Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Industry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to mourn the passing of St Kilda legend and AFL champion Danny Frawley. As a St Kilda fan, a long-suffering St Kilda fan, but one that's still loyal to my team, Danny Frawley was a great player to me and I think to many, many thousands of St Kilda supporters and supporters of Aussie Rules footy. He played for St Kilda between 1984 and 1995 and managed to play 240 games. He was the longest serving captain of St Kilda, between 1987 and 1995. He represented Victoria between 1987 and 1994. He played with some of the great players for St Kilda, including Lockett, Robert Harvey, Stewart Loewe and Nicky Winmar—all great players—but, even amidst those great players, he managed to win St Kilda's best and fairest in 1988. He was an All Australian in the same year, and inducted into the St Kilda Football Club Hall of Fame in 2007.

He also had a role at the Richmond Football Club. He coached Richmond between 2000 and 2004, and led them to a preliminary final in 2001. As we know, life as a coach is tough at the best of times. Coaching Richmond during this period was as tough as it gets. He arrived at Punt Road with dark hair and when he left four years later it had turned grey—a bit like what happened to me. He was chief executive of the AFL Coaches Association for six years, between 2008 and 2014. He did media work with SEN radio and Fox Footy as a commentator. He was a genuinely funny guy.

He co-hosted Bounce, where he created the 'golden fist' award to recognise the best defender. There is now a petition to have this award presented on Brownlow Medal night. It has been signed by over 60,000 supporters, and I add my voice to that petition, here in this chamber, to call on the AFL to award this trophy at the Brownlow in Frawley's honour. He was quite right. Great defenders are not often recognised and too often miss out. I think it was a very good idea of his and I hope it gets realised more formally.

He spoke openly about his struggles with mental health. He was not embarrassed by it anymore and wanted to use his experience to help others. I'd like to extend my condolences to his wife, Anita, and daughters Chelsea, Keeley and Danielle, and to his many, many friends. Vale, Danny 'Spud' Frawley.