Peter Slipper (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am particularly pleased to have the opportunity of joining in this condolence motion with respect to the very sad passing of the Hon. David Francis Jull. Honourable members on both sides had an extremely high regard for David. He was the font of all wisdom on matters parliamentary and otherwise, and—whether or not one was close to him personally—he freely proffered his advice and assistance in a whole range of areas. I can recall a number of conversations that I had with David when I joined the parliamentary Liberal Party in 1993 as the Liberal member for Fisher, despite my earlier manifestation as a National Party member for Fisher. David Jull was one of those people who immediately and warmly welcomed me into the Liberal Party family. As the honourable member for Sturt mentioned, he was keenly religious. He was a very strong Anglo-Catholic. He and I had many discussions of a religious nature. I shared his Anglo-Catholicism and I very much enjoyed the conversations that we had over the years. I can recall him turning up at parliament on one occasion having sourced a second-hand book on a famous shrine, an Anglo-Catholic church, which he presented to me. I greatly appreciated that gesture.

He attended the Church of England Grammar School in Brisbane and actually attended at the same time as my father-in-law, Robert Hall. David was a child of the rectory. His father was an Anglican priest, Father Alfred Stephen Jull. The member for Groom mentioned that David was born in Kingaroy. David had the opportunity of living in a range of localities within the Brisbane Anglican diocese as his father moved from position to position. I believe that, when Father Jull was the parish priest at Holy Trinity Woolloongabba in Brisbane, the former ALP federal president and later Deputy Premier of Queensland, Tom Burns, was an altar boy at that particular church. I suspect that Tom would make certain comments about that experience and I suspect David would probably wonder why his father was not better able to influence what ultimately, in his view, turned out to be the nefarious political inclinations of Tom Burns, the former altar boy at Holy Trinity Woolloongabba.

David was a small 'l' liberal, except that on many issues he was a big 'c' conservative. It is very difficult to actually badge people and call them one thing or the other.

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