that ray of hope is Cynthia Banham’s brave fight, unrelentingly fighting against the odds. With the help of our wonderful medical specialists at Royal Perth Hospital, including our very own Dr Fiona Wood, Cynthia is making progress. In her own time, I hope and we hope that Cynthia returns to journalism and continues to make a contribution to public life, to keep all of us in this place accountable.

Other Australians, including Michael Hatton, Kyle Quinlan and Roger Tallboys, and the Indonesians affected by this tragedy have suffered greatly. Our thoughts and our prayers also go out to them.

I want to pay tribute to all those who have aided the survivors, especially those who have formed specialist medical teams and travelled to help, and those who have assisted the families and made the arrangements for repatriation. This is difficult work; it is often heart-rending work.

The thoughts of all of us in this building are also with Michael Harvey, the Herald Sun reporter and Cynthia’s partner. It is a very tough profession. Michael is one of the truly nice guys that you come across in this place. He has been a tower of strength in this, Cynthia’s greatest time of need. I understand that Cynthia and Michael might be listening to these speeches today, so we just say directly to both of you that you are both loved and admired in this place, more than you will ever know, and the strength you are showing is an inspiration to us all. I know that you will both be with us here soon.

On behalf of the opposition and, I know, all of us in this place, our thoughts, our hearts and our prayers go out to the families, the loved ones, the friends and the colleagues at this very difficult time. The lives that have been lost are the nation’s loss as well.

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