Doug Cameron (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Human Services) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to support the motion of condolence, to pay my respects and to honour the massive contribution made by former Prime Minister Edward Gough Whitlam to this country and to international affairs. I would like to express my condolences to Gough's family—to Antony, Nicholas, Stephen and Catherine. Their father was a remarkable Australian. They were also honoured to have a remarkable mother, in Margaret Whitlam—Margaret, Gough's wife and soul mate.

Gough was a great intellectual, a great politician, an airman, a QC and a campaigner. I heard Senator Abetz talk about roads, rubbish and stray dogs—in the Labor Party you do deal with roads, rubbish and stray dogs, and Gough Whitlam dealt with them in the western suburbs of Sydney. He was a great orator and he was a great fighter. He was also extremely courageous. I think, given what has been said here today, that while politics provides great honour and great support to many individuals, it does bring about some brutal personal times. And I think that Gough Whitlam suffered some of the highest elements of political brutality against himself, his government and his position. But he always was courageous. He always dealt with it with dignity and he was always someone that you could look to and see a great deal of courage and intellectual capacity.

I was not here in 1972, so I am one of the few people of my vintage in this parliament who cannot remember the 1972 'It's Time' campaign. I came here in 1973. When I look at the objectives of the 'It's Time' campaign, there were two key objectives. One was to achieve basic changes in the administration and structure of Australian society. Looking at how Australian society was when I came here in 1973, I think that that was a very, very prescient position to adopt. Certainly, some of the changes that Gough Whitlam argued for then we are still trying to deal with here. One of his issues was equal opportunity. Another was the promotion of Australian ownership and control of industries and resources. That was something I was very supportive of at the time. When you look back since 1973 and see the missed opportunities in Australian resources in this country, when you see what other countries around the world have done with some government intervention in terms of their industries, you see that what happened over that period of time was a lost opportunity in terms of promoting Australian ownership and Australian control over our future through our resources. I think that is something that we can look back on and say that Gough, in my view, had right.

There were a number of programs, including the cities program. When I came here from Scotland in 1973 I could not believe that there were still people in the western suburbs of Sydney who did not have reticulated sewerage. That was probably the second shock—after realising that there was no colour TV in this country! It just showed that we were not at the cutting edge of social and economic reform in the seventies in this country. In the early seventies to have Gough Whitlam lay out such a prodigious position on social and economic change was fantastic, to me personally it was a great thing. To put sewerage in the outer suburbs of our cities was great—as were changes on local government and gender and racial discrimination. Coming from Scotland in 1973 I could not believe that Indigenous people could not go into some areas of pubs. They were being told that they could not have a drink in a pub. To me, that was just unbelievable. And it was one of Whitlam's programs that made sure discrimination was gone.

I came here from the British health system in 1973. When I was told that I had to take out private health insurance to make sure my family was looked after it was a foreign thing to me, as a beneficiary of the health system in the UK, to see how far back the health system in Australia was. Health was another example of the Whitlam approach to bringing about change that was good for society and good for individual Australians.

When I arrived here in 1973 I first went to the Endeavour Hostel at South Coogee. It was a modern hostel built to help migrants to integrate into the community. It was well-resourced under the Whitlam government. Migrants who could not speak English had access to English language training. There was a creche there for the children of the migrants. A lot of money was spent to allow migrants to become engaged in Australian society. For me, that was one of the positives that we had.

When I came here in 1973 I did not really know the figure of Gough Whitlam. But I soon learnt that he was unquestionably the leader in Labor and unquestionably the person who was leading the bulk of Labor's political agenda. He had some fantastic people around him and some fantastic changes were made. One change that has not really been well understood over time was giving ordinary Australians access to the legal system. In the early seventies, unless you had the money you could not get access to the legal system. That was another great change that Labor and Gough Whitlam implemented.

The issues that I was looking at when I came here in 1973 were international issues. There was Watergate. There was the first real act of terrorism when a plane was blown up at Benghazi airport. There was the CIA coup in Chile, where the Allende government was overthrown. At the hostel in South Coogee I met many people fleeing that coup. They were looking for support and refuge in Australia. There was a coup in Greece. Idi Amin was still in power in Uganda. The Vietnam ceasefire was being negotiated. Papua New Guinea was just about to get self-government. There were also the Tory sex scandals dominating the press in the UK.

In Australia the issues were about trying to get this country engaged internationally and trying to open the economy up. Many of those issues I did not agree with at the time. I did not agree with the 25 per cent across the board tariff cut because my job as a fitter in the engineering industry was protected by those tariffs. My approach was that that tariff helped me get along in this country. But the Whitlam government changed it. It is interesting that the Financial Review said this was undeniably one of the most forthright and courageous economic decisions by any Australian government. But it was not all about pushing for social change, it was not all about trying to deal with what the Whitlam government wanted to do. Inflation was a problem and, as I understand it, there were huge debates within the party about it at the time.

In 1973 we were in what was still a pretty rugged society. What comes to mind is the 1973 rugby league grand final, between Manly and Cronulla, where we were watching people nearly beating each other to death on a football field. I could not understand what was going on. That was the society we had in 1973. But we have come a long way and changed a lot of things since that time. In those days we had Number 96 on the television, and Abigail was saying that the casting couch was not a myth. So there were lots of things happening in Australia when I first came here. We bought Blue Poles. At that time, a Country Party politician saying it was a crazy idea. But I do not think anyone in the arts would now say it was a crazy idea.

I think Gough Whitlam also said that one of the greatest mistakes of the government was the ASIO raids by Lionel Murphy. I have to tell you that I am a bit of a Lionel Murphy fan. Lionel Murphy was a senator and a QC. He was actually a good QC. He did not talk about it, but he was a good QC. Lionel Murphy helped set up a system that everyone here benefits from, and that is the Senate committee system: a system where analytical approaches were taken to legislation, where we looked at that legislation in great detail. It was the Whitlam government and Lionel Murphy who set that process up within the Senate.

There was that issue of ASIO, and I take the opportunity to say that I believe that, if you are going to give more power to ASIO, and if you look at the history of ASIO in this country, then it is absolutely essential that the scepticism that the Whitlam government had about ASIO remains loud and clear in this parliament. I believe that if you are going to give more power to ASIO in this country, then the checks and balances must be increased, and those checks and balances, in terms of ASIO, must include proper parliamentary oversight. If that becomes a legacy that has been fought for for many years and we get that, then we should do that. I think it is important that that oversight takes place because, as I said, Gough Whitlam did indicate that that position with ASIO was one of the biggest mistakes of the government.

In 1975, as a rank-and-file shop steward working in the power industry in the Hunter Valley, I was horrified that the Queen's representative could dismiss a democratically elected government. I could not think of many other countries where that could happen, and I was appalled. I took industrial action with workers right around the country in protest against the dismissal of the Whitlam government. In those days, let me tell you, many workers—certainly in the power industry, which was a rough and tough industry—did not have a lot of money, so to take two days off work for a political issue was a big deal. It showed that rank-and-file workers, working-class people in this country, could not understand how that could have come about and were absolutely appalled that the Governor-General, the representative of the Queen, could dismiss the elected government of the country.

I have to say that I was disappointed that the ACTU did not organise more decisive and effective industrial action around the country at the time. As a rank and filer, I could not understand why Bob Hawke, the leader of the trade union movement at that time, was not as disgusted as I was, which I thought was the rank-and-file view of working class people around the country. I was very committed to continuing to take industrial action. If there had been a different ACTU decision, then history might have changed in this country. There was a lot of nervousness. We know that people were ready to cross the floor against the Senate leadership of the coalition and, if we had hung out a bit longer—I think in hindsight—then things may have changed. But that is history, that is hindsight and that is not what happened.

Gough Whitlam gave me the drive and determination to participate in not just industrial politics but also parliamentary and party politics in this country. I think he did that for many, many people. It was so fantastic to see someone who stood up for their vision, who stood up for their politics, who stood up against all the attacks and did that with such dignity and such courage. That is the thing that stands out to me about Gough Whitlam. It is not his intellect, which was, I think, unquestionable and what people have all talked about. It was not his biting sarcasm, his self-deprecation or his ego. It was none of those things. It was that Gough was a leader who understood his values, who understood what was in the interests of the country and was prepared to take that up despite the personal cost to him and his family.

He was a role model to many; he was an inspiration to many. In the future, we always need to keep in mind that your values and your principles are so important in this game. That is what Gough Whitlam taught me: values and principles and to be courageous in support of your values and principles. That is the lesson that Gough Whitlam gave me and that is the lesson all political parties need to continue with. I hope it is a lesson that is laid out for a long period of time.

Vale Gough Whitlam. You have been a constant in my life since I came to Australia. You will be sadly missed by Australians. You will be sadly missed by the body politic of this country. You have made a fantastic contribution to this great nation. I think we owe Gough Whitlam a lot.