Sue Lines (WA, Deputy-President) | Hansard source

I rise on behalf of the WA branch to put on the record my contributions to the condolence motion to former senator and President of the Senate Michael Beahan and I wish to associate my comments with those of Senator Keneally and Senator Cash. I knew Michael, really, as a party member and as someone who was active in the party. I knew, obviously, that he was a senator, but most of my association was in working with him as a member of the party and as an active member of the WA administrative committee and the national administrative committee.

Michael joined the party, as we've heard, in 1968 and was active in the Bunbury branch. He took that branch from a fairly moribund branch to an active branch. He really worked to increase the membership and revitalise the sorts of activities members got involved in, and I'm pleased to say that that activism of the Bunbury branch continues today under the stewardship of Don Punch, the local Labor member down there. I've certainly met with the branch on many occasions and they are still an active branch, and I think they would be pleased to know that the history of that branch is of it being revitalised by Michael Beahan.

Michael, as we heard, had retrained as a teacher. He became an educator, and he first worked with the WA Trades and Labour Council, now known as UnionsWA, as a trainer. He was part of a three-person committee that established the Trade Union Training Authority, which was an amazing establishment, and I'm sure Senator Urquhart, like me, as a union official, attended courses at TUTA in Albury-Wodonga. Certainly, Michael Beahan was part of the small group that established the Trade Union Training Authority, and I'm sure there are other people apart from Senator Urquhart and me in this place and in the other place who also attended TUTA. It was a very sad occasion when it was defunded and became lost to the trade union movement.

In about 1981, as we've heard, Michael became the secretary of the WA Labor Party, and it was in this role and in his role on the national executive that I certainly got to know him more closely. Michael was pivotal in Labor winning the state elections in 1983 and 1986. It was probably in 1986 that I got to know Michael. Of course, that followed the federal campaigns that we won from WA in '83, '84 and '87.

As history shows and as, I believe, Senator Cash and Senator Keneally have remarked upon, but I lived through these times, these were heady days for the Australian Labor Party—very heady days indeed—some that those opposite are like to refer back to and try still to tarnish us with in this modern day of politics. They were heady days for the Australian Labor Party, and I have to say that, in all of the time that I knew Michael, he was very gentle. I cannot recall a time when I ever saw him raise his voice or, indeed, lose his temper. He was a very calm influence and a very good secretary to have at the helm of the Labor Party during those years.

As we've heard, in 1987 Michael was elected to the Senate, and during his time in the Senate he continued to pursue his passions on industrial relations reform, working conditions, education, the economy and electoral matters. Michael was also passionate about peace—something that he and I shared, although we were from different arms of the party. We certainly had peace activism and nuclear disarmament as something that we shared together. Of course, he was also passionate about native title.

In 1994 Michael was elected President of the Senate, and I must say that it is with great pride, as I walk backwards and forwards to my office each day, that I often look at that portrait of Michael. It is the Michael Beahan I remember and recall. He doesn't look any different in that to the Michael Beahan who I recall. He continued in that role and, as we've heard, he made great reforms to the Senate in the role of President—indeed, even though he was somewhat cynical when he was first elected to the Senate, he became a great supporter, as we all do in this place; we are all fiercely proud of the roles that we play as senators in this place.

The WA party, through its current secretary, Tim Picton, and the assistant secretary, Ellie Whiteaker, wanted me to put their remarks on the Senate record as well. They extend their deepest sympathy to the family and, indeed, to the friends of Michael Beahan: 'Michael, as we know, was a stalwart of the Labor Party, whose ongoing contributions continue to mean so much to us all. And WA Labor extends its condolences and sincere appreciation for the impact that Michael Beahan made to our party and to Australia.' Vale, Michael Beahan.