John Hogg (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Before I call Senator Cameron, I remind honourable senators that this is his first speech. I, therefore, ask that the usual courtesies be extended to him.

Doug Cameron (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr President. I congratulate you on your election and I thank the Senate for the opportunity to make my first speech in this place. I acknowledge and pay my respect to the traditional owners of the land on which we meet, the Ngunawal people, their elders past and present. Firstly, I want to acknowledge the work of my predecessor, former senator George Campbell, who served the working people of Australia with dedication, integrity and principle over many years.

I find myself in a truly remarkable situation: a working-class migrant from Scotland who has been given the great honour and privilege of representing the people of New South Wales and the Australian Labor Party in the Senate. I see the challenge for government as that laid down by Franklin Delano Roosevelt on the occasion of his second inaugural address, when he said:

The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.

Roosevelt knew that trickle-down economics is a flawed approach and that there must be strong and effective government intervention on behalf of the neediest in society. Homelessness, chronic illness, alcoholism, mental illness, old age, bad luck or simply being born in the wrong place means that you face significant and onerous challenges. Indigenous Australians face all of these problems as a result of systemic exploitation and abuse. The Prime Minister’s apology on behalf of the nation was a wonderful moment of huge importance to all Australians. There is much to be done and much more to be done to make good the devastation wrought on Aboriginal Australians since white settlement. We have an obligation to treat disadvantaged Australians as human beings, not as part of an accounting exercise in some flawed economic model dreamt up by the theoreticians. Common decency and compassion must win out over economic theories based on the law of the jungle.

My wife, Elaine, and I and our eldest daughter, Lynn, arrived in Sydney from Scotland in 1973. Like most young migrants, we were full of aspirations and hope. I was also full of trepidation after moving from the land of our birth to a new home and a new life on the other side of the world. We will never forget flying into Sydney and seeing the beautiful Sydney Harbour, the Harbour Bridge and the soon-to-be-opened Opera House. We could not believe the blue skies, the sunshine and the city beaches. For us, it was all a bit surreal.

I was born and raised in the working-class town of Bellshill, just outside of Glasgow. My early memory is of growing up in a prefabricated home known to us as a prefab. We lived in a large council housing scheme where the centre of entertainment was the local football park. Money was in short supply for most families and we had some tough times. But the good memories of my childhood have crowded out the bad memories. A number of football legends were born in Bellshill: Matt Busby of Manchester United, Bill Shankly of Liverpool and Jock Stein of Celtic. They’ve got to get a Rangers manager in there sooner or later!

Bellshill and surrounding towns also produced some significant political figures. These included Keir Hardie, the founder of the British Labour Party, who lived in Holytown, a stone’s throw from Bellshill. Robin Cook, the Secretary of State in the Blair government, was born in Bellshill, and the British High Commissioner to Australia, the Rt Hon. Helen Liddell, comes from Airdrie, a neighbouring town. Scotland continues to make its mark around the world.

Bellshill is a product of the Industrial Revolution where coalmining and the steel and engineering industries dominate. Globalisation, and time and structural change have seen most of the steel and engineering base disappear. I attended Bellshill Academy, where I failed to fulfil much of my potential. This was despite the best efforts, commitment, professionalism and perseverance of my teachers. I was not a particularly good student. I was determined to get out of school as soon as I could. In fact, many of my teachers would have said I was a particularly bad student. I left school at 15 to serve my apprenticeship as a fitter and machinist. Completing my apprenticeship opened up many opportunities, most importantly the opportunity to migrate to Australia with my family.

Not long after completing my apprenticeship, the factory I worked in closed and I was made redundant. Fortunately for me, this was my first and only taste of redundancy. My personal experience with redundancy has helped me understand that workers who lose their jobs are not just another statistic or an ‘adjustment problem’. Redundant workers are real people with real feelings. They have commitments to meet and families to care for. They need every bit of support they can get to pick up their lives. Redundancy is an extremely stressful and demeaning time for many workers and their families. Many are affected physically and psychologically and suffer the consequences for years.

Determined to have a better life for myself and my family, Elaine and I pulled together £10 each to pay for our assisted passage to Australia. It was the best £20 we have ever spent. On many occasions employers have offered to refund my £10 and buy me a one-way ticket back to Scotland. I was never tempted to accept any of those offers. We were extremely fortunate that there was extensive government assistance for migrants in the early seventies. We spent our first 12 months in the Endeavour Migrant Hostel at South Coogee, where advice and support were readily available. Migrants had access to child care, family counselling, English language classes, training and assistance with employment opportunities. Unfortunately, this type of support is not so abundant these days. My personal experience with the exploitation of some workers under the 457 visa scheme has made me committed to fight for increased government and institutional support for new migrant workers in this country.

Our youngest daughter, Fiona, was born in 1975 and not long after that we moved to Muswellbrook in the Hunter Valley, where I was employed by the Electricity Commission as a maintenance fitter at Liddell Power Station. The ad for the job sounded brilliant—a three-bedroom cottage, skiing on the lake, a tranquil country lifestyle. Unfortunately, the reality was much different. We arrived in Muswellbrook to find that we had been allocated a fibro Electricity Commission house which was unfit for human habitation. We were moved to another cottage which was not much better—an absolute disgrace with broken windows and filth everywhere and in a general run-down condition. It was July and it was freezing cold.

We were left to our own devices with a three-year old toddler and a one-month old baby. My complaint to management was met with indifference and left me no option but to pursue decent housing with the union delegates. The local delegates demanded action from the commission. We were so grateful for their support and help in this terrible situation. The industrial relations culture in the Electricity Commission was poisonous, with hard-nosed management facing up to a tough and determined workforce. My union career took off as a result of a determination to stand up for myself and help my mates in the face of a management team schooled in the master-servant relationship. Mateship is such an important element within Australia and in the development of collectivism. A combination of strong individuals operating in the collective interest is a powerful force for the common good. As a rank and file unionist, I was involved in a number of lengthy industrial disputes that placed huge pressure on personal relationships and family finances. I know what it is like not to have enough money to pay the bills. I know what it is like to miss mortgage payments. I know what it is like to depend on the support of other unionists and the community to put food on the table. I know what it is like to have to say no to my kids when I do not have money to give them what they want. This experience has taught me that you must never engage in industrial disputation lightly. The capacity for workers to engage in genuine collective bargaining and industrial action in defence of their wages and conditions or in support of their work mates is an internationally recognised human right and must be enshrined in legislation in this country. We must have real collective bargaining, not collective begging.

My family and I made some wonderful friendships in Muswellbrook with people like the late Noel and June Davies, our next-door neighbours for almost a decade, who treated us like their family. They were a huge help to us when we settled in Muswellbrook. This was our first taste of country Australian hospitality and friendship. My two girls were educated in Muswellbrook and at St Clair High School in the western suburbs of Sydney. I want to thank the teachers of the public education system for giving my girls a great educational base which eventually saw both of them with degrees, one in communications and the other in law. Both of my girls have successful careers, and it was the public education system and the teachers at Muswellbrook and St Clair who were invaluable in preparing them for their careers. Ensuring that public education gets a fair go is fundamental to a modern, internationally competitive economy. Without a well-funded public education system that has modern facilities and talented teachers, our goal of an education revolution will fail.

Public school infrastructure has been sacrificed on the altar of economic rationalism for too long. Many of the problems that we face are due to the lack of modern educational infrastructure, not just computers but school buildings, libraries, sporting facilities and those facilities that make school somewhere that children really want to go. Carrots and sticks and penal provisions will mean nothing unless there is a national program to rehabilitate and modernise our public and poorer private schools. We must move to a needs based system where resources are put where they are needed. Transferring funds from the public system to the private system strikes at the heart of a society based on fairness and social justice. We must make the education pie a lot bigger. For too long our public school teachers and their unions have been demonised for short-term political gain. Teachers have demonstrated their support for their union. They want a collective voice, and we should hear that voice. We must have genuine engagement with teachers and their union. Building a world-class public education system that values teachers and provides parents with as much information as possible should not be beyond our political capacity.

After seven years in the power industry, I was elected as the AMWU organiser for the Hunter Valley/New England region. As the local union organiser I travelled extensively to towns like Barraba, Tamworth, Inverell, Wee Waa, Narrabri, Moree, Coonabarabran and Tenterfield. My 11 years in country New South Wales did not qualify me for cow cocky status, but what it did was open my eyes to the struggles of country life. This has been made much tougher by climate change. I found the bush a great place to work and I met some fantastic people. I am really pleased to renew my relationship with the New England region as a Labor duty senator. I am convinced that my time in the bush perfected my Aussie accent! Fair dinkum!

In 1986 we moved back to Sydney and I took up the position of assistant state secretary in the New South Wales branch of the AMWU. This was a period of significant change in the manufacturing industry, with many companies realising that they could not survive by simply focusing on the domestic market. There was also a realisation that to be internationally competitive companies had to develop business plans and strategies to improve their productive performance. The AMWU determined to campaign not only on industrial issues but on the need to improve the productive performance, quality and on-time delivery of the industry. Following my election as assistant national secretary, I was involved in a number of significant initiatives designed to assist companies and unions to implement international best practice in workplaces. My time on the Australian Manufacturing Council and the Australian Best Practice Program along with businesspeople like Dick Warburton reinforced my view that improving the productive performance of our economy was essential in the face of increasing globalisation. My union, the AMWU, recognises the importance of workplace productivity, product quality, on-time delivery and the introduction of new technology. It is an absolute tragedy that, following the initial period of focusing on sophisticated workplace change programs, changes to the industrial system forced workers onto the defensive and many employers took the easy way out by focusing on short-term cost cutting and absolute management prerogative.

I want to turn briefly to the Australian Building and Construction Commission. The building industry is a tough sector to work in. I spent seven years with responsibility for some of the biggest construction projects in the country. At no time did I detect any entrenched corruption, or violence or intimidation on the part of trade unions or their members. I note that the Cole royal commission also failed to detect any of these things. Building and construction workers swear; they can be uncouth and they are tough, but they are ordinary Australians doing a tough job in what can be extremely trying conditions. I have also met many foul-mouthed, uncouth and tough building employers; it is the nature of the industry. It has been like that for a century and it will be like that in the future.

I have never condoned corruption, violence or intimidation in any walk of life. My stand on this is on the public record. My family and I paid a heavy price when I moved to stamp out any perception of unacceptable conduct within my own union. I was the victim of two vicious assaults and my life was threatened. Following advice from the police and security professionals, Elaine and I were forced to move house and relocate to a more secure home. This was an unprecedented situation, but it was not part of any systemic violence or corruption in the industry or my union. Suggestions to the contrary are merely caricatures.

The ABCC and its powers are antidemocratic and breach the obligations Australia has given voluntarily under International Labour Organisation conventions. It is unacceptable that rank and file union members and their officials can be dragged before a star chamber, interrogated, humiliated and face six months jail for undertaking union activities, which are universally recognised as basic human rights. Australian workers must not face jail for participating in basic trade union activity, the type of activity which is legal in democratic countries around the world. The ABCC is an affront to Australian democracy and 2010 cannot come quickly enough. We will then see the end of this secretive throwback to the days of penal powers and the suppression of workers’ rights. In the meantime, I am committed to making inquiries in the Senate, in the party room and with ordinary workers into the operation of the ABCC. A light must be shone on this organisation to ensure that it operates in a manner consistent with basic Australian values and Australia’s treaty obligations under ILO conventions.

I hope my time in the Senate will allow me to contribute to building a good society, a better society, a sustainable society and a society that stands out as a beacon of democracy and equality to the rest of the world. I want a society that is underpinned by social democracy and human dignity. I want a society based on liberty and the protection of the weak against the powerful. I want a society that values peace and diplomacy over war and aggression.

At this point, I want to acknowledge the members of the great Australian trade union movement, especially the tens of thousands of rank and file delegates who play a leadership role in defending and promoting workers’ rights in workplaces around the country. It has been an honour and privilege to represent Australian workers as a rank and file delegate and as a full-time union official. The fight for decent wages and conditions, dignity at work, equity and justice is a fight that I will continue on behalf of working people.

I particularly want to acknowledge and thank the members, staff and officials of the AMWU for their support. The AMWU is a great Australian union. It has been at the forefront of the campaigns to advance the wages and conditions and democratic rights of working class Australians. The AMWU has always recognised the importance of the political process to the wellbeing of its members and the wider Australian community. Issues such as peace, taxation, environmental sustainability, fair trade, health and education are only some of the issues the trade union movement must continue to engage in on behalf of its members. To AMWU members I say: Thank you for the support you have given me. For all working people, while I am in the Senate your struggles will be my struggles. I will be a voice on key issues that affect you, your families and your communities.

I want to acknowledge and thank the members and officers of the Australian Labor Party for their support and for their determination to build a better Australia. We now have an opportunity to restore a proper balance between the market and society. As the economic debate goes on, we must never forget that markets are a tool. They are a means to an end. Markets can help deliver prosperity, security and equity. They are not an end in themselves. The goals of markets are narrow; they are concerned with material wellbeing. On their own they cannot deliver broader goals of social justice. When markets fail to carry out their basic functions or threaten basic values of social justice and democracy, it is up to us to intervene. I do not believe there are market solutions to market failure.

With this in mind, and with the planet-threatening challenge of global warming, it can be all too easy to become negative and despondent. I am an optimist. I must be because my children and grandchildren will be around for a long time after I am gone and they will face the reality of our action or inaction. We must build for them a strong and internationally competitive Australia based on social democratic values—a society of environmental sustainability and of peace, tolerance and opportunity. This requires a new social contract between government, business, workers and the public. It will require us to meet the challenges of environmental sustainability by building the new industries based on renewable energy technologies. Manufacturing industries based on solar thermal power, solar photovoltaic energy, wind, biomass, geothermal energy, wave energy and tidal energy are only some of the emerging technologies that we must develop as our industries of the future.

I am so pleased that the AMWU has continued to take a long-term and progressive approach to the issue of global warming. Recognising the inevitability of structural change is sometimes very difficult, and the AMWU’s recent decision to use the challenge of climate change as an opportunity to build new industries and new jobs is courageous and commendable.

In closing, I want to thank a number of friends who have been of invaluable assistance to me. Bob Adamson, my friend and mentor, thank you. Gene Cooney, one of my delegates at Liddell Power Station, thank you for your help and friendship over many years. Julius Roe, one of the most talented and hardworking unionists in the country and one of the best friends anyone could have, thank you. Dave Oliver, AMWU National Secretary, good luck in one of the best jobs in the country. Paul Bastian and the AMWU state secretaries, thank you for your support and comradeship.

To Bill Kelty, one of the most influential trade unionists ever: thank you for your words of support. Laurie Carmichael, a legend of the trade union movement and still an inspirational friend and adviser, thank you. To Jeff Lawrence, Sharan Burrow and the staff of the ACTU: thank you. To Greg Combet: thank you for your support and friendship. To my excellent staff: thank you. To my friends who are here—Albo, Jenny and the rest of you: thank you.

To my family: I love you all so very much. Thank you for the sacrifices you have made on my behalf. Lynn and Rick, Fiona and Perry, thank you for being such a great family. To my two beautiful grandchildren, Amy and Scott: you are wonderful and fill my life with joy. To my darling wife, Elaine: life with me is never easy. Without your love, understanding and support my journey would have been so much harder; in fact, it would have been impossible. And to the Australian nation I am forever indebted.

John Hogg (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Before I call Senator Hanson-Young, I remind honourable senators that this is her first speech. I, therefore, ask that the usual courtesies be extended to her.

Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr President. It is a great honour to be standing here today, not just in this remarkable place that is the Senate but at a time when the challenges that we face as a country and the decisions that we will make as representatives are more important than ever in determining the destiny of future generations.

Today is the first day of spring, a day when we pull back the curtains and let the sun shine in after months of grey. May this spring mark the beginning of a new phase in Australia’s history where fresh ideas and innovation are actively sourced and debated in an attempt to find solutions to our biggest challenge of all: balancing human needs with our finite and fragile environment. May this, the first day of spring, mark the time when we as Australians shake off those cobwebs of cynicism and distrust. It is a time to bring out the broom and sweep up the mess left after years of inaction, mindless consumerism and self-perpetuating fear.

The reality is, in our rapidly growing world, that the human impact on the earth is compounding to a point of no return and the gap between the world’s richest and the world’s poorest is getting wider. We have been taught, against our better judgement, to fear our neighbours for no other reason than that we do not know them. Can we not see that this is a world that is not sustainable? We need a transformation and a willingness to do things differently. We need to intervene and to change ‘business as usual’—to change from business as usual to a country where we can take responsibility for our impact on the global effects of climate change; to change from business as usual to a community where those who are most vulnerable do not carry the burden for those more prosperous; and to change from business as usual to a parliament that is engaged with all sectors of the community and where as representatives we offer true leadership, with the compassion and honesty that our constituents so rightly deserve and expect.

I am humbled to have been elected by the people of South Australia, who have put their trust in me. I promise to work hard for a change in the legislative agenda from one of vested interests and short-term gain to an agenda focused on community, long-term sustainability and the health of our children and our environment. I am honoured that the Australian Greens’ members and supporters have believed in me and have practised what we preach: a new, fresh style of politics, which has given a voice to a generation who will live long into this century and experience all that it brings.

Mr President, I do not come from a family with a history in politics. There are no streets named after my grandparents and there was never an expectation that a political career was something to which I should aspire. But I do come from a family who are passionate about the world they live in, and from parents who have always been engaged and active in their local community. I grew up in the bush—I am a kid from the bush—and, through that, I have an innate understanding that the health of our environment is connected to the health of our community. My parents, who are here today, have taught me to always stand up for what I believe in, but also to accept that not everyone will think what I think or believe in what I say, and that in order to bring people with you it is important to find a common point of understanding and respect. Mum and Dad: I am sure they are lessons that will become very useful in this place.

Despite always being an active member of my school and my town, I never thought that one day I would be standing in this chamber giving my first speech. As a kid there seemed very little to believe in when it came to politicians and their parties. Most of it seemed much like what I witnessed in the schoolyard—games and tricks played among those who sought power and privilege. So even though aspects of representing my community appealed to me I never wanted to become what I saw as a stereotypical politician.

I aspired to do and to be something quite different from that. I aspire to a change to ‘business as usual’—a change that would see all types of people represented in our parliaments, a change to the way our representatives engage with their electors and a change so that Australians and Australia would honour and believe in our remarkable system of democracy. We should feel a sense of pride. We should all feel empowered that this is our parliament, where the individuals trusted to make decisions on behalf of society will do so in the best interest of the community rather than pandering to big business or corporations. What do I mean by community? I mean the people and the environment in which they live. These are still things I aspire to and things I will strive for inside and outside this chamber.

I stand here today as a young woman and there is something I would like to speak about just for a moment. We are now more than a century into our country’s parliamentary history, yet the number of women in politics is far outweighed by the number of men. If our parliament’s role is to lead our progression as a community we must find ways of ensuring a more balanced participation of women in our political processes. There are many reasons for this gender imbalance and none is more stifling than the structures and culture of our political institutions themselves. One may argue that this is simply a reflection of our society, where women and girls still have to fight for equal treatment and recognition in the workplace, and where the extra roles women play in life are simply taken for granted rather than supported and celebrated.

Women and their families are too often caught between the mounting pressure of workplace participation and the care of children. Is it not time for a shift in the way we value the role of parenting and for us to support the needs of families within our workplaces, our communities and even our parliament? Australia lags behind the rest of the world in being one of only two developed countries without paid maternity leave. It is time that Australia introduced a government funded, paid parental leave system to support our mums and dads and their kids. It is time for the government to recognise the crucial role that parents play in ensuring we have a healthy and happy next generation and that we support this role. Paid parental leave will give our kids the best start to life. It is an investment for the future too precious to ignore.

So how did I, as a young mother, start my journey to Canberra? The tipping point for me was the way our country so poorly treated refugees and asylum seekers. I was appalled that here in the land of a fair go we punished and violated those people who needed our protection and safety. I still shiver when I remember the images of children with their lips sewn together, who, in desperation for understanding and help, had no other means of communication but the mutilation of their own bodies. I was disgusted that our government was perpetrating the fear of innocent children in the display of political might. A strong sense of rage fuelled me to take action and I felt compelled to join the Australian Greens, who had stood strongly against the disgrace that was the Tampa. Some parties used the Tampa to score political points but the Greens knew that was wrong.

Now, several years later, we are starting to see some positive changes and for that I do give credit. But we cannot simply turn over that ugly page of Australia’s history or close our eyes to the lifelong effects of being locked up behind razor wire. The psychological harm of long-term detention, particularly when it comes to children, must not be swept under the carpet. We must face the fact that these children were denied a safe, healthy and joyful childhood—an opportunity that we would expect as a given for our own children. We must admit that this was a mistake that should never, ever happen again. We must make due compensation and provide support for those who have been wrongly treated.

I also stand here today at the age of 26 well aware that I am the youngest person elected to this place. This is a responsibility I relish and in which I take great pride. Younger Australians must be active in shaping our country and its fortunes. A senior journalist said something to me recently that made me realise how important as a young person my role in parliament is. He said, ‘I don’t mind if 20-somethings have jobs; I just don’t think they should be running the country.’ Is that not an example of the barriers placed in front of young people and the barriers placed in front of young women? Can I just point out that it is a statement I utterly reject. I have great delight that the voters do not share the same view as that senior journalist. Young people have a wonderful ability to effect social and environmental change by providing new ideas and creative solutions. It is young people who must champion these solutions to see them succeed in the long term.

Just as the first day of spring brings with it the hope of a fresh new season I hope I can contribute to fresh thinking and innovation, particularly from young people who want to forge their own paths in helping to address the challenges of climate change and the need for us to shift from business as usual. At the last election, South Australia voted in its very first Greens senator. Perhaps this was because for far too long the environment has languished at the bottom of the political agenda even though ordinary people consistently put environmental issues at the top of their concerns. This is yet another area in which we must challenge business as usual. We need a fresh approach and an understanding that the decisions we make today will impact on the future of our communities, the sustainability of our environment and the lives of our children and our grandchildren. Simply put, this is what the Greens stand for.

Today is the first day of spring and hopefully with it will come the spring rains, which are much needed for the many parched regions across the country, particularly in my home state of South Australia. The current crisis facing the River Murray is a tragic example of how we must better understand and respect the vital balance between the environment and the economy. Praying for rain will not solve the mess created by human mismanagement. Overallocation of water use spanning decades has left the once mighty Murray dying of thirst. How fitting that as I draw to a close I am thinking about the Coorong, at the end of the Murray. This beautiful lagoon is of deep significance to the Ngarrindjeri people and cherished by South Australians as Storm Boy country. Without urgent action, all of this could fade away into history as the Murray’s freshwater flows no longer reach its mouth.

Finally, I just want to reiterate why I am standing up here today as the youngest woman ever elected to this place and the youngest person elected in almost a century. I am standing up for the young people of Australia and for generations to come. I am standing up to say, ‘Let’s challenge “business as usual”.’ I am standing up for the rural community in which I grew up—and hundreds of others like it. I am standing up for women, especially young women in Australia, and saying, ‘We too have a right to be heard.’ I am standing up and saying that we need to build an Australia based on caring for those less privileged in our society, like the refugees and the asylum seekers that so deeply affected me. I stand up to recognise that Australia can make the transition from a resource-dependent economy to a clean, green and clever economy that puts respect for each other and respect for the environment at the centre of politics. I am standing here today, standing up for the Murray and the precious Coorong.

In order to achieve a change from ‘business as usual’, we must accept that there is an inseparable connection between the way we treat our environment and the way we treat each other. We must accept that there is a connection between how we share the earth’s resources between nations, how we share the environment with the creatures that depend upon it and how we value the health and security of our communities.

As a mother I feel a profound responsibility to ensure my actions and my decisions take into account my daughter’s future. I feel deeply that I must work for a cleaner, greener and more secure planet. I have no other choice but to ensure that I work as hard as I can to help make my local community and my global community a safer, fairer and prosperous place. That is my job as a mother and now it is my job as a senator. Thank you.

John Hogg (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Before I call Senator Feeney, I remind honourable senators that this is his first speech. I, therefore, ask that the usual courtesies be extended to him.

David Feeney (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a great pleasure to rise for the first time in this place as a senator for Victoria. Mr President, I take this opportunity to congratulate you on your elevation to your new position. I am sure that your wisdom and experience will be appreciated by all honourable senators over the course of this parliament. As I have now known you for several years, you may rest assured that I will draw upon that bank of wisdom and experience as often as I am permitted.

In considering the extraordinary honour and privilege that has been bestowed upon me in representing the state of Victoria in this place, I am reminded of the words of Sir Isaac Newton: ‘If I have seen farther, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.’ I do not agree with everything or, indeed, many things that John Howard said but there is one aspect on which I do. He said:

... I never forget what I owe to the Liberal Party any more than anybody on the other side should ever forget what they owe to the Labor Party ... I despise those people who throw dirt in the faces of the people who brought them into public prominence.

Hear, hear! I am only here because of the trust and faith placed in me by the Australian Labor Party, its members and affiliated unions and, most importantly, its millions of supporters in Victoria. I serve at their pleasure.

It is only natural for me, upon finding myself in this place, to reflect upon the personal journey that has brought me here—on the principles and beliefs that have motivated and guided me and on the reservoirs of support, friendship and love that have sustained me. Mother Teresa said, ‘Love begins at home,’ and for me that has always been true. My parents, Margaret and Ian Feeney, separated when I was young, and as each happily remarried—to Basil Varghese and Lynn Feeney respectively—I was spoilt and blessed with four loving parents. I am delighted that my grandparents George and Joyce Ringer are here today. My grandfather served his country in World War II, and together my grandparents raised an extraordinary family. Basil and his family have always welcomed me into their hearts, and I am proud to be the ‘white sheep’ of the Varghese family.

While none of my family have been hitherto involved in formal politics, I can assure the house they are all intensely political. I have always understood that, if I could survive a family discussion concerning politics, religion or civil society, I might—just might—survive in the ALP. The values that have led me to this place were instilled in me by a loving home, a loving family and, of course, my own experiences. I enjoyed a terrific education at Mercedes College in Adelaide during the 1970s and early 1980s. It was a different era, an era when Malcolm Fraser voted Liberal!

I joined the ALP quite by chance. A great friend of mine, George Karzis, encouraged me to join the Labor Club during the 1988 O Week at Adelaide university. I joined every club in which I had a remote interest, but again and again I found it was the Labor Club that most fascinated me. I joined the ALP itself, and the first campaign I worked on was the Adelaide by-election in 1988—when I might say the party fielded a first-class candidate in Don Farrell. I had always been an ALP supporter, and at university I became an ALP activist. Indeed, at Melbourne university I came to believe that my studies were an irritating distraction from my far more important political activity! I only appreciated later, during my postgraduate studies, that in fact my time at university was a precious educational opportunity. I am reminded of the saying, ‘Youth is wasted on the young.’ I made many lifelong friends while I was at university, and many of them have remained active in politics and important people in my life. I am thrilled to find several of them serving with me in the Rudd Labor government, including Richard Marles, Stephen Conroy and Michael Danby.

The values that led me to the ALP and guided me in my political life have been a belief in justice, equality of opportunity for all men and women, the fundamental human rights of us all and the need to eliminate discrimination wherever it is found, whether it be discrimination based on race, gender, sexuality, religion or belief. While I have remained a dedicated supporter of the pragmatic wing of the ALP, let no-one imagine that I lack a passion for change. In supporting my values, and the values of the ALP, I strive to make change a friend and not an enemy. As everyone here by now is aware, change is the new commodity in politics. I do believe that when we change the government we change the country. While effective change in Australia is always a practical and prudent path, the election of the Rudd Labor government has changed the trajectory of our nation. I embrace that change and the opportunities now found in this new national trajectory.

I spent five years of my life as a federal industrial officer of the Transport Workers Union of Australia. In its members, in its history and traditions and in its delegates and officials, the TWU is a truly magnificent institution. In serving the members of the TWU, I was afforded a unique opportunity. I would like to pay tribute to the men who placed their trust in me and with whom I worked: then Federal Secretary John Allan, then Federal President Steve Hutchins, Alex Gallacher, Craig Shannon, Tony Sheldon and particularly the officials of the Victorian TWU, Bill Noonan and Wayne Mader. I am honoured that Howard and Felicity Smith are here today.

The Australian union movement endured a lot of stick from those opposite over the past 11 years, but unions remain a strong force for fairness and justice in our civil society. Prime Minister John Howard made it his life’s work to destroy the unions, just as Stanley Bruce did in the 1920s. Both of those gentlemen finished up losing their seats and the trade union movement has survived. I believe the great majority of Australians, including those who do not belong to a union, nonetheless know the unions stand for working Australians and their families and for the defence of their jobs, their rights at work and their standards of living. I have enjoyed the support of senior union leaders during my career, as both a union and a party official, and I would like to acknowledge them: Jeff Jackson and Kathy Jackson of the Health Services Union; Bill Shorten, Cesar Melhem, Michael Borowick, Paul Howes, David Cragg, Michael Eagles, Bob Smith, Dick Gray and Ben Davis of the AWU; Michael Donovan of the SDA; and Russell Atwood of the ASU. I would like to thank the members and officials of those unions as well—that is, those people who make possible their work, who sustain and are sustained by that work. I am reminded of Lily Coy, life member of the Health Services Union.

For me, the values of justice and equality are paramount. Christ says, at Matthew 25:40, ‘In so far as you did this to one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did it to me.’ A major challenge facing the Rudd government will be reversing the drift towards greater inequality that characterised the 11 years of the Howard government. The gap between high-income earners and low-income earners is steadily widening and steadily worsening. I am not an old-fashioned socialist. I do not want to see everyone having the same income or enjoying the same standard of living. Our system recognises and rewards enterprise, and that is a good thing. I do not believe in equality of outcome, but I do believe in equality of opportunity. The stability and health of our magnificent society depends upon the maintenance of the principle of equality of opportunity. I do not want to see Australia move any further towards a society in which we have a small class of super rich and a large class of struggling battlers who can never hope for a higher standard of living for themselves or their children. I want to see an Australia in which good health care, higher education, homeownership and a secure retirement are all within the reach of every Australian.

All those things became harder for many Australians to attain during the years of the Howard government. Between 1996 and 2006, for example, the proportion of Australians who owned their own home fell from 41 to 33 per cent and the proportion of median family income that homebuyers were paying on their mortgages rose from 28 to 37 per cent. Today fewer Australians can afford to buy their own homes and more Australians have gone deeper into debt trying to do so. Indeed, our slide into becoming a nation of debtors is striking. We must not become a nation of wage slaves. During the Howard years debt as a percentage of income rose to 160 per cent, so the average Australian now has debts amounting to 1.6 years of their total income. The household savings ratio fell to 0.2 per cent, meaning that Australians are now saving virtually nothing. It is all going into consumption, usually financed by debt. And, as we are seeing in the US at present, this is a recipe for disaster in the long run.

In education we have seen the stalling of the remarkable progress made during the Hawke-Keating years. Under Hawke and Keating, thanks to Labor’s needs based school funding policy school retention rates to year 12 rose sharply. Under Howard that rate stagnated. The proportion of Australians in tertiary education rose from eight per cent in 1983 to 12 per cent in 1996. And it is still 12 per cent today, thanks to cuts in university funding and mounting HECS debts. Our universities have been forced to become commercial operations and they have pursued fee-paying overseas students at the expense of Australian school leavers.

In health we need to end the scandal of three billion tax dollars a year being handed over to the private insurance industry—a handout that has done nothing to reduce the pressure on our public hospitals. For all this vast subsidy, the proportion of Australians who have private health cover rose during the Howard years only from 34 to 44 per cent. And most of the new purchasers were well-off people who bought a cheap policy to avoid the government’s tax surcharge. That is to say, the private health insurance industry has been grown with conscripts not volunteers.

I have always been an admirer of Chaim Herzog, the sixth President of Israel. He was born—like my father—in Belfast and was a founder of the Israeli Labour Party. In addressing the UN, to denounce the two great evils which menace society in general, Chaim said:

I come here to denounce the two great evils which menace society in general and a society of nations in particular. These two great evils are hatred and ignorance.

I hope to make a contribution to the best of my ability in that struggle against hatred and ignorance. The spectre of racism and an irrational fear of the ‘other’ has from time to time haunted our country. Such a fear was unleashed in this country in recent years, damaging our civil society and the psyche of our nation. I hope we may now work together on Australia’s new trajectory and seek peace, reconciliation and tolerance.

It is my ambition to be an effective legislator. The Senate does have a distinct collegiate culture and I hope that through intelligent and proper use of our Senate committee system we will play our proper role. I happen to believe in bicameralism, although I can well understand why so many people called for the Senate’s abolition after the abuse of its powers in 1975. If we are to have an upper house, it can only justify its existence by being a genuine house of review. It cannot become a house of obstruction, as it was in 1975, nor can it be a mere rubber stamp for the government of the day as it has been over the past three years. We must hold governments to account but we must not thwart the right of the majority in the House of Representatives to govern. So it is alarming and disappointing to see that those opposite are now treading the same dangerous path their predecessors trod in 1974 and 1975, threatening the integrity of the Labor government’s first budget by blocking important measures such as the tax on luxury cars. As in 1974, a weak opposition leader is propping up his leadership with cynical, short-term populism.

I am very proud to be a Victorian. We are a federation and despite the centralising trends of recent times, the states retain their individual identities and their differing points of view. I was elected as a senator for Victoria and, within the context of my loyalty to my party and my loyalty to the Rudd government, I intend to speak up for Victoria’s interests when I believe it is right and proper to do so.

In the last decade Victoria has enjoyed strong growth and strong prosperity, and I pay tribute to Premiers Steve Bracks and John Brumby and their first-class governments. Melbourne is today a thriving, confident, cosmopolitan city. Rural and regional Victoria is thriving, with new infrastructure and investment. Notwithstanding the challenges, Victoria’s resurgence is the fruit of the enterprise of its people, Victorian companies and entrepreneurs, Victorian schools and universities, Victorian communities, Victorian workers and Victorian unions.

Victoria remains Australia’s manufacturing heartland, and I believe that it is now emerging as Australia’s cultural, intellectual and educational heartland as well. It is striking that Victoria has achieved this recovery in the face of continuing economic discrimination by the Commonwealth in the distribution of grants. For decades Victoria, and to a lesser extent New South Wales, have been subsidising the other states and territories. For every dollar raised by the GST in Victoria, only 91c comes back to Victoria as Commonwealth grants. That is, Victorian taxpayers contribute $1 billion a year to the budgets of the other states and territories so that they may cut their taxes and lure businesses and jobs away from Victoria. And the remarkable thing is that this arrangement was set in stone while a Victorian served as Australia’s federal Treasurer.

I know I come here with something of a reputation as a Labor machine man. I make no apologies for that. In serving as the ALP campaign director in Victoria and South Australia and as the deputy national campaign director last year, I have made a contribution towards getting Labor governments elected and re-elected. I would like to pay tribute to the men and women of the ALP, its members and officials, upon whom I have so often depended. I would like to particularly thank Steve Bracks, Mike Rann, Tim Pallas, Sharon McCrohan, Tim Gartrell, Elias Hallaj, Nick Reece, Tom Cargill, Robin Scott, the officials of the South Australian and Victorian branches of the ALP, and the National Secretariat of the ALP. Party officials are a dedicated and talented class in Australian politics on all sides. They endure much in the hope that they may achieve much. I am proud to have been one of them.

I would also like to thank my staff who, like me, have enjoyed the whirlwind since 1 July and upon whom I have come to rely with confidence: Stephen Donnelly, Dr Adam Carr, Amanda Boyd and Lambros Tapinos. Finally, I would like to acknowledge my wife, Liberty Sanger. Marrying her remains the single greatest honour ever bestowed upon me. And it will ever be thus.