Condolence

Hall, Mr Raymond Steele

The Hon. V.A. TARZIA (Hartley) (14:41): We clearly have lost an absolute legend of South Australian politics in Steele Hall, the 36^th Premier, three years in the Senate, the member for Boothby for an extended period of time—a career in the parliament of some 33 years. He was a man who had a deep conviction. We have heard the stories on what it took to achieve that concept of one vote, one value. He was a man of fairness, a man of equity, a man of principle. These principles, of course, were at the forefront of everything that he did. In fact, he embodied the word 'principled', being such a legend of South Australian politics. His legacy continues to live on in the state.

We have heard about electoral reform, we have heard about reforms regarding health, we have heard about reforms regarding water and the arts in regard to the Adelaide Festival Centre. He also continues to inspire South Australians, South Australian politicians, to do what is right, to do what is right in the face of adversity even if sometimes in the short term that is going to take political capital to be lost.

It was a real privilege to be able to help commission a portrait that has been referred to of Steele Hall that is proudly now displayed in the south-western corner of this building. Every single time students walk past that portrait and every single time residents walk past that portrait and every single time that one of us walks past that portrait, we will be reminded of the legend that Steele Hall was.

My sincere condolences go to Joan and Steele's family and friends. Like the member for Morialta, many of my constituents will often remark about Joan and the late Steele and the contribution they made to this state. His memory will continue to live on long into the future. May he rest in peace.

Ms PRATT (Frome) (14:43): In speaking to this condolence motion for the late Steele Hall, I rise to acknowledge a titan of Liberal politics, a man who cut across both state and federal lines and who reformed the system that changed the course of state politics forever. Steele Hall was a politician of great conviction and brought courageous reforms to the political system which we recognise today. His sense of duty and his commitment to service above self, to put the state's interests above his own, was the mark of the man, and that resonated throughout his years in the state parliament as the member for Gouger from 1959 until 1973 and then through a redistribution which saw him elected as the member for Goyder from 1973 until 1974.

Born on 28 November 1928 at the Balaklava Hospital, which I am proud to say is still going strong, he grew up on a mixed farm at Owen. Raymond Steele Hall began a farming life that many of my colleagues can relate to in our own circumstances, being born locally at the hospital in the local town, going to the local primary school, sharing farmland across extended family, being involved in local progress associations, and learning at an early age what it means to give back to your community.

I have the privilege, and it is a great privilege, to represent those very same communities of Owen, Grace Plains, Pinery and Balaklava, and I can say without exception that that altruism and that sense of community service are alive and well. These communities are still particularly well represented today by an Owen local resident, our mayor Rodney Reid.

When I was little, I did not know too many country road names. GPS did not exist, and our navigational landmarks were unnamed back roads and long black tree stumps, and the triangle paddock and salt lakes and water pipes. But I did know the Nine Mile, that long stretch of road that cut through the farming heartland of Owen and Grace Plains, and it is the same road that was scorched on that apocalyptic day of the Pinery fire. That road is now known as Traeger Road, and it runs past the Hall family land.

Family reflections of this farming period being shared at the local level include, no surprise, another Hall personality, namely Doug Hall, who, of most notable fame, is the secretary of the Balaklava Racing Club and that award-winning cup day that we are all familiar with. On Steele's passing, Doug has noted that his own father, Murray, a cousin to Steele, farmed at Grace Plains and had a great respect for Steele. As a young man, he would call Murray up for advice and guidance in all matters farming.

As a very young boy, Steele and his peers attended Owen Primary School, which led on to Balaklava High School and subsequently many other adventures, including the generational livelihood of being a wheat and sheep farmer. Steele had a number of different farming enterprises during his younger years, which included breeding turkeys and building that flock to 20,000 birds. He also expanded into medic clover harvesting, a low-lying crop that took weeks to reap due to the cumbersome machinery requirements that meant the harvester be run at a walking pace—heaven forbid.

During the era of ag bureaus and Rural Youth—and in preparing my remarks I have discovered that the very first rally of Rural Youth was in fact held at Balaklava—it is no surprise that in 1953 or thereabouts, Steele found himself an active member of the Gouger Young Liberal Movement, and went on to become the Gouger Young Liberal secretary. At the youthful age of 30, in 1959, he fended off about 10 preselection contenders and was on track to be elected as the member for Gouger, not, of course, before some contention was resolved about the results.

One preselection candidate, Mr Ira Parker—another significant Balaklava local with a nursing home named after him now—received 49 per cent of the vote, and so a countback was done on preferences, which saw Steele preselected. It would have made for interesting family dynamics, as I am told that Steele's younger brother, John, was engaged to Ira Parker's daughter, Verna, at the time. With the dust settled on that preselection, an electoral victory in Gouger, and Premier Playford's retirement seven years later, Hall found himself Leader of the Opposition in 1966. By 1968, his star really was rising when he became the 36^th Premier of South Australia.

When we think of political titans on the global stage, we are quick to recognise unique monikers from famous leaders in the US or the UK, like 'JFK', 'LBJ', 'FDR', 'Ike', 'Dubya' or, across the pond, 'British Bulldog' and 'Iron Lady'. On the Australian front, of course, we are more familiar as political tragics with 'The Little Digger'—you have to cast your mind back a bit—'The Silver Bodgie' and 'Kevin 07'.

In 1959, South Australian politics was introduced to 'Tin Shed'. Have a think about it—Steele Hall; Tin Shed. I will wait for you to catch up. Modern nicknames in politics are rarely kind or well-meaning, but for a country boy from a wheat farm in the Mid North what better reduction of the imposing name of Steele Hall than Tin Shed.

His commitment to service and the state's interests was evident throughout his tenure. Steele's legacy includes electoral reform, women's health, Aboriginal affairs and the fluoridation of South Australia's water supply, and it is appropriate that all of the speakers today touch and expand on those elements. I have been pleased to expand on a more personal and local level on Steele's life. He also played a pivotal role, of course, in determining Adelaide's Festival Centre site and negotiating financial support from the commonwealth.

Today, by coincidence we are joined by some young year 10 work experience country students who are listening to our remarks. I wonder, what might young people see when they look at us and our profession? What are our responsibilities as custodians of this house, and do we work hard every day to leave it better than we found it? What legacy does Premier Steele Hall leave behind for the next generation?

Young men and women who live in regional South Australia should look to their own local members of parliament and understand that there is a pathway for them to follow us to this hallowed place, not just to serve but to lead. Our party has a proud tradition of country Liberal MPs becoming Premier, like Playford, Hall, Olsen and Kerin.

On behalf of the Liberal opposition, I wish to pass on my condolences to Steele's wife, my friend and supporter, Joan Hall, former member for Coles, along with Steele's children and grandchildren. I make special mention of Alexia, who I know has been by her mom's side all the way. Extended family are also grieving, and I make special mention of Steele's brother, John Hall, who lives in Port Vincent with his wife, Verna, and John's son, Jason.

I am truly proud of Steele Hall's service to our state and the leadership he offered through his years of service, and this recognition is well deserved. Members in the other place have chosen to proffer new names for the electorate that I represent. While that will be a matter for the Electoral Commissioner, I certainly do not hesitate to proudly recommend that, in line with former premiers Playford and Dunstan, consideration be given to this great man in the renaming of a future electorate the seat of Hall. Vale.

Mr PATTERSON (Morphett) (14:52): I would also like to take the time in parliament to recognise the passing of Steele Hall and also his commitment to South Australia, to this parliament in general, and to his family. As has been said, he truly was a giant of South Australian politics, and the fact that so many of his colleagues are here to recognise this condolence motion moved by the now Premier speaks volumes about him as a man.

As I said, he is a giant of SA politics. He is the only Australian to serve as Premier of a state as well as three different legislatures in the country. First elected here to the South Australian parliament as the member for Gouger back in 1959, he served that community with great distinction, going on to become the 36^th Premier of this state. We have heard his achievements, and really it speaks a lot to his integrity and also his political courage. What is most obviously remembered during the course of this remembrance is his work in electoral reforms and what he did to value democracy, which we all aspire to, and his recognition of one vote, one value.

In his term of office, he also saw significant progress in other areas such as women's health, Aboriginal affairs and also the fluoridation of South Australia's water supply. And, yes, it was controversial at the time, but it has certainly led to significant dental health improvements for those who have had the benefit. I remember as a young boy going along to the dental clinic at school, doing the checkup and having lots of plaque show up on the teeth. I probably was not brushing my teeth as well as I should have. But I still have a very good set of teeth, so I think Steele certainly had something to do with that.

As I said, Steele served in three different legislatures, including the Senate of Australia. It was quite a tumultuous time in federal politics. He was elected in the double dissolution election in 1974 and served for three years in that Senate. During that time, he was very influential because he held the balance of power. It was such a fine balance between Liberal and Labor representation in the Senate, and he held that balance of power.

Of course, he also served in the House of Representatives in the seat of Boothby from 1981 to 1986. Boothby is the federal seat which takes in so much of Morphett. As I have heard stories of his integrity and political courage and what he stood for, I thought it worth recalling again another display of his political courage in the federal parliaments.

In March 1986, Steele Hall was alarmed by trade practices legislation, which he saw as assisting Robert Holmes à Court's attempt to take over BHP. The second reading of the bill was carried on the voices, but Hall requested that his lone, dissident voice against the measure be recorded. That says a lot about him rather than just allowing it to go through on the voices. He wanted his position to be put on the record so that people knew where he stood on that. Again, I think that is another reason to remind us to stick to our values and our principles.

Of course, yes, we are parliamentarians, we represent our community, but there is also the family that stands behind you. In the 1970s Steele met his wife, Joan, and they married in 1978. It is through Joan that I got to know Steele in person. Joan was kind enough to help me in my campaign back in 2018. At that stage, while Steele's health might have been failing him, he was still very active and he came out to help me on the campaign trail once, and it was great. He was there, and people remembered him fondly—so, again, not only his parliamentary colleagues but also the people he represented remembered him very well.

To Joan, thank you for introducing me personally to Steele. He was a man of integrity. You cared for him through to his last days. We remember with a great deal of care, and also pass on our sympathies to you, your children and your grandchildren. We remember Steele very fondly. Vale Steele.

Mr TEAGUE (Heysen) (14:57): To Joan and to all the family, our condolences. We are here doing our best to remember Steele with affection and, as the contributions so far have done, to put on the record some matters of substance along the way. We are remembering a great man and human being, and reference has been made to that 2019 Hannaford portrait that sits just outside the chamber, well that it is, and well that it is a portrait of Steele at the peak of his powers. This is a portrait of a man who was on the stage of the South Australian state parliament at the time of the portrait, and I reflect a bit on the values that drove the person who comes through Hannaford's great skills in a moment.

Back in June 1968, The Australian had this to say about the contenders, and this was focused on Steele. There are a couple of pieces. Mungo McCallum wrote:

South Australia's two parliamentary leaders are young looking, tanned and handsome, and neither would look out of place in a Gary Cooper style Western.

Both are enormously accessible to Press and public and eager to talk about themselves and their aims.

But there the resemblance ends. Mr Don Dunstan, the lawyer, is a cool, sophisticated political theorist, a complex intellectual who reads widely and corresponds with men who share his views around the world.

Mr Steele Hall, the farmer, is a friendly, relaxed man who tends to play politics by ear and is frank almost to the point of naivety. It seems a paradox that he is the Liberal, and Mr Dunstan is the Labor man.

Mr Steele Hall (his first name is Raymond, but he prefers to drop it) is almost embarrassingly easy to talk to.

And he goes on. It is a point that ought to be made in this context because he could be, and perhaps should be, referred to as the Hon. Steele Hall, but he declined that title; in fact, he positively requested it be removed, and he is correctly described in terms of the condolence motion. I have the letter. He said, 'Thanks, but no thanks. I won't be the Hon. Steele Hall. I am Mr Raymond Steele Hall, thank you,' and there he was.

It is good to reflect on some of the particulars. A great leader is remembered for the things that they do—the practical things that they do—but, more than that, what comes through is where someone is leading driven by their values first and foremost, and that is displayed by taking courageous decisions at one's cost and finding one's self in multiple legislatures for various reasons because you cut straight through to where you think things ought to be, and that has consequences. There is a model for public service. There is a model for leadership. There is a model for public life.

It inspires an analysis of the values. We often talk about the fact that the Liberal Party brings together a broad church of values: the values of conservatism, liberalism and what has been recently described in writing as regional interests. Steele embodied those values so very well. He was ably personifying Liberal values as he was at the peak of his powers only a few short years after he entered state parliament at the age of 30.

The member for West Torrens has reflected on Steele's contribution to what was a very serious debate that occupied the public mind in the eighties. I know a bit about that and, indeed, it is right that it is recognised. That contribution at that time, that demonstration of values, stands the test of time and that legacy only grows subsequently.

I want to perhaps focus on the electoral reform aspect as a means of demonstrating how those values resonate into the present. Just almost exactly a week ago in another place down the road, spontaneously, in the wake of Steele's passing just days before, those appearing before the Boundaries Commission found themselves reflecting on Steele's contribution to electoral reform and then, in a rather spontaneous way, coming to a view that it would be entirely appropriate to recognise Steele and his contribution by naming one of the electoral districts after him, because what a remarkable display of values it was when Steele, as Premier, said, 'I'm going to lead the way to a better, fairer electoral system.'

Steele did so at his cost; that is uncontroversial. What was controversial was how people within his own party felt about it at the time and what he had to encounter as a result. There is no indication that it fazed him at all. He was right to support the expansion of the number of electoral districts in the House of Assembly, and it has been a significant contribution to electoral fairness.

The Playmander is often referred to as a gerrymander. It is not, of course. It is a malapportionment. That malapportionment was what needed to be addressed so that we did end up in a situation where we have electoral districts with the same number of electors. That was not the end of the electoral reform challenge, of course. You have to keep working on ensuring that the will of the electors across the state is properly reflected on the floor of the parliament. There is no doubt that was an era of significant reform led by Steele Hall and carried on throughout the course of the decade to follow.

I reflect on Steele's life going back to his entry into the state parliament at the age of 30, the Steele Hall that is reflected in the Hannaford portrait just outside of the chamber, Hall at the peak of his powers, and as recently as this time a week ago when the boundaries commission was reflecting on the contribution of Steele Hall that resonates right through until today. Vale Steele Hall.

Mr WHETSTONE (Chaffey) (15:05): I rise on this very important condolence motion and reflect Raymond Steele Hall, aka Steele. He was born in Balaklava on 30 November 1928 and was a former wheat and sheep farmer in Owen in the state's Mid North. He was originally a regional MP representing Gouger. His parliamentary career spanned over 33 years, as the only Australian to serve as Premier and a member of three legislatures: the House of Assembly, Senate and the House of Representatives.

Many of the legacies that he left, the man he was, and what he meant to South Australia has already been stated and so I will not traverse those. One thing he was well remembered for in particular was a maiden speech in the House of Representatives. The story was that while on the hustings he and Andrew Peacock, Minister for Industrial Relations, visited a hotel in Boothby and they were told that the Leader of the Opposition, Bill Hayden, had been at the bar the day before and was on the wagon and he was drinking Claytons Tonic. Minister Peacock quickly said, 'Claytons, that's the drink you're having when you're not having a drink,' and Steele said, 'That's the leader you're having when you don't want a leader!' Steele recalled perhaps that summed up the voters' views in the electorate of Boothby.

He succeeded Sir Thomas Playford as the Leader of the Liberal and Country League in 1966. They shared similar backgrounds: firm but fair, strong views, both former farmers and both serving premiers. Steele was a great mentor to many incoming politicians and MPs, as he was to me, and as was Joan. Very often at outings he would pull me aside and give me words of wisdom, words that I think were principled and that I still adhere to today.

I want to acknowledge the great work that Steele did, particularly in pushing back with Sir Thomas Playford's vision to secure water supply for South Australia, which was to build the Chowilla Dam, at a cost of $68 million. It eventually was going to cost $28 million more than was planned. Steele was not prepared to support that. He did lose the 1970 election over that issue, as did the former member for Chaffey, the Hon. Peter Arnold. He had real concern.

He continued to lobby for what he saw as an environmental evaporation and science-based evidence that the Dartmouth Dam be built in Victoria on the Mitta Mitta River. It was a much better option. Having long conversations with the former member for Chaffey, Peter Arnold, he said that he persisted until the others just gave up and agreed and that negotiation was reached. The icing on the cake is the 1,850 gigalitres of water that Steele Hall negotiated, the water security that we all enjoy today. That 1,850 gigalitres of guaranteed storage is a legacy that he left.

I would like to acknowledge you, Joan, your extended family, Steele's colleagues, and your friends and family. Well, what a great man he was and what a legacy he left. He will never be forgotten.

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (15:09): Thank you, Mr Speaker, and I rise to support this motion in memory of the great man Steele Hall and acknowledging Joan and her extended family. Steele's service has been well put to the chamber. His sense of getting things right was essentially lost in the premiership here in South Australia. He did the electoral reform process that he thought was the right thing to do, and the Chowilla dam process. He looked at everything and weighed it up as, 'What is the right thing to do here?' He was a man of true conviction who served not only this state but this nation for decades, and I doubt whether the service will ever be equalled in this country.

He was a man of great conviction, and I remember, as a Liberal Party member in Hammond after the 2002 election, the time when we saw Peter Lewis run as an Independent Liberal and deliver power to the Labor Party. Steele came down and met with me and other Hammond electors out at Karoonda and he just wanted to see if we could get a different decision and do what was right, and there was quite a bit of turmoil around that. I acknowledge Steele's support at the time, not just for Hammond but for the Liberal Party of South Australia.

One thing I truly treasure is something I have got in my electorate office now. I was in Liberal headquarters as a candidate—I think it must have been in early 2005; I was preselected in 2004—and there were quite a few items that were going to be thrown out, and I said, 'What's that black table there and those black upright stands?' and they said, 'That's Steele Hall's cabinet table.' I said 'Well, that's not going anywhere.' I rang my brother, and then said to them, 'I'll be back here Monday with two utes and a trailer and we'll be taking what we can get on board,' and we did. It was just going out in the skip otherwise, which I could not believe.

This big cabinet table—and I saw it on the news the other night on Channel 7 and I thought, 'That's got to be the same one.' It came in two big pieces. It's a couple of big, heavy pieces of timber with its big upright stands and in a nice deep black colour. I had it in two different sections in my campaign office, and then when I got my office that I have now it was put together in my meeting room as it would have been in the day. Every day when I walk past it to get into my office I always have a little smile about Steele Hall, and I will keep doing that.

He was a man whose nickname was Tin Shed, and I know in one of the debates around the Festival Theatre it was indicated that someone would rather have a Steele Hall than a tin shed. Truly, I believe Steele Hall was a man of steel for this state and this country, and my deepest condolences to you, Joan, and the family, and thank you all for your care for Steele in the latter years of his life. Vale Steele Hall.

The SPEAKER: I have just asked the Serjeant-at-Arms to head around to repossess that table from your electorate office, member for Hammond! Thanks for furnishing us with that information. The member for Bragg.

Mr BATTY (Bragg) (15:13): I rise to support this motion and pass on my sincere condolences on the passing of former Premier Steele Hall and to pay tribute to his decades of public service, not only in this place but in the Australian Senate and the House of Representatives as well. I want to make a brief contribution today to acknowledge the legacy that Steele Hall leaves to our state, to our party and, of course, to his own family.

First, Steele Hall left an enormous contribution to our state. He was a Liberal Premier whose legacy should be celebrated and has been rightly celebrated today. His government, while only brief, contributed to enormous reforms during 1968 to 1970. We have heard about a lot of it today, from the Festival Centre, to the fluoridation of the water supply, to the Dartmouth Dam.

He is also being rightly recognised today for his reform of the House of Assembly electoral boundaries, despite those very reforms ultimately leading to the downfall of his government. He said in 2018 that the boundaries were 'totally undemocratic, totally wrong'. He said that he knew that he was sacrificing government, but it had to be done. It had to be done because it was the right thing to do.

When I reflect on these reforms, I am reminded of Kennedy's Profiles in Courage, which is a short volume of biographies of eight US senators who made brave, courageous moves because it was the right thing to do but always in circumstances where it was not in their personal or political interests. I think the story of Steele Hall is just that: our very own South Australian profile in courage that we should recognise today. He was undeniably a man of conviction, of principle and of intellect, and he will leave an extraordinary legacy. I might say he serves as a model, I think, for members in this house, particularly those like me who are relatively new to this house, on how we conduct ourselves and who we are here to serve.

Secondly, I want to briefly acknowledge Steele Hall's contribution to our party. Steele Hall was undeniably a stalwart of the Liberal Party. During my time in the party, he has always been somewhat revered as an elder statesman of sorts. I have been a member of the Liberal Party for half of my life, joining at age 16. As, I think, the youngest person contributing to this motion, I want to particularly acknowledge his involvement with and support of the Young Liberals here in South Australia.

Beginning in the 1950s and continuing right up to the 2010s, Steele has always extolled the virtues and the importance of the Young Liberals as the future of our party. When Steele as Premier brought an end to the Playmander in South Australia, the Young Liberals campaigned wholeheartedly in the public debate in favour of the reforms. When he pursued the modernisation of our party in the 1970s, it was the Young Liberals who were amongst some of his key allies leading the debate both internally and externally at that time.

Throughout the eighties and nineties, as the member for Boothby, Steele acted as a mentor to many who took an active interest in politics, including, I am sure, many of my own now SEC members, who I suspect joined the Liberal Party in no small part because of Steele Hall. They were proud to have him as a local federal member. This continued in his retirement. He supported a number of generation Y campaigns and campaigners, and he was a leading fundraiser for Young Liberal campaigns across the state.

Steele's final campaign, for the member for Morphett in 2018, which we heard about today, saw him standing at polling booths with Young Liberals who probably were not even born when Steele retired from parliament in 1996, but they had the opportunity to learn from him and to admire him. I am sure he was extremely pleased to see not only the election of the member for Morphett but the end of 16 years of Labor government at that time.

I think it was this longevity that made him such an admired figure amongst generations of Young Liberals. He was honoured with life membership of the Young Liberals, which I am told he was incredibly proud of. We thank him and acknowledge his service and contribution to so many Liberal Party members and parliamentarians and indeed in shaping the modern Liberal Party today.

Finally, I want to pass on my sincere condolences to all of Steele's family, in particular my constituent and my friend Joan Hall, Steele's beloved wife for over 40 years. I never really had the opportunity to get to know Steele, but I have had the absolute honour and privilege of knowing Joan. Joan was a very early supporter of mine when I sought preselection, and I continue to be very grateful for her support and advice, which I am sure is born in part from Steele's great political experience as well.

I pass on my condolences to you and to all of Steele's children and grandchildren, particularly my friend Ben, who I got to know very well during my time in London, and Alexia as well. You mourn a husband and a father, but we all celebrate today the legacy of a great man. Vale Steele Hall.

The Hon. D.G. PISONI (Unley) (15:19): I, too, rise to offer my condolences to Joan and family and to reflect on personal experiences that I had with Steele Hall. It is funny that Jack Batty, the youngest member of the team, talks about the support he received as a young Liberal by Steele Hall. Well, I was there 20-odd years earlier and I received that very same support from Steele and Joan, and I am forever grateful for that.

There is no doubt that we have heard the changes that were driven by Steele's desire to do the right thing for the state, regardless of the consequences for him politically. It really showed that he had a real commitment to South Australia. Not only did he have a commitment to South Australia, he could read the room, both from a collective point of view—and just the stark comparison between Tom Playford, even if you compare the two portraits in the parliament, you can see that Tom Playford was a man of the past and Steele Hall was a man of the time, a man of the future.

The Minister for Energy and Mining referred to the one-seat loss in 1965, and that one-seat loss was the seat of Modbury. That was held by Laucke. The reason that seat was lost was because it turned from a rural seat to a metropolitan seat and all of these British migrants who could vote on day one back then when they had arrived were complaining that they could not buy a state lottery ticket and they could not go to the pub after 6 o'clock. Playford said, 'Don't worry about that. The economy is going really well,' and, of course, they voted for the Labor candidate at the election and changed the government.

Steele Hall knew that times were changing and he knew that it was the right thing to do and he was very successful in some very big changes and very controversial changes, particularly in his own party. I was seven years of age when he left the office of Premier, but I knew as a 23 year old when I first met Steele and Joan about his reputation and what he was able to achieve in a very short period of time in the parliament.

I thought I would try to find something that might not be quite as commonly known about what he attempted to do in his reforms of the South Australian parliament. I had to go to Dean Jaensch's The Government of South Australia, which was published in 1977. It says that back in this period the constitution until 1975 was also vague about the source of ministers, in other words where they came from, which house. So the convention was that the maximum number of ministers who were able to be ministers were chosen from the House of Assembly and the remainder would come from the Legislative Council. It states:

This precedent of Council representation in cabinet has caused some tensions in the past. These came to a head during the L.C.L.-Steele Hall crisis in 1972 which led to the formation of the Liberal Movement. Hall had intimated his intention of forming a future cabinet of 'no more than ten' by appointing only seven ministers, all from the Assembly. And in the closing stages of the 1974 session, the House of Assembly passed unanimously a private member's bill to amend the constitution to enable an entire ministry to be formed from the Assembly…

It was blocked by the opposition-controlled upper house at that time. So, again, a fighter, taking risks for what he believed was right. I think it is fair to say that when I joined the Liberal Party—the boy from Salisbury—I did not know anybody, and coming across Joan and Steele very early in that process helped me decide that I had made the right decision. My first Liberal Party meeting, I have to say, was in stark contrast to the first political meeting I went to as a Young Labor member two years earlier, where I was completely ignored and had to sit through the Young Labor president at that time ranting—

An honourable member: Who was it?

The Hon. D.G. PISONI: I do not know who it was. He was ranting about how he was going to resign from the Labor Party—this was in 1984—to support Peter Garrett running for the Nuclear Disarmament Party. And there was Chris Schacht, trying to manage the whole situation, and I thought, 'No, this is not for me.' So I was a lost boy for a couple of years and then I joined the Young Liberals and was made to feel at home because of people like Joan and Steele. So thank you Joan and thank you Steele; it has been a terrific relationship.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. D.G. PISONI: You can blame her that I am here. Thank you so much for your care for Steele in his later years also.

The SPEAKER (15:26): Thank you for some great testimonies and tributes and contributions. It was very good indeed to reflect on the life and the great contribution that Steele Hall made to our state. I again want to thank all the former members who have come in here today to hear those contributions.

A lot of people spoke about Steele Hall being a man of principle and a man of integrity, but the saying goes: integrity is doing the right thing when nobody is watching. The story I want to tell is a story not in the public glare through politics or the media. In 1992 in Leigh Street, before the council made it a pedestrian precinct, before John Rau made it a hipster place, I can tell you how unhipster it was. I was driving a white Saab. I came back to the car and got in and there was a note on the windscreen. It said, 'I'm sorry, I reversed into your car. I think I have damaged your bumper bar. Can you please ring me, this is my home phone number. Steele Hall.'

I think we had both been to Rigoni's for lunch but at different tables. I got out and I couldn't see any damage so he must not have hit it very hard. It was not really until the next day that I thought that I would not have noticed that for weeks, if not months, but it was something that I had to get fixed or it would have fallen off. So I rang Steele and he said, 'Just take it to a crash repairer, get it fixed, let me know how much it is and I'll send them a cheque.' Now, that is a man of integrity. That is a man who does the right thing when people are watching and when people are not watching.

Joan, our condolences, my love, to you and to your family, and thank you for sharing Steele with the rest of the state. Could members please rise so that the motion can be carried in the customary manner.

Motion carried by members standing in their places in silence.

The SPEAKER: The house will stand suspended until the ringing of the bells.

Sitting suspended from 15:28 to 15:39.