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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, First Session (54-1)
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Condolence

Hawke, Hon. R.J.L.

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL (Dunstan—Premier) (11:14): I move:

That the House of Assembly express its deep regret at the death of the Hon. Robert James Lee Hawke AC, former Prime Minister of Australia, and places on record its appreciation of his long and meritorious service, and as a mark of respect to his memory that the sitting of the house be suspended until the ringing of the bells.

Bob Hawke was a man whose memory is revered by people from all walks of life: from workers, as he represented them; business leaders, as he engaged them in the cause of economic growth with equity; young Australians, encouraged as he gave them more opportunity to get a better education; followers of sport, as he watched and played with them; punters, as he bet with them; beer drinkers, until he became prime minister; world leaders, as Australia's international influence grew under his leadership and our relationship with the United States remains steadfast; and, of course, our senior citizens, as he became one of them.

The economic and social contribution of our nation's 23rd Prime Minister is enduring. It touched millions; it still does. As South Australians, we take pride that he was born in our state. We welcome the fact that his legacy is permanently honoured in the Bob Hawke Prime Ministerial Library at the University of South Australia. In between, he lived a remarkable life. For most of it—for more than 70 years—he was a member of the Australian Labor Party, having joined in 1947, but across the political divide Bob Hawke is rightly remembered as one of our greatest leaders.

He was born at Bordertown on 9 December 1929, the second son of Clem and Ellie Hawke. His father was a congregationalist minister, his mother a teacher. Their first son, Neil, died at the age of 17 from meningitis, then a condition for which there was no cure. With their hopes invested in their second son, Clem told him, 'Son, you should do your best to improve the lives of others.' That is what Bob Hawke set out to do as he prepared for a career in the trade union movement and then in the Australian federal parliament.

The family moved to Western Australia, where he went to university before going on to Oxford as a Rhodes scholar, writing his thesis on wage fixing in Australia and establishing a world beer drinking record—a yard in 11 seconds. The contrasting dimensions of the famous Hawke character were evident from an early age. By 1959, he was the ACTU's advocate in the national wage case, which resulted in a weekly rise of 15 shillings—three times the award of the previous year. This was regarded as a personal triumph for him.

A decade later, Bob Hawke became president of the ACTU, a position he held until his election to the federal parliament in 1980. During his leadership of the union movement it became much more politically active. In 1971, his commitment to the selection of sporting teams on a non-racial basis led to a ban on the South African cricket team touring Australia. His abhorrence of apartheid would lead to further effective action while he was prime minister in support of human rights in South Africa.

While Gough Whitlam was prime minister, Bob Hawke was also federal president of the Labor Party. This became a clash of the two colossal intellects. The two did not always agree. Bob Hawke learned a lot from Gough Whitlam about how to avoid chaos and crisis in government. When the Whitlam government was dismissed by the Governor-General, there were calls for a nationwide strike. Bob Hawke insisted that the issue had to be dealt with through the ballot box and not in clashes on the streets. This underlined a key theme of his public life: the desirability for consensus rather than conflict in resolving industrial and political challenges.

In the late 1970s, the ALP and the union movement were deeply divided about uranium mining. Again, Bob Hawke's advocacy was courageous and convincing. He memorably told the 1979 ACTU national conference that banning uranium mining would be a monument to futility. South Australia remains indebted to his consistently strong support of the industry. Without it, the Olympic Dam mine would not have been able to proceed in the 1980s. By then, Bob Hawke had become prime minister and insisted that his government support South Australia's opportunity to develop this world-class mine. This was not the only issue on which he successfully challenged prevailing party orthodoxies and assumptions.

During his leadership of our nation, the Commonwealth Bank, Qantas and TAA were prepared for privatisation, Telstra was opened up for competition, personal and company taxes were reduced, the entry of foreign banks was allowed, the financial industry was deregulated, the dollar was floated and tariffs were cut. He urged the opening up of Australia's trade and economic relations to the rest of the world, particularly with China. In fact, Bob Hawke anticipated before most the China opportunity.

He encouraged all aspects of our relationship with China, but human rights, not economic ties, became his priority in the immediate aftermath of the student uprising in Tiananmen Square in 1989. To his eternal credit, our prime minister granted more than 40,000 Chinese students permanent residency when they feared persecution should they return home.

In a lot of what he did, Bob Hawke was supported by the federal opposition led by John Howard. Their relationship showed what can be achieved when political discourse rises above meaningless slogans and cynicism. The respect between the two endured in their retirement years. Both had been political winners. Each won four elections. Each gave the government they led strong, sensible direction and each was able to rely on competent ministries operated through good cabinet processes and sound Public Service advice. Each led significant policy reform as nation builders. Each contributed to a golden period in our nation's politics.

Uniquely, Bob Hawke was a leader and a larrikin: a leader with a brilliant mind able to advocate with great passion and conviction; a larrikin with a common touch. At times, he wore his heart on his sleeve; occasionally, there were public tears. His love of his nation and its people was beyond doubt as he took them with him on his long journey of successful reforming government.

In what he was able to do while prime minister, we should remember the contribution made by the constant support he received from Hazel, while his retirement years were enriched by his marriage to Blanche d'Alpuget. To Blanche and his children, Susan, Stephen and Rosslyn, we send our sympathy and our gratitude for a husband and father who put it all out there for Australia. We thank Bob Hawke for a life of outstanding public service to our nation. Vale, Robert Hawke.

Mr MALINAUSKAS (Croydon—Leader of the Opposition) (11:22): I thank the Premier for his remarks and take the opportunity to speak on this important motion before the house. Bob Hawke, Australia's longest serving Labor prime minister, was a leader, a reformer and, yes, indeed, a lovable larrikin. Over his 50-plus years on the national stage, he gave Australia confidence of its place in the world and economic structures to secure that confidence for many decades to come. Every Australian's life benefits from his social, economic and political legacies.

Bob was born in Bordertown on 9 December 1929, the year of the Wall Street crash. The son of a preacher and a teacher, history records that the future prime minister's name, Robert, was chosen after his mother's premonition that her son was destined for greatness, hence the name Robert, which means 'of shining fame'. His early childhood in South Australia was against a backdrop of the Great Depression, with unemployment hovering at 30 per cent, supply shortages and indeed an age of austerity.

As a religious leader, Bob's family became a cornerstone of the Bordertown community. Care and concern for the community would have dominated dinner table discussions. When he was six, his father was called to a new ministry in Maitland on Yorke Peninsula. Parishioners awaited the arrival of little Bobbie with the forewarning that he was a terrible kid but also lovable. That proved to be the case. While Bob was described as a scrapper at school, mothers found him very endearing, very friendly, full of wit and daring—a marker of his future exploits.

There were early setbacks. The climate of Maitland did not agree with Bob and he stopped growing at a normal rate due to a respiratory illness. So, at the age of 10, the Hawkes moved Robert to the west, establishing their home in the high-density, working-class area of West Leederville in Perth. Bob received a scholarship to Perth Modern School, in those days a place for upward scramblers from the working and lower middle class trying to escape their impoverished backgrounds. Bob excelled academically and was popular at school for his quick wit, high marks and sporting skills. He was already proving to be the classic Australian all-rounder. He was a keen and capable cricketer, showing early leadership skills.

Politics would first emerge in his life at the tender age of 18 at the University of Western Australia, where he formed the first ALP club on campus in 1948, emerging as a student politician. This was the beginning of seven decades—70 years—of active contribution to the labour movement. There would be a side story, however, that leads to an unusual piece of Australian folklore and that, of course, is that shortly after winning his first job, with Mobil Oil, he won a Rhodes Scholarship.

During his scholarship and tenure at England's Oxford University, where the lovable larrikin characteristically engaged and emerged, he set a new world record for beer drinking: 2½ pints in 11 seconds. I challenge anyone in this place to match that record. More importantly, his thesis at Oxford University focused on the Australian system of industrial relations conciliation and arbitration. That academic work would later secure Bob a role as a researcher and industrial advocate with the ACTU. So it was that the seeds of change would start to grow.

Each next step was guided by the early advice of his father: 'If you believe in the fatherhood of God, you must believe in the brotherhood of man. You should try to improve the lives of others.' Just over 60 years ago, the wages of all Australians were determined by centralised wage fixing. Bob's role at the ACTU as an advocate placed him at the very centre of the national industrial and economic affairs.

By 1967, he was elected as the president of the ACTU, promising, importantly, to 'work in harmony with all sectors of the movement'. During his time at the ACTU, Bob achieved the reputation of being the most intellectually gifted and successful advocate ever to pursue the cause of the working man. Bob's public image began to grow. Often described as a good performer, a great crowd pleaser and able to fill the halls, he began to look at the political stage and bigger challenges that could shape the future of our nation.

After taking a little longer than anticipated, in 1980 Bob entered parliament as the member for Wills. Immediately, he was appointed to the shadow cabinet by Bill Hayden, as the shadow minister for IR. In 1983, Fraser, the Liberal prime minister who ended the Whitlam era eight years earlier, called a general election to capitalise on internal ALP tensions. Simultaneously, Bob Hawke ended those tensions by taking over the leadership from a generous Bill Hayden. Fraser had gone to the Governor-General seeking to campaign against Hayden, and when he left the grounds of Government House he was facing the ascendant Hawke.

The script was rewritten with a new ending for Fraser and Labor was back in power, this time with skills and experience not evident in the Whitlam era. A new era would change Australia in so many ways. The Hawke government transformed our country's economy. Bob was able to fuse his experience as a trade union leader and acute knowledge of the workings of the economy with the levers of government. His prime ministership was described as a force of consensus but on Labor's terms.

He led a cabinet he described as 'universally regarded as probably the best cabinet since Federation', and they set about the business of founding a modern Australia. The first year of the Hawke government got the big ideas out to the Australian people: recovery, reconciliation, reconstruction and the social wages concept. Such an approach reflects Bob's leadership ability to announce and sell a vision to the electorate while raising the inspirational umbrella that articulated a proposed reform.

Bob saw the historic wages accord as a necessary precondition to serious structural reforms required to modernise our national economy, yet the wages accord was not just a means to an end. It spoke to Bob's core values and those of the labour movement: the concept of justice all round. The ability to bring business, the union movement and government together on a shared mission set a fine political example for all future politicians. It broke down the barriers, ushering in enterprise bargaining and providing balance to the Australian IR system. The social legacies were entwined with the economic reforms.

The Hawke government ensured access to taxpayer-funded universal health care and universal compulsory superannuation contributions—both vital security nets. These initiatives stemmed from the values of the labour movement. The Hawke government doubled the number of childcare places and public housing funds and increased the old-age pension. Focused on the importance of education, Hawke's era oversaw a unique equalisation of education, with school retention rates rising from the lowest in any developed nation to 70 per cent.

With Bob as PM and Paul Keating as treasurer, the federal Labor government set out to open Australia for business. The floating of the dollar and the decision to deregulate the financial system exposed the domestic market to global competition, driving efficiency and productivity improvements. Our own state's wine industry began to see new and bigger markets: a shift that has driven growth, wealth and jobs in our state for decades, amongst other reforms that affected South Australia.

With major reforms occurring at home, Bob was also able to make a substantial contribution on the global stage. Bob's hatred of bigotry, wherever it was, showed itself, and he judged men and women on the merit of their argument rather than on their remuneration, political affiliation, colour or creed. Bob was the international flag-bearer for the imposition of financial sanctions against South Africa, later described as 'the dagger which finally immobilised apartheid'. Nelson Mandela himself later confirmed to Hawke that it was only 'because of you' that he was freed from imprisonment on Robben Island.

I had the benefit of meeting Bob a couple of times, but one occasion undoubtedly stands out above all others in my mind. In 2007, I was the campaign manager for the Wakefield campaign in the federal election. Nick Champion was the Labor candidate back then. It was an important Liberal-held seat and one that Labor needed to win to form federal government. All sorts of offers were coming in for marginal seats back then, and rumours were going around that Bob was willing to travel to campaign. He was well known for that. I got on the phone to his office—Julie I think was the name of his loyal assistant—to arrange a time for Bob to come to South Australia. It was all very spontaneous and last minute.

I received a phone call on the Thursday before the weekend advising that Bob was able to join us on Sunday and that arrangements should be put in place. We could not really arrange or do much at short notice, so I thought, 'What can we do with Hawkie to win votes in the seat of Wakefield?' There was not much we could do apart from take him to a shopping centre, so we decided to take him out to Munno Para. I got a phone call the day before he arrived, or something to that effect, and Julie said to me, 'There's one thing we need you to arrange for Mr Hawke's convenience.' I said, 'Oh, yes, what's that?' She said, 'We need you to arrange a car and a driver.' I thought, 'I can arrange that.' So I cleaned out my car.

I had heard that Bob had actually hit a hole in one playing golf the week before. He was a pretty keen golfer. So I was cleaning out the car and I found a golf tee in the mess in my car. I thought that, rather than ditch it, I would put it on the console of my Commodore. As I was driving with Bob in the front and Blanche in the back with Julie the assistant, I was incredibly nervous. When Bob got in the car he said, 'G'day, lad.' I said, 'Mr Hawke.' He wasn't saying too much. He just got in the car and started doing his crossword. He said, 'How long is the trip to Munno Para?' I said, 'It's going to take us around about 35 to 40 minutes.'

It was a Sunday morning. I was incredibly nervous. We got to Gepps Cross and not a word had been spoken. He was just diligently doing his crossword. He put the paper down and he saw the golf tee and said, 'You play golf, son?' I said, 'I don't mind playing every now and then. I heard you hit a hole in one last week, Hawkie.' The paper went down and he was off, telling me all about his hole in one. So the conversation started.

We got out to Munno Para and—I will never forget this—I introduced him to Champs (to Nick) and he said, 'Right, here's the way it's going to work, Nick. I am going to walk into the shopping centre and introduce myself to people and then I am going to introduce them to you. Are you okay with that?' and Nick said, 'No worries.' So we walk into Munno Para shopping centre completely unannounced; no-one knew we were there or that we were going. It was a Sunday morning, Munno Para shopping centre, systems normal, people going through their routine.

We walked in and there were a few people around. The first shop on the right was a fruit and veg shop and there was some fellow, on a low wage, just going about his business stacking apples, and he looked up and there was Bob Hawke. He looked at Hawkie and as soon as Hawkie acknowledged the recognition he made a beeline for this bloke and said, 'G'day, mate. My name's Bob Hawke!' and the man goes, 'Strewth, I know, Hawkie!' and they started chatting. Bob said, 'I will introduce you to my friend Nick Champion,' and they had a bit of chat.

Then he moved to the next shop and the next shop, and within about 15 minutes word had started to spread throughout Munno Para shopping centre that something special was going on and crowds started to form. Then I witnessed the magic: you could see the way he lifted, the way he started to respond to ordinary people. Within about 30 minutes, there was an energy and a buzz that I have never seen in my working life; it was utterly extraordinary.

There was a hairdresser with three ladies sitting there getting their hair cut, going about their ordinary business. The next second, Hawkie was banging on the window at the ladies getting their hair cut and they were all saying, 'Hawkie!' He walked into the hairdressing salon and stood behind the little lady in the middle who was getting her hair done. She was looking in the mirror and, before you knew it, he was picking up her hair and snipping away at it—it was just magic.

We walked further down, to the Wendy's. The crowd was buzzing and Hawkie was up and about. A lady at the Wendy's was halfway through her soft serve ice cream, I kid you not (and, if I am honest, this lady was no oil painting), and she said to Hawkie, 'Do you want some ice cream, Hawkie?' He said, 'No worries,' and he ate a big scoop of her soft serve. Then he had ice cream all around his lips and, before you knew it, she said, 'Give us a kiss, Hawkie!' and he went straight for it on the lips—and everyone absolutely erupted.

The magnetism, the enthusiasm and the raw energy that came from Bob were sincere. Kim Beazley put it beautifully recently when he said that there was a prevailing sense of confidence and enthusiasm and a love for people and their affection for him, but there was never narcissism. He did not see the narcissism in Hawkie that is often attributable to those sorts of characteristics, and I think that is what made him incredibly unique. He was a giant.

There is never going to be another Bob Hawke, and everyone who wants to emulate him should stop trying. He was an extraordinary human being, a giant of our great movement. Most importantly, this country is a fairer place because of Bob Hawke. That is a legacy that will never leave him and one that should always be honoured.

The Hon. V.A. CHAPMAN (Bragg—Deputy Premier, Attorney-General) (11:38): I rise to support the Premier's motion and acknowledge the contribution made by the Premier and the Leader of the Opposition in respect of the outstanding contribution that Mr Hawke has made to political life, and indeed to public life generally, covering the period that he led the ACTU. I would like to make a few comments and reflect on Mr Hawke's visits to South Australia in the 1970s, during his time as the leader of the ACTU, which I think was an important developmental and educational period for the purposes of, ultimately, public life in the parliament and in government.

As the minister now responsible for gambling, I would hope that if the commissioner for liquor and gambling reads any of this contribution he understands the context in which it is presented—the 1970s, which predated him and the laws that currently apply, which fortunately are not retrospective. But let's place it to this: Mr Hawke did frequently visit South Australia, as I am sure he went around to other regions of the country. He visited South Australia for a number of activities associated with both his leadership of the ACTU and his meetings with other leaders of very powerful unions that operated both here and around the country.

He came for a number of other extracurricular activities, and I will address his membership of the round table for poker playing. I will not mention who else was at the table, other than the fact that my father was one of them. The regular sittings they had of these occasions were in a context of a time when gambling was still largely done through SP bookmaking and when the Totalizator Agency Board was a new concept being developed but was not yet in place.

The card playing also predated the era of the 1980s, which came with the advent of the Casino and subsequently, in the latter part of the that decade, the establishment of poker machines. It is within that context I say these few matters. Firstly, it was a game that had various different leaders in politics and industry around the table. It was also a time whilst I was at school and university when I was frequently the handbag for my father in relation to events, given my mother was not there.

Can I say that what developed from the camaraderie around the table was a capacity for Mr Hawke and others at the table to pick up the phone at any time and discuss matters of mutual interest. It meant that they were able to deal with a transport dispute on a Christmas morning, for example. Where there had been a problem, phone calls were made. My father would not come to the Christmas lunch table until these issues had been resolved, and it invariably meant some phone calls to Mr Hawke and others to get on to someone else, who might be the head of another union, to sort out that issue. That was a type of direct conversation and resolution of major industrial matters, which did not always culminate in there being a strike, but frequently there were frequently threats to be a strike.

Remember that this was an era also when there was a very high level of membership of the union. The ACTU, the Transport Workers Union and others were very powerful unions in Australia. I will never forget the capacity of these men—they were all men—to translate the resolution in a dignified manner to be able to arrest damage, to be able to place productivity back on the agenda, to provide for fair entitlements obviously for the membership of the unions, etc.

It was an extraordinary era during which I am sure all the men around that table, who went into different areas of enterprise, learnt the value of that level of camaraderie. It did translate for me in having to pick up from the airport all sorts of odd bods, including a very young Laurie Brereton and an even younger Patrick Conlon, who was working for one of them at the time, and drive them out to the property, where they would have conversations and inevitably end up having a game of cards.

I just make this point: it is important in public life, whether one aspires to and achieves the prime ministership, as Mr Hawke did and whom we recognise today, to maintain a level of civility, maintain a camaraderie but also a powerful pursuit of what we are here to represent, but obviously ultimately to resolve it in a manner which is for the benefit of the public.

I hope that Mr Hawke will be remembered for the good he has done for our country as a prime minister. Sure, he had some other extracurricular activities. Some of them helped, perhaps some of them did not, but he was a man who stood by his conviction and administered that for the benefit of the people of Australia. I hope that my father is up there setting up the cards as we speak.

Dr CLOSE (Port Adelaide—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (11:44): It must have been around 2005 or 2006 that I went to see Keating!The Musical at the Festival Theatre. I do not know if anyone else here went to see it, but it was a tremendous show, not least because the fantasy ending was that there were a whole lot of ballots that were found down in Antarctica, I think, that proved that Keating actually did not lose the 1996 election and that he had won after all. Of course, we were all in some way suffering through very many years of a Howard government, and, as a pretty lefty audience, we revelled in it. I think a lot of people were at that event because of an affection for Paul Keating, an affection that was born out of enjoying his razzmatazz, his verve and his vigour in policy.

Early on in the show, the character of Bob Hawke comes out. He is in a dressing gown and has a beer in one hand, and he sings a song—don't worry, I am not going to burst into song—that was something like 'I love Australia and Australia loves me'. It took me, my friends and all of us in the audience right back to what it was like when Bob Hawke was our prime minister. Some of us had allowed the Keating excitement to overshadow the absolute significance of Hawke becoming Labor's longest serving prime minister and allowing the Hawke-Keating partnership to exist at all, a partnership that then became the Keating prime ministership.

The affection which Bob Hawke genuinely held for Australia and the way in which it was reciprocated, as has been so beautifully illustrated by the story from the leader, was an immeasurably important part of why Bob Hawke, and the Labor Party, was successful at that time. I wish that some of the younger people who were sitting here before—for whom the Hawke government must seem like ancient history—were here to listen to all these contributions, because the way in which Australia has been profoundly shaped by the Hawke prime ministership should never be forgotten.

A country that was still clinging onto an old way of running itself required a government that not only was immensely and courageously reformist but also able to capture and keep the confidence of the people of Australia so that it could be a long-lived government. The Whitlam government had done a huge amount to change, reform and modernise, but it was such a shooting star of a government and so short lived that it was unable to maintain some of the reform.

The fact is that Bob Hawke was able to reintroduce what had been Medibank, and then became Medicare, and keep it long enough to become part of what Australians expected, so that, when the conservatives came back into office, any tentative move to think about removing universal health care was rebuffed, not just politically but also by the people of Australia. It had been there long enough for it to be treasured and woven into what we expected.

There is much made, as there should be, of the modernisation of the economy that occurred under Bob Hawke. That was twinned with deep concerns about fairness, about the wages that people receive, about the conditions that people receive and about preparing people for a retirement in which they are not necessarily going to be able to depend entirely upon the state. The way in which equality was prized in the form of the Equal Opportunity Employment Act of 1987 and the way in which environmental reform was twinned with social and economic reforms enabled us to make huge strides, not just in the spectacular saving of the Franklin but also in the very difficult negotiations that occurred over forests in the Eastern States and in dealing with land clearing.

None of the reforms that occurred in that time were perfect. None of them were complete, but nothing that has happened since, and nothing that will still happen, would have been possible without that tremendous intellectual courage and without the fact that the people of Australia liked and trusted their leader. He was a complicated human being, as we all are, but he was more spectacularly so perhaps.

My own life was profoundly affected by his leadership. In 1983, when he won the election, I was 15 and I ran out and joined the Labor Party because of the enthusiasm which he brought to the country and with which he was greeted, as the leader referred to, and the excitement he made all of us feel about the endless possibilities that were before Australia, so I rushed out and I joined the party and I have been a member continuously ever since.

Later on, having become an active volunteer and so on through those many elections during the eighties and early nineties, I decided to stay at university to undertake a doctorate and that I would do it about the impact of the Hawke and Keating era. In fact, my supervisor was Professor Dean Jaensch, who I will forever feel great affection for, not least because I wrote my entire thesis to disprove the most recent book he had written, to argue that it was wrong. He found it tremendous that he had a student who was prepared to take him on head-on. In fact, we had a very big clash over the 1993 election, which incidentally I got right and he got wrong, and I never allowed him to forget it.

The privilege I had in being able to write about that era and to understand what happened then to the party that has given me so much was enormous—to understand the traditions that were dragged through by Hawke, the labourist traditions, the traditions of fairness, the traditions of every person being treated with dignity, but the modernisation that needed to go with that, the modernisation within our party as well as in larger policy. Not only has Australia been affected forever by the courage of that government, and also its capacity to keep winning elections, but so has my party, so has this great, old, fierce Labor Party.

As we contemplate a loss a couple of weeks ago that hurts many of us deeply, we do not ever forget what we have learnt from the leadership of Hawke: the priority of trusting and believing in the Australian people, in democracy and in always seeking to learn what they are saying to us, never being patronising, never being narcissistic, as the leader pointed out, in expecting the love and adoration but in showing it and showing faith in the people.

I am honoured to be able to speak about Bob Hawke. I am very sorry that it is on the occasion of his death. I am sure I am not alone in having shed a tear when I heard that he had died. Yes, he was old; yes, he had lived a magnificent life. It felt like an era had passed and I want to mark that; I want to mark our gratitude on this side of the chamber as well as on behalf of all the community. Vale, Bob Hawke.

Mr TEAGUE (Heysen) (11:52): I thank the house for the opportunity to rise and make some brief remarks on the passing of our 23rd Prime Minister, Bob Hawke. It is not often that we have the opportunity to pause and reflect on significant leaders. This is one such occasion and I think it is important that we reflect on a truly significant giant of particularly the 20th century in Australian politics.

To the extent that my life growing up was immersed in politics, and particularly national politics, it was also very much characterised by and in the context of that time being under the leadership of Bob Hawke. It is plain that he brought the country together in 1983 and his leadership was characterised by the politics of consensus. His key intellectual driving force was his ability to use consensus, persuasion, negotiation, a bringing together as a means of achieving effective outcomes over the long term.

That is a message that I think is more relevant today perhaps than it ever has been as we consider, in not just Australia but globally, an increasingly polarised political culture. Bob's involvement in politics was driven by an aspiration to collaborate, as the Deputy Premier has exemplified, to reach across political boundaries and institutional boundaries to make things relatable and to achieve practical outcomes. That legacy as a consensus leader is one that I feel pleased to have grown up with, and I look to carry it forward, as I think we all ought to.

More than just a consensus leader—and we have had the opportunity to reflect on Bob's life over several decades, not just in his passing—I think the significant thing that I and Australians across the board are left with is Bob's love of life and, in turn, his love of the people of Australia and his belief in the people of Australia and what we can all achieve.

In these remarks I do not want to eulogise Bob, and there has been a lot said about the course of his life's journey. But the way in which he engaged through a prism of a love of life juxtaposes on the one hand the serious, intellectually capable, hardworking side of someone who dedicated his career to public service with the lighter side that he wore just as easily. He would flick from one to the other and often with a view directly to making a complex issue relatable to a broad audience, an entire audience.

There was never a sense in which you got the impression that Bob would talk about an issue in closed terms. It was always about how this may be difficult but you can understand it this way and you can be persuaded by relating to it and understanding. So it was the strength of the personal qualities that I think was the genius, unique aspect of Bob Hawke. It is important to note that sometimes, if you are going to chart a course in that way as a leader, you need some cover, and as prime minister he was well and truly ably covered in that respect by Paul Keating as treasurer.

I think those serious aspects of capacity are the sorts of things that can lead to the big reforms: the floating of the dollar, getting rid of tariffs and the wages accord that he managed to negotiate. There is a particular magic, I think, in the wages accord that was negotiated through the 1980s. Perhaps one could compare the journey that was going on for similar towering leaders of the time such as Thatcher in the UK achieving similar reforms but in circumstances that were inevitably much more beset by confrontation.

On the personal side, I think at all times, and particularly in the course of his time as prime minister, Bob reminded us who we are as Australians. He made us proud of who we are as Australians and he made us feel good about ourselves and each other. In that sense, I often draw the parallel to those similar qualities of Ronald Reagan in the US. They were two people who were of their time. They lived comfortably in their own skin and they exuded an embrace of the people they set out to lead.

So he combined the two: the serious intellectual capacity and that extraordinary ability to reach out and relate. In doing that, I think he managed to achieve a transcendence of the usual divisions that you could easily draw between capital and labour or politics and party. Over time, I think we became used to laughing with Bob, to being drawn in and to expecting to see human qualities we could admire in our leadership.

There is a particular case study that I would encourage people to glance at in a spare moment; it is one of hundreds, perhaps, but one that sticks in my mind. It is an interview that he gave on one of Roy Slaven's and H.G. Nelson's programs. It was then called the Channel Nine Show, for some odd reason. He came along and gave an interview six years after he left the parliament and seven years after he finished up as PM. It was around mid-1998, immediately after Suharto had resigned and shortly before the Queensland election of that year. It is only a relatively short piece.

For those who are familiar with Roy and H.G. and their particular brand of humour, Bob was able to come on to a show and mix the serious with the humorous. He was able to relate to an audience with the same depth of understanding that they were able to display. There was a question asked: 'What's going on with Suharto? What's happened?' Bob dealt with that very seriously and said, 'Well, he's come to the end of an era. He had to go.' He then flicked it to reinforcing that there are 200 million Indonesians who are at our doorstep and how important it is to understand these good people in Indonesia, and that we have to make sure we keep building bridges to them. He related it as an ordinary person.

He then flicked to dealing with questions about the good diplomatic results that could be achieved on the golf course. He told stories about experiences with individual leaders on the golf course and took the chance to remind the whole audience that there are some really wonderful people working in the Public Service and the government who help bring together our international relations. He brought it home and he made it relatable. He talked about the wonderful skills of interpreters and his particularly famous meeting with Gorbachev, the one that famously was supposed to go for 20 minutes and ended up going for 3½ hours. I think it was the one time it has been reported that Bob regarded himself as being out-charisma'd by a leader.

He was then asked about what the then looming threat of the rising popularity of One Nation in Queensland posed ahead of the 1998 Queensland election. We know that One Nation went on to win 11 seats. It was a high-water mark for that party, and history has panned out to tell a story. He was asked to analyse where we were at. He had no hesitation in saying the threat of that party at that time was the result of fear in the community in Queensland and that there was a job for leaders to do to overcome that fear in order to confront the looming threat.

He said what were very memorable words for me at the time I first heard them. Without hesitation, he said, 'It will be a dark day for Australia if One Nation takes a seat.' They had that high-water mark at that point. Again, he took the opportunity to be emphatic about the importance of Asia to our country going forward. Others have reflected on how prescient that appreciation was and how important that ongoing authority of Bob's on that topic was.

Finally, but importantly, he was asked to reflect on whether Australia should have two cricket captains back in 1998. He flicked straightaway to a completely authoritative and serious answer.

An honourable member: What was that?

Mr TEAGUE: The desirability of having one. If Mark Taylor at the time was regarded as perhaps not being able to hold his place in the one-day team, he might have had to have a transition, but ideally one would be a good idea. He gave the answer very seriously and thoroughly, as credibly as anyone might in Australia.

In the course of those remarks, and in the course of reflecting on the benefits of participation in sport, he said, 'One thing I would say is that perhaps people professionally these days are playing too much sport and getting jaded. What's important in the sporting life is that the players retain the joie de vivre.' Everyone raised an eyebrow, saying, 'What's this? Speaking French?' He said, 'Oh, yes, the joy of life. It's important that you keep the joy of life.' That piece is just one example that I think highlights what we will most remember about Bob: someone who was ultimately driven in his public engagement by the joy of life and the love of all Australians in the process. Vale, Bob Hawke.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens) (12:07): This parliament has a close connection to the Hawke family. Former Prime Minister Hawke's uncle Albert Hawke served in this house. At the age of 23, he was the youngest member of parliament ever elected to the House of Assembly, a record that has not been bested. He served here between 1924 and 1927 and then, after being defeated by George Jenkins in the seat of Burra Burra, he moved to Perth, where he went on to become a member of parliament and premier of Western Australia, which is probably why the Hawke family moved from South Australia to Western Australia: to be with Hawke senior's brother, who was then a senior minister in Labor governments.

Bob Hawke, without a doubt, is the most prominent Labor figure we have ever produced, probably more prominent than Curtin and Chifley. He is someone whose hallmark is on every subsequent government. Every Labor government I know, and every Labor minister I know, wants to govern in the same responsible manner of the Hawke-Keating tradition, which serves, I think, as a great example and testament to their longevity. It is a great honour for them that so many state parliaments, state governments and federal parliamentary Labor parties want to continue to govern in that tradition.

We talk about Bob Hawke as a giant of Australian political history, yet he served in parliament for only 12 years. When you listen to the man's life story, you assume that it was a lifelong parliamentary career, but the truth is that he entered parliament in 1980 and left in 1992—12 years only—yet in 12 years he fundamentally changed the landscape of Australia forever. The reforms that he introduced will never be undone. Anyone who attempts to, I think, will face the wrath of the Australian public because they have become institutionalised changes. But they were not always that way.

Medicare was not inevitable; compulsory superannuation was not inevitable; the accord was not inevitable. The reforms of the Hawke-Keating government were not inevitable. Floating the dollar was not always going to happen. Lowering tariffs was not always going to happen. Former treasurer Howard argued strongly against lowering tariffs and opening up Australia to the world. Just in terms of political courage, think of this for a moment: when the Hawke-Keating government removed tariff protection on Australian manufacturing, the manufacturing workforce in Australia halved in two years. That is a reform that would make most prime ministers weak at the knee.

I want to tell a very quick anecdotal story about Bob Hawke's impact on my family and me. I am Labor because of Bob Hawke. I was 11 years old, and we were heading towards the 1983 election. My mother was a staunch Liberal. When I say 'staunch Liberal', these people pale into insignificance compared to my mother's adherence to conservative ideology. She grew up in the aftermath of the civil war in Greece. She felt that anyone left of centre was a communist or a communist sympathiser and that we should have nothing to do with them.

My father, on the other hand, was a factory worker and a Labor voter. He worked in a factory for 20 years, and my mother was a cleaner at the Royal Adelaide Hospital and a seamstress. They eventually bought their own business, a chicken shop—the story of many migrants to Australia. I remember that it was March, and my mother was having these rolling arguments with my father: 'You can't vote for this man. This man is dangerous.' My dad said, 'Yes, no worries. Don't worry.' She said, 'I know you have always wanted to vote for him, I know you like him, but you can't this time. It's too important.' He said, 'Don't worry. I won't.'

On election day, we were at the shop. We drove to the shop on Saturday morning and prepared it for opening. I was doing whatever I was doing at the back. My mother went to vote, and she came back with a Liberal Party how-to-vote card. She said to my father, 'Don't do anything stupid. This man is dangerous. Do not vote for him. If you vote for him, we will have to take all our money out of the bank and put it under the bed.' You may remember that scare campaign that Fraser was running. My dad said, 'Don't worry. I will take the boy with me, and he will be my witness.'

So we got in the Ford XB and off we went to the Netley primary school, which Rob Lucas closed a few years later. We got to the polling booth, and my dad took all the how-to-vote cards from the volunteers. We walked in and he got his name ticked off. We got to the booth and he said, 'Which is the Labor one?' I said, 'But mum said—' He replied, 'Don't worry about what mum said. I'm a man; I will vote for whoever I want to. Which is the Labor one?' I found the Labor one. He said, 'Quick, vote for Hawke.' I was 11. I followed the how-to-vote card.

Thinking back, I assume that we voted for John Scott, the federal member for Hindmarsh, in Netley, or it might have been the member for Hawker, Ralph Jacobi or his predecessor. I cannot remember. Anyway, we voted, and we voted Labor. We got in the car—silence. Dad did not speak the whole way back. We got to the chicken shop. When I walked in I had a big smile on my face, and my mother knew instantly what had happened. She said to my dad, 'You voted Labor, didn't you?' Dad said, 'No, no. Ask the boy.' I said, 'I don't know. I just did what dad said.'

My dad never drank. He did not drink socially: he only drank on occasions. He drank at baptisms, funerals, weddings and christenings but never with a meal. That night, as the election results were on TV, my old man cracked open a Southwark Bitter. He looked at me with a big smile on his face, winked and said, 'That's your Uncle Bob.' That day, I knew I was going to be a Labor voter for the rest of my life. He fundamentally changed me. After that election, my father took great pride and joy in telling my mother how wrong she was. In 1984, she voted Labor for the first time in her life, and she has continued to vote Labor ever since.

That was the impact that someone like Bob Hawke had on our family. He was someone who spoke to the working-class aspirations of migrants, people who wanted to save, wanted to buy a second house and wanted to invest. They felt safe and secure in the knowledge that the Hawke-Keating government spoke to them and their aspirations. That is the Labor Party that I joined. That is the Labor Party that I fight for. It is the legacy of Bob Hawke that has given us the ability to speak to the entire nation, not to just a small group of Australians. Bob Hawke did that for all of us, and we are eternally grateful.

Last night, on Four Corners, there was an excellent program on the 30-year anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. It showed in full force the evil of communist regimes and what they can do to their own people. Bob Hawke was under immense pressure internationally. This country was going to become our largest trading partner. Make no mistake: the bureaucracy in and around the prime minister's office at the time would have put immense pressure on the prime minister not to allow those students to stay: 'Do not upset this country. We need to trade with this country. We've lowered our tariff barriers; we are now a trading nation. We need to export and import from this country. They are to become our largest customers.' But Hawke took the moral option, and that was a function of leadership.

The last time I saw Bob Hawke was in Darwin. I was at an event in Darwin with the then chief minister Adam Giles, and Bob Hawke was speaking at the parliament. We went out for dinner afterwards. Bob Hawke's great ambition was for Australia to have a nuclear life cycle. It was not just about the mining of uranium; it was about processing uranium and storing its waste. We had a long, deep conversation about that and many other issues, but the one topic he wanted to raise with me the most was the closure of Stanley's Fish Caf on Gouger Street. He was devastated that you could not get a King George Whiting and sit outside and have a cigar in Adelaide anymore, and he wondered whether the treasurer could give once-off funding to keep this restaurant open. I said, 'No, I'm sorry, Prime Minister, I cannot.'

That was my last meeting with him. He was a great intellect. He was a giant. I think it is fair to say that he was beloved by all Australians, even those who did not vote for him, and that he has made this country better for his service. God rest him.

Mr McBRIDE (MacKillop) (12:16): I rise today to add to the condolence motion to remember the life of Robert James Lee Hawke AC, the 23rd and longest serving Labor Prime Minister of Australia, former federal leader, Rhodes scholar, Oxford graduate and proud son of the township of Bordertown and the South-East of South Australia. Bordertown is a town with a vibrant community that is proud of its heritage and its connection to Bob Hawke and sits in my electorate of MacKillop on the Dukes Highway, about 20 kilometres from the South Australian-Victorian border.

Bob Hawke's life and legacy as a leader have been well documented and celebrated in the township of Bordertown for many years. Bob Hawke was born on 9 December 1929 in Bordertown, South Australia. He was the younger of two sons born to parents Clement Hawke, a congregational minister, and Ellie Hawke, a schoolteacher, who were both of Cornish heritage. His father, Clem, was posted to Bordertown from 1928 to 1935 and was in charge of the largest parish in the district.

The family, comprising his mother, father and older brother, Neil, lived in a sandstone house that can be found at 63 Farquhar Street, Bordertown. The home, built originally in 1885 by the National Bank, became home to the Hawke family when his father served as the congregational minister for Bordertown. Bob Hawke's family eventually took the next step in 1936 and moved to Maitland on Yorke Peninsula before moving to Western Australia after the tragic death of Bob Hawke's older brother, Neil, at the age of 18. Today, their Bordertown house is used by community organisations to service the town and districts.

In reflecting on his early life in Bordertown, I have learnt that Bob Hawke was the product of a religious, protective and loving home. I understand that he was encouraged to speak his mind and use his intelligence and that he had a strong sense of social obligation instilled in him by his parents, values and traits that stood him in good stead for his life at university, in politics and beyond.

During his time in government, he saw a significant period of change and some undoubtedly turbulent times, including the introduction of Medicare, the floating of the Australian dollar on international money markets, the initiation of a charge for tertiary education and the initiation of an assets test on age pensions. As I belong to a conservative farming family that has existed on the sheep's back since the 1860s, with all the highs and lows of the wool industry, this gives me the opportunity to highlight the importance of the role that Bob Hawke and his government played during a very difficult time for the wool industry.

The Hawke government was swept into power in 1983, after what my forebears would describe as a disappointing Liberal government. The new Hawke government faced the wide comb dispute, one of Australia's most significant farming industrial relations battles. The Hawke government described an outcome that delivered efficiencies and outcomes that the industry enjoys today. This dispute had been going on for many years before the arrival of the Hawke government, and this issue belongs to an industry that founded the Australian Labor Party. The shearing industry also founded the Australian Workers' Union.

At the same time, the Hawke government was bringing the Australian economy into the new world, building new ties to the rest of the world and looking for further prosperity. It created an economic summit that was pushing new reforms not seen in Australia before. Developed as part of the new reforms, the accord embedded arbitration and brought change through its liberalised financial controls and reduced tariffs and changed the economic order of the time. This change was a testament to the conviction that Bob Hawke had as a leader navigating these changes in his early days in government.

Today, the legacy of Bob Hawke's significant achievements and proud beginnings in this small country town are captured in the Bob Hawke Gallery, located in Woolshed Street in Bordertown. The gallery includes a number of pieces of Hawke memorabilia, including the Australia jacket he wore when Australia won the America's Cup and a motorbike from his youth. The collection also includes photographs, newspaper clippings, cartoons, paintings and memorabilia that acknowledge and celebrate Bordertown as the birthplace of our country's longest serving Labor prime minister. The collection also includes a portrait of Bob Hawke by artist Michael Henwood.

Bob Hawke has been and will continue to be remembered within my electorate through a bronze bust of the former leader, which is located outside the council chambers at 58 Woolshed Street. The sculpture was unveiled by Hawke's father, the Reverend Clem Hawke, in 1987 and was a gift to the citizens of Tatiara from the sculptures of the Giannarelli family.

From this beginning in a conservative country town, history will portray Bob Hawke as a successful leader. His values and character were embraced by the nation. Ironically, it would seem that the conservative values embedded in him by one of country's most conservative regions were used to his country's benefit through his involvement in the union movement and the Labor government. Bob Hawke left a lasting legacy in federal politics and our country and has left a significant impression on his birthplace in Bordertown. He will continue to be remembered for his long service to Australia and his party and by his family. Vale, Bob Hawke.

Ms COOK (Hurtle Vale) (12:22): I rise to speak to the condolence motion for the Hon. Robert James Lee Hawke. It sounds strange to refer to the previous PM with those official words in such a formal way because to me, my family and the majority of our community he was always 'Bob' or 'Hawkie'. He was one of us and the best of us because he brought the best out of Australia.

From the sixties up until he retired, my father worked across a number of manufacturing and labouring roles at Chrysler, the Port Stanvac oil refinery in Lonsdale and Monroe/Wylie. Dad worked long hours and my mum stayed at home to raise the family; as it was with most families in that period, we relied on the wages of our father. Although many Australians look back at this time as the golden era, when life was much simpler, the workers in factories and workplaces, like the Port Stanvac oil refinery, knew that to improve their lot they had to work together.

As an example, in 1962, metal workers from the amalgamated engineering union and federated engine drivers' and firemen's association members at Port Stanvac went on strike for six days. The strike occurred because their American employer, Kellogg Overseas Corporation, failed to give them a wage rise after two months of negotiations. The unions are a little more patient these days. Through those years of the sixties and onwards, my father participated in a number of strikes, and I know that, without unions having our backs in those days and Bob Hawke as a key unionist, we would have struggled.

In 1964, members of the amalgamated engineering union, the Australasian society of engineers, the Electrical Trades Union and the ironworkers and boilermakers' union all went on strike after their employer refused their request to negotiate their conditions of employment. This type of industrial environment, where the bosses had such disregard for their workers that they would not even meet with their representatives, was very challenging for workers, not just from a material perspective but also from an emotional one.

Even now, workers do not want to take industrial action to force an employer to negotiate fair and reasonable wages and working conditions. They only do so when things are so bad that there is no other option. I know that when my father and the millions of workers like him in those environments knew that they had a prime minister elected in 1983—Bob, the man at the top—who would look after them, they were relieved. That is what Bob did: he looked after Australians, and he connected with us.

Bob brought unions, employers and the government together to negotiate the Prices and Incomes Accord, which created industrial peace. In a speech to the ACTU Congress in 1987, Bob said that his government had seen:

…a 60 per cent reduction in the number of working days lost through industrial disputes—a record which forever must condemn the industrial relations practices and attitudes of the conservatives in government.

This is the glorious part of the legacy that Bob bestowed upon Australia. He showed us that when workers feel respected, when they feel listened to, when they have the basic right to have their say over their working lives and, God forbid, a small pay rise to keep up with the cost of living, the whole country works a lot better. The country is better now. The economy and society are better when the government works for all Australians.

Bob also taught us that economic markets could be opened up to the world while protecting the society in which they operate. It was an enormous challenge, and in this respect Bob was the people's prime minister; he looked out for the people first and, lo and behold, the economic spoils followed. Instead of letting the market rip and trying to pick up the pieces afterwards, Bob's government made sure that the economy worked for the people. It seems strange to have to make the point that the government should represent the interests of the people, but apparently we still need to have this argument over and over again.

Bob showed us why a people-centred approach is good not only for the health of a society but also for the health of an economy. Yes, we loved Bob's common touch. We loved his larrikin style and, as a girl who grew up watching Test Cricket on the black and white television during summer holidays, I know we loved it when he celebrated our America's Cup win. When he said, 'Any boss who sacks anyone for not turning up today is a bum,' it is something we will always remember.

This was Bob's quintessential Australian charm, but what we loved most of all was what Bob did for Australians: delivering universal health care through Medicare, striving for gender equity and caring for our natural environment. Bob was the people's prime minister and that is why the people loved him. My family loved him, our community loved him and I loved him. He was the first prime minister I voted for. We could see that he always put us first. This simple idea is at the heart of the Labor Party purpose, just as it sat in the heart of Bob's legacy. Bob's vision is Labor's light on the hill. We will miss Bob Hawke. Vale, the Hon. Robert James Lee Hawke.

Ms HILDYARD (Reynell) (12:28): As many others have done in such a lovely way, I also rise to speak today with so much pride and so much admiration for the late former Prime Minister Bob Hawke—a much-loved giant of Australia who was so important to many Australians and who will continue to inspire me and many others.

I first had the incredible pleasure and honour of meeting Bob Hawke in 1993, when I was a very, very young member of the Labor Party, during the federal election campaign for the seat of Hindmarsh. I had the pleasure of hearing him speak, giving a voice to those who felt unheard. I saw how he treated and connected with people, how he valued them and how he brought them together.

I knew from that moment that when you met with and spoke to Bob Hawke your voice was heard. You felt heard; you knew that you had his full attention. You knew that he cared about you, your views and your thoughts and feelings. You also knew that Bob Hawke had that effect on everyone he came into contact with and on the Australian people at large. He was an authentic leader and a thoroughly decent person. He listened deeply to people, got along with them and fought for what he and they believed in. He relentlessly built consensus around what mattered.

Bob Hawke was an incredibly popular leader because of this genuine, authentic, inclusive leadership. He was hugely popular and never a populist. He created and progressed our discourse, and discourse across the globe, on some of the biggest challenges our nation and our world confronted. He was so clever, so sharp, and his abundance of wisdom was equally matched by an abundance of an innate ability to organise people, to build collective sentiment and voice on those issues that required depth of thought, discussion and commitment, on those issues that required effective, genuine leadership and that inspired and engendered such leadership in others.

As Barrie Cassidy said, Bob Hawke was disgusted with apartheid in South Africa and absolutely could not abide the timid responses around the world. He led responses that were absolutely not timid, that were brave, that set an example of what global leadership against human atrocities and racism should look like. He abhorred racism and he tackled it head-on. He encouraged conversation about it, and he led the way in that conversation here in Australia and beyond.

His signing of the Barunga Statement, his work to amend the Aboriginal Lands Right Act to return Uluru Kata Tjuta National Park to the Anangu people, and his deep and sincere listening to Aboriginal people were a measure of his understanding of and compassion about dispossession and the need for justice, for reparation, for reconciliation. His leading with an intolerance to racism saw him inspiring global actions to stamp it out. This is and was a mark of his ability to have courageous conversations around the issues that have shaped our views as a nation and characterised what we stand for. They were and are a mark of his unbridled ability to build consensus.

I absolutely thank Bob Hawke for his rejection of racism and all that divides us and for building consensus against hatred. I also thank him for his bold, visionary leadership on the environment, against the damming of the Franklin and mining in Antarctica and Kakadu. Whether you agreed with him or not, the positions he secured on these issues through bold conversations, through taking a long-term view and through bringing people together to deeply thrash out these issues, helped to shape the focus on the environment by our nation that remains today. Bob Hawke brought environmental issues into our national discourse and international consciousness. He saw how integral to our future that discourse was and he pursued it without fear.

As others have, and as millions of Australians do to this day, I recognise and heartily thank our much-loved former Prime Minister Hawke for his vision, which gave us universal, accessible and affordable health care, which gave us Medicare. Before this outstanding signature reform driven by Bob Hawke, Australian families were at risk of being pushed into poverty every time a family member required a hospital visit, needed to see a specialist, or was forced to grapple with long-term illness.

This reform was all about both fairness and security. It utterly characterised the ideal of every Australian having a fair go, having access to the support they need, particularly when things were tough. It also ensured financial security and peace of mind. It was a safety net that meant people did seek the treatment they needed, that they went to the doctor when they needed to without fear that doing so would send them broke—a fear real in my family and in so many others.

Medicare was the biggest and greatest Australian social reform, and it continues to characterise our nation's desire and commitment to fairness, to equality of opportunity and to ensuring that everyone could access basic support when they needed it. It continues to improve people's lives to this very day.

I also deeply thank Bob Hawke for fighting for the rights of working people, for decent wages, for equality in the workplace, for super, for secure jobs and for leading our Australian union movement in the way that he did. He was at the centre of change in our industrial relations system and in our economy. Like no other, he brought together every group in our economy to strike the accord. In doing so, he reshaped our economy, but at every point he ensured that the hopes of working people were heard and enabled. He fought for workers and, through the sheer force of his wisdom, of his charisma and of his negotiating skills and ability to organise, he resolved disputes for the benefit of all.

One of my fondest memories of Bob Hawke will continue to be singing Solidarity Forever with him at an ACTU Congress and my reflections at that time and since about how his energy, his force, his sheer humanity, his love for all people and his deep commitment to achieving equality made such a difference to so many and inspired them to fight for their rights in a system that enabled them to do so.

I know there is much celebrated about Bob's remarkable ability to down a yard glass of beer in under 12 seconds—very impressive and a feat that did a lot for Australian breweries and the beer industry. However, there is also a lot to celebrate about the time when he did not drink, when he bravely grappled with alcoholism and when, whilst he served in parliament, he refused to touch a drop and, when he did so, courageously went through such a hard personal transformation in the most public of environments.

There is so much to remember and celebrate about Bob's character: his incredible intellect; his charisma; his incredible ability to just talk well with all people, to have a chat, listen and get along with literally anyone, and not just get along but make people know that they were important; his vision; his leadership on the global stage; his building of relationships that have positively shaped our nation; and his desire to fight for fairness to ensure that everyone was treated with dignity and respect.

Today, I thank Bob Hawke for his incredibly strong, authentic and inclusive leadership, for being a giant of real reform that touched people's lives and that helped them. I thank him for his humanity, his wisdom, his love for Australia, and indeed for all people, his capacity to love well and to be well loved and for changing our nation for the better forever. Solidarity forever, Bob Hawke. You will continue to inspire me, our party and our nation. My love and condolences to your loved ones.

Mr HUGHES (Giles) (12:37): I also rise to say a few words about Bob Hawke. A lot of his amazing life has been covered, as a union leader, a politician and a prime minister, and also the contribution that he made after retiring from politics. Much has been said about what a transformative government it was, ably led by Bob Hawke, but with an amazing team around him.

There is also the impact of the people who made up that ministry as part of that cabinet. As a nation, we still bear the very positive mark of much that was done then in transforming the economy: opening up the Australian economy and the reduction of tariffs, the deregulation of financial markets and the floating of the dollar. As was said, these were brave decisions. In hindsight, there appeared to be some sort of consensus about these decisions, but there was not. A lot of people within the Labor Party at the time would have been doubtful about this particular direction.

However, given the intellectual calibre of Bob Hawke and the calibre of the cabinet, those changes were introduced, and the important element—and it has been touched on repeatedly—was that those changes were twinned with very significant social reform. The wages accord has been mentioned, as has Medicare, a stand-out piece of policy that has made a profound difference to the lives of a lot of people.

When you look at healthcare systems around the world, it is universal healthcare systems that make those countries that have not gone in that direction pale when it comes to health outcomes. Medicare is now part of the institutional framework of this country, but we should always be vigilant because there have been attempts in the past to undermine and destroy it. Indeed, Medibank, the first equivalent of Medicare, which was introduced by the Whitlam government, was removed.

There were actions taken in relation to the environment. The last wild river, the Franklin River in Tasmania, would not be here now if it were not for the Hawke government. There was the work done at Kakadu. The Antarctic has been mentioned. The role Australia played when it came to the Antarctic has been forgotten. There was an incredibly strong environmental legacy. The changes to the age pension were important changes. Compulsory superannuation was an important change, and the changes to higher education—and I was at uni when some of those changes occurred—were also incredibly important reforms.

One of the things that stands out for me as a person from Whyalla was that, in the early 1980s, I worked in the steel industry as a steel deseamer. The 1983 election that Hawke won is often referred to, but the important election for people at Whyalla, Port Kembla and Newcastle was the election held on 1 December 1984. There was a minor swing against the Hawke government, but it did go into that election. Hawke went into that election with a 75 per cent approval rating, which is pretty astounding in this day and age, so they comfortably won that election.

The important thing for communities like mine is that they made this commitment before going into the election—that within 100 days of being re-elected they would develop a steel plan. The steel industry in Australia at that time back in the mid-1980s—I feel a bit of deja vu, having been elected in 2014 and knowing what the steel industry faced recently—faced an existential crisis. The leadership provided by the Hawke government through the Button steel plan was what got that industry at that time through that crisis.

The leadership that was demonstrated took into account that the changes that needed to happen in the steel industry would have a marked effect upon communities like Whyalla, Port Kembla and Newcastle. There was that assistance to put in place structural assistance packages. These packages are always hit and miss, and it would serve us all well to bear in mind the nature of these packages, what works, what does not work, why it works and why it does not work.

We have a legacy in Whyalla today where the steelworks continue to fight another day, but the pain that was exacted over a period was very significant. We went from an industry in Whyalla that employed over 6,000 people to one that employed around 2,000 people, but without the leadership of the Hawke government at that time we would not have a steel industry in this country. They intervened in the market. They worked with both BHP and the union movement to put in place a tripartite agreement that called for no compulsory redundancies, so there were voluntary redundancies over an extended period of time. To me, that was incredibly important.

I remember my dad, who was an active trade unionist and a fitter at the steelworks, in these negotiations saying, 'These are not our jobs to give away.' They were thinking about the people who were going to come after who would need work but realised they had to compromise because if they had taken a pig-headed view towards this, the result would have been no steel industry.

I look back on those Hawke years with gratitude and gratitude on behalf of my community. It is interesting to reflect on the crisis that the steel industry went through. Even though it is still a national industry, it was left to this previous state government to provide the leadership and the drive, even though, within the steel industry nationally, more people were employed outside South Australia than within South Australia. That is not to say that the federal government did not do anything, but they were not as willing as the Hawke government to demonstrate that degree of leadership.

There is much to be thankful for in Australia. Our economy has not been in recession for almost 30 years and a lot of that to do with the solid foundations that were put place in by the Hawke-Keating government. Of the social reforms that were carried out, most are still with us today to the great advantage of our nation. Vale, Bob Hawke.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN (Lee) (12:46): I rise to speak in support of the condolence motion moved by the Premier and seconded by the Leader of the Opposition. As a nation, we deeply mourn the passing of Robert James Lee Hawke, Australia's 23rd Prime Minister. For those of us in the labour movement, few will ever reach the level of admiration and adoration we share for the man who insisted he be called Bob. He became the heart and soul of the Labor Party.

Much has been said and I am sure will continue to be said about the incredible service Bob Hawke gave to the country and to the people he loved—and the people loved Bob. In fact, during his first term in office, Hawke received the highest popularity ratings of any prime minister since the introduction of public opinion polls. He was a political leader the likes of which Australia had never seen.

Born in Bordertown to a congregationalist minister, Clem, and a schoolteacher, Ellie, Bob was raised in a loving family environment. The sudden death in 1939 of his older brother, Neil, after contracting meningitis brought the Hawke family closer together, and Bob was smothered and even more loved by his protective and upstanding parents. This parental love gave Bob a deep-set sense of self-worth and self-confidence that lasted throughout his life. It informed his approach to everything that he undertook from then on.

From an early age, Bob's mother and father believed he was destined for greatness, instilling in him a great sense of social obligation and compassion for his fellow man. After an impressive academic career, with tertiary studies culminating in a Rhodes Scholarship that took him to University College in Oxford, he embarked on his first full-time job at the Australian Council of Trade Unions at the age of 26. There, he rose up through the ranks and in 10 years, before he was 40 years of age, he held the ACTU's top job.

An excellent conciliator, Hawke effectively resolved many national industrial disputes. He was respected by workers and also by employers and maintained his principles and the priorities of those he was representing throughout the disputes he sought to resolve. He played a key role against much public sentiment in highlighting the dreadful realities of apartheid in South Africa, eventually turning public opinion in Australia against the policy.

Hawke knew what he stood for, but he also knew the value of working with others and bringing people together. As Prime Minister, Hawke's strong belief in governing by consensus saw him achieve extraordinary success by brokering agreement between business and the workers in the pursuit of economic growth. Like Labor's 1983 election slogan, 'Bringing Australia Together', Hawke's consensus style was evident right from the very start.

A month after taking office, Hawke held a national economic summit aimed at forming a national consensus on economic policy, involving all political parties, unions and employer organisations. Hawke believed that ignorance is the enemy of good policy and so every participant at the summit was provided with the same information on the state of the national economy and the challenges it faced as what was presented to the government in a way that had never been done before.

Remarkably, the summit culminated in a near unanimous communiqué—unanimous except, of course, for Queensland premier, Joh Bjelke-Petersen—whereby participants agreed with the analysis of the economy but also accepted what needed to be done to turn around Australia's economic woes. Indeed, much of the economic success of the period beyond 1983 stemmed from the summit.

Improvements in economic performance were pursued by other consultative means, including a tax summit, the economic planning and advisory council and the Australian Labor advisory council. The historic tax package of 1985 saw the top marginal tax rate cut from 60 per cent to 49 per cent and for average wage earners from 46 per cent to 40 per cent. New progressive taxes on capital gains and fringe benefits were introduced, along with the closing of tax loopholes.

Double taxation on company dividends was abolished with a lift in the company tax rate to help finance the reform. The level of industrial disputes dropped and the only prolonged dispute was with the airline pilots in 1989, in which the government intervened to protect general pay restraint. As Australia's longest serving prime minister, Hawke presided over an historic shift from a protectionist to a free-trade economy, embracing market-based reforms that reshaped our economy and exposed it to the world, delivering benefits to all Australians and increasing national prosperity.

The Labor government, led by Hawke, was transformational for our country. No government before or since has pursued and delivered such a broad and lasting suite of economic, social and environmental changes. His leadership did not drive all the reforms, but his cabinet, often noted by historians and commentators as one of the most talented in the nation's history, drove much of this reform. Hawke's role as their leader and prime minister was to help drive the political support for these policies, within the Labor caucus, inside the parliament and throughout the community.

The economic reforms of the Hawke government are well known by most now: reducing tariffs, floating the dollar, reforming the tax system, deregulating the financial system and introducing superannuation. These reforms were often hotly contested, particularly from the then Liberal opposition, despite what more recent political commentators have claimed to be broad-based support for these reforms. Can anyone imagine a current federal government issuing 16 new banking licences into the market at once? These were extraordinary reforms. They re-enlivened the recommendations of the Campbell report into the financial system, which had lain dormant under the previous Fraser government since 1981.

Equally as impressive were the generational advances in social and environmental policy: the introduction of Medicare, Landcare, the higher education contribution scheme, negotiating the Prices and Incomes Accord, increasing school funding to improve retention rates and doubling childcare places across the country. He moved to stop the damming of the Franklin River. His government established the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody. He moved quickly to assist new waves of refugees and migrants into Australia, most notably those fleeing China following the Tiananmen Square massacre.

Abroad, Hawke ran a foreign policy that deepened ties with Asia—most notably with China—and renewed the United States alliance. Fundamentally, though, Hawke showed us what collegial, pragmatic and determinant political leadership can deliver for our country. As prime minister, he set out to lead a country and to change it for the benefit of the community. Hawke later remarked:

The essence of power is the knowledge that what you do is going to have an effect, not just an immediate but perhaps a lifelong effect, on the happiness and wellbeing of millions of people and so I think the essence of power is to be conscious of what it can mean for others.

Importantly, though, Hawke was a man of the people, a leader who could relate to the average Australian. He appeared to move seamlessly between featuring on the world stage with global leaders and speaking with regular Australians simply looking to improve their lives. Perhaps it was his uniquely Australian strengths and flaws, notably his alcoholism, that endeared Hawke to the Australian public. He promised to give up the grog, and he did so when he was prime minister. He was not just a larrikin then: he was also a man of his word.

Through his enormous national profile, Australians also came to observe Hawke as a deeply human and sensitive man, with that sensitive side never far from the surface. Australians saw Bob raw and emotional on television when revealing the extent of his children's battles with drug use, along with the pain and hurt that his infidelities had caused his family and his first wife, Hazel.

Undoubtedly, with a record of securing four election victories from four contests, Hawke shall forever remain one of the true giants of the Labor Party and he stands tall in comparison with all other Australian prime ministers. He will be remembered as a leader who showed the country just what could be achieved by a government.

His government was one that changed our nation, wrenching us economically, socially and environmentally into modernity. His government was responsible for the economic reforms that have given our nation nearly 30 years of unbroken economic growth and massive increases in our standard of living. His government placed the equal entitlement to affordable health care for all Australians at the heart of Australian social and political policy. And, amongst all the reforms, he shaped our national conscience with his leadership on humanitarian issues.

Bob Hawke was a remarkable and, sadly in this day and age, unique politician who showed Australia what is possible for our country. Most of all, he was 'a bloke who loved his country and loved Australians', and he will be deeply missed. Vale, Bob.

Mr PICTON (Kaurna) (12:55): I also rise in condolence on the passing of Robert James Lee Hawke. Along with other members of this house, I was deeply saddened on hearing the news a few weeks ago of the passing of Bob Hawke. As a child of the 1980s, there were two things you knew: Allan Border was captain of the Australian cricket team and Bob Hawke was prime minister. He was certainly an inspiration to me when I was growing up and epitomised what it was to be a politician and what it was to be a political leader.

Bob was a leader who drove consensus. He was a leader who tried to bring Australia together, and he achieved some magnificent reforms in his time as prime minister. With hindsight, those reforms look easy. They look like they were inevitable. They look like everybody supported them. But they were contentious. They took an enormous amount of hard work and convincing to get the Australian people to support some of those very significant reforms, particularly in terms of opening up the Australian economy.

The floating of the dollar has been talked about a lot, but I think some of the big reforms in terms of trade and tariffs were enormously hard to stomach by people on our side of politics in the labour movement, but ultimately a lot of the reforms in the 1980s have led to almost 30 years of continuous economic growth in Australia since then. As I said, he sought to unite Australia. He was elected in 1983 on a platform of reconciliation, of bringing Australia together, and that is what he sought to do and that is why he is so beloved. That is why his passing was such a sore, sad point for so many Australians over the past few weeks.

Of course, we remember some of the big successes in his time as prime minister, with Medicare being number one on that list. This was brought in under the Whitlam government but then abolished under the Fraser government. We have to remember that, through that Medibank reform that was abolished, getting a reform passed does not necessarily mean that it is forever. You have to continuously win elections to convince the Australian people that something should be in place forever. That is what happened with Medicare: it was through the length of the Hawke-Keating government that it became so that the Howard government could not abolish it. It is now supported by the Australian people and no-one would ever dare try to abolish it.

In terms of health, there were many other reforms, including improvements to pharmaceutical benefits, the first ever mental health plan for Australia and the leading work that was done by Neal Blewett, under Hawke's leadership, in tackling HIV, which was a big issue in the 1980s. We really led the world in tackling HIV and AIDS in Australia.

There were many other issues in terms of the environment, such as protecting the Great Barrier Reef, protecting our forests in Tasmania and protecting Antarctica. There are lasting legacies for the Hawke government in terms of opening up Australia to the world not only in terms of the economy but also in terms of our leadership in the world and our position on the world stage. Bob Hawke always made sure that he spoke out against racism in Australia—from apartheid to any other type of racism in Australia.

One of the most important things that is not focused on enough is the work to alleviate poverty in Australia over that period. A huge amount of work was done to reshape social services for housing, child support, child care and family benefits, which brought down child poverty rates substantially and led to a more equitable society. We will significantly remember and thank Bob Hawke for all those things, and he will live forever in our hearts and memories as one of the greatest Australian political leaders ever.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. L.W.K. Bignell.

Sitting suspended from 13:00 to 14:00.

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