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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2010-05-13 Daily Xml
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GIFFORD, MR DUN

Mr BIGNELL (Mawson) (15:24): I rise today to pay tribute to a man I met only last Wednesday and who, unfortunately, by Monday this week was dead. Dun Gifford, an American health food expert, was speaking at the American Chamber of Commerce lunch last Wednesday and I went along to represent the Premier. Dun Gifford has been a good friend of the Premier over many years, and I was fascinated to hear him talk about food and the way he is trying to encourage people in America, and also around the world, to eat healthier food and also less food and ensure that it is food that is good for you.

It was a fascinating speech and, afterwards, I spent some time with Dun Gifford and his partner Sarah. We had a great conversation when the rest of the lunch guests had gone, and we continued as the staff of the hotel packed up around us. We walked and spent another 20 minutes or so chatting about their work around the world and, also, the love that they had for the area I represent which, of course, is the seat of Mawson, incorporating the Willunga Basin and the McLaren Vale wine region. Dun was very fond of the wineries and restaurants in my electorate. He was taken previously by the Premier and his wife Sasha to the Star of Greece, where they enjoyed their meals. Dun loved a very good red wine so, of course, he loved the McLaren region.

Mr Venning interjecting:

Mr BIGNELL: Given that the member for Schubert is here, I will also mention that he enjoyed a Barossa red as well. Dun started as a lawyer and worked for Senator Teddy Kennedy. During Bobby Kennedy's run during the presidential campaign in California, Teddy sent Dun down to work on Bobby's campaign. In fact, he was there when Bobby Kennedy was shot in the head and helped to subdue the assailant. He then also had to go in the ambulance that took Bobby Kennedy off to hospital, and of course he died.

Then Dun went back to work for Teddy Kennedy, and this is a story that he shared at lunch. He was on Teddy Kennedy's staff when Teddy decided to organise a reunion of everyone who had worked on the Bobby Kennedy campaign. They went off to have this weekend together and that, of course, was when the woman was killed in the incident on the bridge.

Mr Griffiths: Mary Jo Kopechne.

Mr BIGNELL: That's it, Mary Jo Kopechne, and thank you very much to the member for Goyder for his input. Dun Gifford received a phone call in the early hours of the morning from Teddy Kennedy asking him to go down and sort it out, so he had to go and tell the dead woman's family that they had lost their daughter.

Dun had always had a fascination for and great love of food. He travelled to China and was amazed by the history of food, and a later trip to Italy convinced him to set up a non-profit organisation called Oldways which, as I have alluded to, promotes healthy eating and the healthy growing of food around the world. As I have mentioned previously, in the seat of Mawson we have some of the great wines in the world and we also produce some fantastic local produce—as we do throughout the whole Fleurieu Peninsula. We have a great variety of different produce down there, and one of the things that I have really pushed hard for in my first term here (in the four years that I have been in this place) was to convince the government to maintain its ban on the growing of GM crops. I think that is a very important thing because the side effects of genetically modified crops are still unknown, and we are now the only mainland state in Australia not to allow the growing of GM crops. It gives us a point of difference in the world marketplace but also gives us a better chance of withstanding disease and other health consequences that we may not yet be aware of.

Health is very important to all of us. In America, they have very high levels of obesity and Dun Gifford has been one of the leaders in getting people to eat healthier and promoting healthy eating to kids. I think shows such as MasterChef and the like are helping our kids to not only see the cooking of the food but also to get them to try different sorts of food, and to help change the way people eat. If we continue eating food laden with sugar and overproduced foods and fats, we will have a very unhealthy society. I hope we can all honour Dun Gifford's time on this earth by promoting, through our roles in here, healthy food.

Time expired.

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