Daryl Melham (Banks, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

A number of people have asked: why put a motion on the Notice Paper in relation to Basil D'Oliveira?

It is pretty obvious that this has something to do with cricket and with something beyond cricket. In a nutshell, his obituary, which was written in the Guardian by Peter Mason, summarises it, and I quote:

As a mixed race—in South African terms, 'coloured'—player of exceptional ability in his native Cape Town, he was denied the chance to play for the country of his birth by the racial segregation of the apartheid regime. When he went to play in England and became a Test player there, his eventual selection for the 1968-69 England tour to South Africa so offended the warped sensibilities of John Vorster's government that it refused to allow him to play, and the tour was cancelled. As a result, South Africa was exiled from international cricket until the fall of apartheid in 1994.

We know from Sir Michael Parkinson, who delivered a moving address, that Basil helped to change the political history of South Africa. Sir Michael Parkinson revealed how in a personal conversation Nelson Mandela told him how D'Oliveira played an important role in the lifting of apartheid. That came about in part because of D'Oliveira's quiet dignity when he was banned by Prime Minister Vorster from representing his adopted country.

Peter Mason went on to give a bit of background about that. He wrote:

With the 1968-69 tour of South Africa coming up the following winter, D'Oliveira refocused, and he hit a fighting 87 in the first test of the 1968 summer series against Australia. But it became clear that members of the cricketing establishment wanted to avoid the embarrassment of taking D'Oliveira to South Africa, and to widespread disbelief he played no further part in the Ashes series until the final test at the Oval, where he was a late substitute. Knowing that his place in history was riding on it, D'Oliveira rose to the challenge magnificently with a score of 158 to help England win the match and draw the series—and so topped the Test averages for the season.

For most commentators he had squarely made his case for inclusion in the squad to South Africa, but the MCC, which picked the touring team, felt otherwise. To general consternation and much recrimination, he was left out. Arlott summarised the mood when he said the MCC had 'never made a sadder, more dramatic or more potentially damaging selection', and the subsequent fallout turned into the worst crisis of the MCC's history. D'Oliveira, privately devastated to the point of physical collapse but publicly stoic throughout, received so many thousands of letters of support that the Post Office had to make special arrangements to deal with them—while the MCC was castigated by the media and the Labour government for cowardly appeasement of apartheid.

Chastened by the outraged response, the MCC found a way out. On 16 September 1968, the bowler Tom Cartwright pulled out of the tour with an injury, and the selectors brought D'Oliveira in, even though he was not a logical replacement for the slot that had been vacated. D'Oliveira and his supporters celebrated, but the moment was short-lived. Within three days, the South African government had made it clear that it would not allow him to play, and the MCC was forced to cancel the tour.

The decision was a great disappointment for D'Oliveira, who had wanted above all else to play Test cricket in his native land … When the 1970 South Africa tour of England was cancelled too, he batted with great success against a replacement Rest of the World side …

That is the background. In effect, that helped change the apartheid regime in South Africa and allowed South Africa back into the community of nations. Sport, frankly, was the way to do it.

I had my own little experiences of D'Oliveira. In the 1970-71 series in Australia, in which seven tests were played, the fourth test was played in Sydney in January. The seventh test was also played in Sydney. I was a paperboy selling papers at the Sydney Cricket Ground at that time for the Daily Mirror. I do not have a specific recollection of D'Oliveira in the fourth test but I do recall that the openers, Boycott and Luckhurst, put on a century partnership. D'Oliveira scored 56 in the second innings and took two wickets in the first innings.

When it came to the seventh test, which was played in February, I was again selling papers. Most of my recollection of that test is of Ray Illingworth leading the England side off the field after Snow was manhandled in the outer. He had felled Terry Jenner with a bouncer. I was selling papers on the hill that day and again I have no specific recollection of D'Oliveira. He is obviously in the books, having played with distinction. The hill crowd basically knocked out every single light on the SCG scoreboard, and the shutters had to be pulled up. There was a real tenseness around. Sport is something that Australians feel pretty strongly about, and so does everyone else.

I do have a vague recollection of D'Oliveira, but not as specific as the one I have now. He overcame great adversity. Indeed, it is said that he concealed his age by three years to allow himself to play test cricket. In later life his age was revealed. He was some 38 years of age when he played his first test against the West Indies on 16 June 1966. His last test was on 10 August 1972. This would have made him in his early forties, which is quite remarkable. Overall, his test record is 44 matches, 70 innings, eight not out and 2,484 runs. His highest score was 158, with an average of 40.06; five 100s; fifteen 50s; and 29 catches. His bowling career was 47 wickets at an average of 39.55.

The member for Bennelong knows how hard it is to play at an international level in any sport. To do that with the burden of many of your own countrymen on your shoulders—D'Oliveira was a 'coloured' and coloureds were banned in South Africa, so he had to go to England—puts an extra special burden on someone's shoulders. For him to succeed as he did was to become, in effect, a beacon. As has been said by those who wrote his obituary, it was from little things that big things grew. We saw with his exclusion from the South African tour an end to apartheid in South Africa and then the bringing of them back into the fold. The South Africans no doubt have a wonderful love of sport and so the exclusion of sporting teams from going to South Africa and their exclusion from going to other countries would have hurt them. We now see South Africa back in Rugby Union and certainly in cricket in a very competitive sense, but people are not being excluded on the basis of race. However, we still need to recognise that it is harder for those people to come through the ranks anyway because they have other burdens.

So what we have here is a very special person—someone who did, I think, help change the course of history in his own way. It is for this reason I felt it important that the parliament pause and recognise his contribution.

John Alexander (Bennelong, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to recognise the kind words of the member for Banks. In an age where sports men and women are making significant contributions to race relations and global politics, Basil D'Oliveira, known affectionately as 'Dolly', is truly one of the greats. In the period of 1967-68 there was great social dislocation. Muhammad Ali's refusal to serve in Vietnam under the pretence that no Viet Cong had ever subjected him to racial taunts left behind an empowered new generation preferring to fight at home for the civil rights of their neighbours rather than for people thousands of kilometres away. American athletes Tommie Smith and John Carlos gave us that immortal image from the Mexico Olympics, standing on the dais, with black gloves raised in the air out of respect for the victims of race riots occurring back home. Australia's Peter Norman, who won a silver medal in the same race, supported his competitors' action by wearing a human rights badge. His reward was to never again be picked in an Australian team. Forty-four years later his time for that 200m race still stands as the best time ever run by an Australian. Two decades earlier Jackie Robinson had fought against the racial boundaries preventing African Americans from playing major league baseball and had won.

These legends all embraced their role on the public stage as a catalyst of change to bring people together in the fight against racism. But Dolly was different. He did not want the publicity. He did not want the politics. He just wanted to play cricket. His record on the pitch shows that he was one of the best all-rounders to have played the game. In the process he changed the face of international relations with apartheid South Africa.

Basil D'Oliveira grew up in Cape Town and was an obvious talent. Rising to captain the non-white national team, his exploits started to earn him a reputation overseas. He had scored over fifty centuries, including a cracking 225 runs in just 70 minutes of play, he had recorded a score of 46 off a single eight-ball over and had maintained a career batting average of over 100. With the ball he had taken over 100 wickets in three different seasons, including one game's figures of nine wickets for two runs. All this was achieved without any organised formal coaching, without proper cricket gear and on lumpy grass wickets that many of our national stars would struggle to bat on.

With a burning desire to play first class cricket, Dolly wrote to members of the British media and cricketing establishment in search of an opportunity. He wanted to play, to learn and then to return as a coach to the non-white league to help disadvantaged kids like himself. It was John Arlott, England's media equivalent to Richie Benaud, who convinced the Middleton Cricket Club in the Central Lancashire Cricket League to give this raw talent a chance. Starting in April 1960, Dolly had scored 930 runs at an average of 48 and had taken 71 wickets at 11 runs each by the end of his first season. In 1964 he became a British citizen, and two years later made his debut for the English national team.

Owing to the long road he had been forced to travel to make his international debut, Dolly was always guarded about his real age. Since his death we have learned that he made his test debut a few months shy of his 35th birthday—about the same age that current cricketers like Ponting and Hussey are being called on to retire.

In early 1968 England hosted Australia for an Ashes series, where Dolly dealt out a spectacular 158 in the final test—seemingly guaranteeing his place in the side for the upcoming tour of South Africa. However, motions behind the scenes displayed an ugly side of English cricket. The South African government, keen to protect their apartheid policies, wished to avoid the embarrassment of a non-white South African returning to their shores and beating them. An official from a South African tobacco company, clearly operating under instructions from the government, offered Dolly a financial package that would have set him up for life if he refused to tour. Dolly declined.

The South African Prime Minister threatened to cancel the tour if Dolly was named in the team. Meetings with the British Prime Minister failed to resolve the issue. Instead, claiming that Dolly was not one of the best 16 players in the English squad, the English cricket establishment omitted him from the team. This was despite his position on top of the English batting averages and second in the bowling and possessing superior knowledge of the South African conditions. The response from the English media, public and politicians was uniform in its outrage. Dolly stayed silent, instead focusing on his preparation for an upcoming county game. In the lead-up to the tour two English players declared themselves unfit to play, giving the MCC no option but to recall Dolly to the team.

On 17 September 1968, South Africa's Prime Minister announced he was not prepared to accept the side and the tour was cancelled. It is amazing to consider that the highest levels of government could become so involved in the selection of another nation's cricket team and, furthermore, to consider that this one decision started South Africa's isolation from international sport. It is a stain on our own history that the Australian national team continued with a tour of South Africa the year after the D'Oliveira affair, appearing to add some credibility to this woeful decision. It was only in 1970, in the lead-up to South Africa's tour of England, that anti-apartheid protests forced England to ban the tour. We followed suit the following year. In a sport mad nation like South Africa isolation from the world of sport is a crushing rebuke felt directly and immediately throughout the community. More than trade sanctions or the closure of embassies, it is through an individual's inability to represent their nation and the fans suppressed desire to cheer them on that real change can occur. Within a few years exemptions were being made to allow non-whites to tour. I clearly remember the great American, Arthur Ashe, being given an 'honorary white' visa so that he could play with us at Ellis Park.

Sport is a great leveller, a great unifier. Through participation in sport diplomatic walls can be broken, common interests can be found and friendly competition can be developed to patch over historical wounds. South Africa's return to international cricket in 1991, following the release of Nelson Mandela and the repealing of the apartheid laws, was hailed as a new dawn. Fifteen years later Ashwell Prince was selected as the first non-white captain of the national team—a moment that, without any doubt, would have made Dolly proud.

It is fitting to finish with the writings of this most humble man, Basil D'Oliveira, who did not seek to change the world but, through the sheer force of his brilliance on the cricket pitch and his strength of character off it, left an indelible mark on the world of sport and international politics:

I'll never forget the events of the summer of 1968 as long as I live. It was a nightmare, punctuated by occasional bouts of euphoria. Actions that had little to do with events on the cricket field meant that South Africa would inevitably be barred from Test Cricket and. Indeed, from most international sport. And the unwitting reason for that ban? ME!

Laurie Ferguson (Werriwa, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Today we join with many others in recognising Basil D'Oliveira, a recipient of the CBE, the OBE, the 2004 announcement that games between South Africa and England would, in future, be fought for the Basil D'Oliveira Trophy and the subject of a resolution in the House of Commons which stated:

That this House recognises the passing of Basil D'Oliveira; and records its thanks for the dignified and courageous role he played in helping to do away with apartheid in South Africa and the important and critical part he played in changing history.

Of course sport has always had a connection with racial issues. The famous 1868 Aboriginal tour of Britain was followed the next year by a decision of the Victorian authorities that it would not occur again because they decided that, in future, Aboriginals would have to get permission from the Protector to leave the state. Eddie Gilbert was famous in this country and, if he had not been an Aboriginal,—and if he had not been a Queenslander as well, quite frankly—would have been selected in the Australian team.

When we look at people who have been involved in these issues around the world we look to Lloyd McDermott, the first Aboriginal Australian to play rugby for this country who, with other players, made himself unavailable for the tour of South Africa in 1963 as a matter of bringing these issues to the fore. On another front Peter Norman from Australia became famous for his role in 200-metre final in the 1968 Olympics.

The genesis of this was that John Arlott, the famous commentator, received a letter from D'Oliveira who, like most South Africans of coloured or mixed background, faced non-access to first-class amenities, lack of opportunity, lack of training et cetera. Arlott, obviously knowing that D'Oliveira had great potential and having a feeling for the discrimination he faced, approached a Lancashire club, and D'Oliveira went on to play for Worcestershire. He accomplished five centuries, 44 test matches and played in county cricket until the age of 46. The Guardian, my weekly edition of the Bible for the last 25 years, commented that:

Anyone who would swallow that—

The decision that he should not be in the team—

would believe the moon was a currant bun.

That was the ridiculousness of the decision by British authorities to not make him available for the original team.

The umpire, Charlie Elliott, was very prescient when D'Oliveira scored 158 runs for England against Australia and said to Dolly:

Oh Christ, you've put the cat among the pigeons now

because he, obviously, perceived that they had to select D'Oliveira if they were doing it on merit. He was Wisden Cricketer of the Year in 1967. Interestingly, I note that the people who initiated the House of Commons resolution came from the Democratic Unionist Party of Northern Ireland, who are very much on the conservative spectrum of British politics. That is the way in which D'Oliveira has become so recognised. I notice that his son said that he was not only very reticent about telling his true age throughout his life but he was also disinclined to ever discuss the situation that he faced in South Africa. Even amongst family he was not really keen to cover these issues.

Along with many other sportsmen in rugby, tennis and cricket, D'Oliveira was part of a process that led to the dismantling of apartheid. Not only Lloyd McDermott but also other Sydney-based players refused to go on that campaign. We know that the New Zealand and Australian tours by the Springboks in that period were widely disrupted. Two games had to be abandoned on the rugby front in New Zealand because of crowd activity. D'Oliveira has been recognised on many fronts since then. He did play a central role in dismantling a racist regime. It was typical of that regime that they did actually discuss at cabinet level the possibility of bribing him, of paying him significant amounts of money to avoid this issue coming to the fore, because they could see that processes like that—the selection of people like D'Oliveira—would eventually cause major headaches for the regime. I commend the previous speakers for this important motion.

Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Cricket lost one of its finest when Basil Lewis D'Oliveira died, aged 80, on 19 November 2011. Moreover, nations throughout the world which play the great game of cricket felt the loss of a man affectionately nicknamed 'Dolly', who gave so much on the field and, more importantly, made such an impression and impact off the field.

But we should not mourn for D'Oliveira; rather, we should celebrate all he gave, what he achieved and his lasting legacy not just to sport but also to race relations within the community of nations. He will be best remembered for the dramatic and, indeed, noble role he played in helping to defy apartheid in sport. A person of mixed race—in South African terms 'coloured'—yet a gifted cricketer in his native Cape Town, D'Oliveira was denied the opportunity to play for the country of his birth. This was due to the unfair, discriminatory racial segregation of the apartheid regime.

D'Oliveira went to England to become a test player there, and his eventual selection for the 1968-69 England tour to South Africa so offended John Vorster's government that it refused to allow him to play and the tour was cancelled. Subsequently, South Africa was exiled from international cricket until the fall of apartheid in 1994. The determined yet dignified way in which D'Oliveira dealt with the uproar endeared him to the British public and ultimately proved to be a turning point in the South African attitude to segregated matches. It took many years to change, but the D'Oliveira affair played a pivotal part in the start of a gradual easing of official segregation in South African sport. It also significantly hurt the regime's world standing.

D'Oliveira never desired to be the focus of attention or controversy. Whilst he was proud that the role he played brought the injustice of apartheid to wider attention, he was a reserved, quiet individual. All he wanted to do was to play cricket as well as he could and at the highest level. His achievements are testament to his ability. In 44 tests, he scored 2,484 runs, with five centuries and a top score of 158. He was a handy bowler, claiming 47 wickets. I know the member for Banks—and I love the way he described him as a beacon—also quoted Peter Mason, who penned D'Oliveira's obituary in the Guardian:

From an early age, D'Oliveira was the best cricketer in the non-white leagues of South Africa. At 21, he hit seven sixes and one four in an eight ball over, and at 23 scored 225 in an astonishing 75 minutes—out of his team's total of 236. He was a successful medium pace bowler too, taking nine for two in one innings. …

Had he been white, D'Oliveira would probably have played in his teens for South Africa and might well have risen to be acknowledged as one of the greatest cricketers of all time. But while his success in non-white cricket was unmatched, he spent his prime years up to the age of 28 confined to playing on scrubby matting wickets on wasteland. By 1959, disillusioned and disheartened, he had become resigned to his situation. He married his childhood Sweetheart Naomi and channelled his efforts into his job as a machinist at a printing firm.

But class always shines through and eventually he made his first-class debut at 30 years of age. The first non-white South African to play county cricket, D'Oliveira's remarkable middle order batting and economical bowling made an immediate impact. He scored a century on his county championship debut in 1964 and helped Worcestershire to win the competition that year. The rest, as they say, is history.

The test series between South Africa and England is now known as the Basil D'Oliveira Trophy—how appropriate. D'Oliveira is survived by Naomi and their two sons, Damian, who also played for Worcestershire, and Shaun. As Peter Mason penned:

"Dolly" was a very popular figure in his adopted home: he had also carried the hopes of so many of his black South African countrymen and – through grit, determination and huge skill – triumphed on their behalf as well as his own.

May he rest in peace.

Tony Zappia (Makin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am pleased to be able to speak to this motion and commend the member for Banks for bringing it before the House. Our journey through history has often been marked by single events which have caused or triggered a change in direction. The story of Basil D'Oliveira is one such event. His story not only precipitated events in South Africa but across much of the Western world. Basil D'Oliveira was a brilliant South African born cricketer. In the late 1950s his brilliance was noticed by the cricket community in Cape Town. His problem was that he was a black man. At the time, being a coloured person in South Africa meant that you were discriminated against, segregated and not allowed to represent your country. Discrimination was firmly entrenched in South African society through the apartheid system enforced through the National Party regime.

Interestingly, it was an era when discrimination against black people was clearly evident in many other parts of the world, including here in Australia. But the 1960s was also a time of great social change and significant historical events, particularly on the issue of racial discrimination. In Australia the constitutional change to recognise Aborigines is a case in point. Simultaneously in the United States, Martin Luther King Jr came to prominence for his fight against racial discrimination before he was assassinated in 1968. In 1967 the classic film Guess who's coming to dinner,featuring Sidney Poitier, Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy, portrayed a romance between a black man and a white woman and very clearly reflected community attitudes of the time in the United States, where marriage between black and white people in many parts of the country was frowned upon. South Africa's refusal to select Basil D'Oliveira to the national cricket team provoked a chain of events that ultimately resulted in an international sporting ban on South Africa that lasted for 22 years. A single, previously unknown black South African man with extraordinary cricket skills prompted international condemnation against South Africa and highlighted the racial discrimination in that country.

Basil D'Oliveira was not the only black South African sportsman of that era to be a victim of South Africa's apartheid policy. Precious McKenzie was an outstanding South African weightlifter. He too migrated to the UK in 1964 after he was not selected for the 1960 Rome Olympics because of apartheid policies. The South African government offered to select him in 1964 provided he was segregated from the white members of the team. Precious refused. Precious McKenzie went on to win several gold medals, although regrettably not for his country of birth, in the World Powerlifting Championships and the Commonwealth Games, competing first for England and later for New Zealand, where he resettled and still resides. In 2006, in recognition of his heritage, he was inducted into the South African sports hall of fame. Precious was an outstanding athlete and a gentleman. I have the pleasure of knowing him personally and the displeasure of having competed against him.

In Basil D'Oliveira's era cricket was the sport of gentlemen and in South Africa of upper class white people. Human existence has always been tribal. Our differences can divide us and our commonalities unite us, but sport is a powerful unifier that can overcome cultural and racial differences. Nelson Mandela understood that and cleverly used sport to unite the people of his country. Those who say that sport and politics should not be mixed should think again. Basil D'Oliveira was an extraordinary, internationally recognised cricket player, and his international colleagues stood by him. In doing so, they drew attention to not only his cricketing ability but, more importantly, the apartheid regime in South Africa. Basil's cricketing greatness was ultimately recognised by South Africa. His more important place in history, however, was his role in bringing an end to apartheid. He gave hope and inspiration to the oppressed. He helped turn the tide against racial discrimination across the world. We may never have seen the best of Basil D'Oliveira but his personal and public achievements were remarkable. His life marked a turning point in history.

Patrick Secker (Barker, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Banks for bringing this motion before the parliament. Some might wonder why you would talk about a sportsperson, but Basil D'Oliveira actually changed the world and had a great effect, through sport and through his political involvement, in what happened in South Africa. So this is a very important motion to commemorate him in this parliament.

For Basil D'Oliveira, affectionately known by his friends as Dolly, his introduction as the first non-white South African in English county cricket was itself a breakthrough. Through his role in having South Africa banned from international sport, and up until his recent death due to Parkinson's disease, he led an extraordinary life and was humble from start to finish. He was a great cricketer whose career could have been greater were it not curtailed by the oppressive apartheid regime in South Africa. Beyond cricket, in unintentional ways he raised awareness of the oppressive apartheid regime, which led to South Africa's international ban from sport.

Basil D'Oliveira never revealed his date of birth. Had he done so, he would not have been selected to play cricket in the UK for Middleton, Worcestershire or England. Had he let it be known that he was born earlier than the date of 1931 that he officially gave, he would not have got his league cricket start at the age of 32 or 33. He did not qualify for Worcestershire until 34 or, so he was still a bit of a mystery, and did not play for the England team until he was 38 or maybe 39. Of course, he played until he was 45. These days people would say that is a bit old. Ricky Ponting is 37 and people say he is getting a bit too old. This shows that age does not always weary them.

You could argue that Basil D'Oliveira's first-class batting average of 39.97 and his test batting average of 40.06 would have been considerably higher had he been fairly granted the opportunity to play representative cricket at the highest class when he was an up-and-coming player in South Africa. I remember watching cricket on TV with my mother when I was a youngster when Australia was fighting back in the last innings with a chance to win the match against England. I think it was a very stubborn fifth-wicket partnership and we were starting to get on top. The commentators on TV were saying England should bring on one of the specialist bowlers, but the cunning Ray Illingworth actually brought on Basil D'Oliveira. I remember the commentator saying that was a big mistake. Well, before long Basil D'Oliveira had broken that partnership, got another couple of wickets and won the match for England as a humble medium-fast bowler. So I think Ray Illingworth knew a lot more than the commentators did.

Basil D'Oliveira had the misfortune of being born a non-white in apartheid South Africa and grew up in the discriminative world that apartheid South Africa imposed. D'Oliveira got a start when he developed his trademark back-foot stroke play with a short backlift to devastating effect. He was prolific in those early formative years and he scored 80 centuries on uneven matting pitches before emigrating to England for an opportunity. I have played on a lot of matting pitches but I certainly did not have that class or score 80 centuries like he did. The closest to official cricket that Basil D'Oliveira got was sitting in the coloured stand at Cape Town. That was a crying shame for South African cricket at the time but I think they have now recognised their mistake. It is good to see that people realise he has done a lot of good for cricket in South Africa, in England and internationally. Despite pressures from above, when he was not initially selected for the South African tour, he finally got his chance, and that is what really caused the whole problem for South African cricket, leading to a ban for many years to come. But it was the right decision to make.

John Murphy (Reid, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I take this opportunity to associate myself with the contributions made by all honourable members. They have been a great tribute to a great citizen. I applaud the member for Banks for bringing this important motion before the parliament.

Debate adjourned.

Proceedings suspended from 13:06 to 16:00