Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Climate Change and Energy) Share this | Hansard source

Bill Hayden was a favourite son of Queensland. He was a servant of our party. He was an eminent Australian, and he was a friend of mine. Bill Hayden's loss did not come as a surprise to those of us who knew him, but it came as a sadness nonetheless.

Bill Hayden was a very, very good man. I want to talk about his political achievements over many portfolios in a long time in this House. I want to focus particularly on his achievements as Treasurer. He spent a relatively brief period as Treasurer—only six months—but his impact as Treasurer was enormous and is still felt today. In that six-month period, he crammed in a lot. He inherited a very difficult situation. It was probably the hardest incoming brief of any Treasurer since Ted Theodore before him and Wayne Swan, who came after him. Labour treasurers from Queensland tend to have a rough road, as they inherit very tough economic situations. Bill Hayden was no exception to that rule of the three Labor treasures from Queensland.

Of all the treasures of Australia, few were better suited or better prepared for the role than Bill Hayden. He famously entered parliament as a policeman, but then studied at night in the Old Parliamentary Library and got his economics degree. He studied very hard, and he was a very, very fine Treasurer indeed. He brought discipline and toughness but also compassion. He got out-of-control spending back in control. He reduced the budget deficit substantially. In that six-month period, he also embarked on an amazing period of economic reform, reducing the number of tax thresholds from 14 to seven, which is an amazing thing to think about in today's context. He also ensured that fairness and compassion were his talisman in the budget that he brought down.

Bill Hayden's crowning achievement, which has stood—and will stand—for generations, was his work as the Minister for Social Services in engineering Medibank, which was the precursor to Medicare. Medicare is now an inbuilt part of our body politic and of our social construct. It is a standard that nobody would dare attack, but it was highly controversial when it was introduced. It's sometimes easy to gloss over and forget what a hard job it was for Bill Hayden. He was subject to scare campaigns and vicious attacks. His wife received threatening calls at home. His personal health records were released to the public as part of that campaign against him, and yet he persevered, and he delivered Medibank. The scare campaign was, of course, not borne out. It was eventually watered down by the Fraser government, but it came back strongly in Medicare.

That is his crowning achievement, for which Australians enjoying Medicare in 2023 can still be thankful.

In many ways Bill Hayden set the tone for the Hawke-Keating years of reform. He took over as Leader of the Labor Party in 1977 and served until that famous—or infamous—day in 1983 when the election was called. He set a tone of compassion, again, but also discipline and toughness. He made clear that the Labor Party would need to engage in fiscal rigour and careful, methodical reform if we were to return to the government benches. It's often said that the Hawke-Keating cabinet was the best cabinet in the history of Federation, which I think is true. Bill Hayden of course was a very important member of the cabinet, as Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade. More importantly, the Hawke-Keating cabinet was the Hayden shadow cabinet; he put it in place. When Bob Hawke became leader, he didn't change a thing. Apart from appointing Bill as minister for foreign affairs, he left the rest of the arrangements in place—as close as possible—and that is to Bill Hayden's great credit.

I came to know Bill in later life when I wrote The Money Men, a history of the treasurers. I included Bill Hayden as one of the 12 most notable treasurers in Australian history, despite his relatively short tenure. I got to know him. He was a little bit wary, at first, that I was writing this book and I was from the New South Wales Right. The New South Wales Right wasn't always high on his Christmas card list, it's true to say. He was a little wary, but, as soon as I assured him that it was a very genuine exercise, he was extraordinarily generous and we became good friends. I would visit him. I visited him in hospital. He had a long stint in hospital in the electorate of the member for Blair. He was in hospital for many weeks. I spent half a day with him in that hospital room at one point. He made a point of bringing all the nurses in to meet me. He introduced me to everyone, and anybody passing by in the corridor got pulled in by Bill. I got the opportunity to see Dallas on that visit and on other visits to Bill as well. It was wonderful to see Dallas in the parliament yesterday. It was a very big effort for her to make it to the parliament. We all know how deeply Dallas is feeling the loss, after decades of marriage, and a very successful marriage at that.

I do want to stay, on a personal note, that I had a deep and warm and abiding affection for Bill Hayden. He was a very genuine, deeply compassionate and considered man, and his company was always a pleasure. He always had a view about events in Canberra. He watched events very closely. It was his destiny not to be Prime Minister of Australia. He would've been a very good Prime Minister of Australia, but that wasn't his destiny. We ended up with another very good Prime Minister in Bob Hawke. Bill Hayden made his contribution as Minister for Social Security, as Treasurer, as Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade and as Governor-General. There are a few people who can say they've been Treasurer, minister for foreign affairs and Governor-General—Lord Casey is one—but not many; it's a rare trifecta. In his later years, Bill could certainly look back with great pride, as the many generations of his family can today. Bill Hayden, my friend, rest in peace.

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