John Menadue

As a journalist-bureaucrat 42 years ago, for me nothing illustrated more the bewildering speed of Gough Whitlam’s rollercoaster reforms than the removal of the last vestiges of the White Australia policy.

I was publications editor for the Australian Information Service in Canberra, then Australia’s apolitical, overseas information agency. Part of my job was to produce the Australia Handbook which, with a print run of multiple thousands, was sent to our high commissions and embassies around the world for distribution.

It was traditionally a dull, military-style manual, printed in black and white, updated each year by government departments and sought to give a comprehensive, factual account of Australia from its beginnings to its current economic, social and cultural achievements.

Fresh from Fleet Street, I introduced full-colour, including a wraparound cover showing the yet-to- be opened Sydney Opera House, and revamped the layout and text.  Inevitably, there were delays, but with the election of the Whitlam government in December 1972, we were confident, with the book complete in those early weeks of 1973, there would be mostly minor changes for that year’s edition.

But extensive changes were ordered. The revision was a nightmare; the book was on film and the amendments had to be laboriously stripped in.

Poring over the revised text, I worried especially about the section on immigration which noted that following the 1966 policy review, it had been possible for non-Europeans ”to be considered for entry as migrants: Applications are considered individually on their merits, and approval is subject to their capacity to integrate…

“Most approved applicants have been people eligible to practise in the professions in Australia. The application and approval rates have been increasing gradually though the numbers remain relatively limited. Non-Europeans are admitted as visitors, for business or as tourists…”

Then – startlingly – Australia’s objective to maintaining a “homogeneous” society. I knew enough from Whitlam’s pronouncements that the White Australia policy was on the way out and took the text to a senior journalist colleague in the Immigration Department.

The next few minutes, as he phoned a superior, were straight out of Yes, Minister, my colleague echoing, “Leave it in…take it out… leave it in…take it…” We took it out.

We didn’t catch up in that edition with significant steps which, as the Immigration Department now notes in a fact sheet, the Whitlam government was to take later in 1973: legislating that all migrants of whatever origin be eligible for citizenship after three years’ permanent residence; issuing policy instructions to overseas posts to totally disregard race as a factor in the selection of migrants; and ratifying all international agreements relating to immigration and race.

We did manage to squeeze in the announcement that from the 1974 academic year fees would be abolished at universities, college of advanced education and technical colleges, and that the government planned to discuss with the states assuming full responsibility for financing tertiary education.

Medicare, still some time off, didn’t make the book, but we told how patients could insure themselves for hospital treatment through voluntary membership of non-profit health insurance organisations, contributions ranging from 70c to $1.90 a week for families.

We reported the maximum weekly rate for unemployment benefits was $17 “with lesser rates for unmarried younger people,” but noted it was proposed to increase the rate for a married couple to $37.50 and single people to $21.50.

We highlighted the mineral boom, pointing out the resources accounted for about a quarter of all our exports with manufacturing growing “spectacularly”, contributing  more than a quarter of GDP (that’s now halved). And we said the Snowy Mountains Hydro-electric Scheme, begun in 1949, was nearing completion.

On the Arts, we quoted Prime Minister Whitlam that a new Australia Council for the Arts would be created with seven boards, ranging from Theatre to Aboriginal Arts. We pictured Professor A.D. Hope as one of the nation’s distinguished poets and told how movies like Wake in Fright were creating interest overseas.

On international affairs, we complemented Australia’s increasing focus on participation in regional associations and relations with Asian and Pacific nations with a full-page picture of Indonesia’s President Sukarno. On Defence, we said Australia’s strike aircraft included Canberra bombers and Mirage fighters. Among sporting stars, we named Olympic gold medallist Shane Gould and tennis champions Evonne Goolagong and Margaret Court.

The book had prolific statistics; among them, Australia’s population was estimated at 13 million, Aborigines at 140,000 and expected to double by the end of the 20^th century.

John Coleman is a freelance journalist and travel writer.

 

 

It is difficult to make this speech – so much to say about this great man and his times.

I observed him from a number of angles:

• Working with Tom Uren and Gough Whitlam on urban policy proposals before the elections.
• Assisting my friends Peter Wilenski and James Spigelman in their work on the administrative orders for the new government.
• As Uren’s principal advisor for the first year I attended that amazing two man Cabinet meeting when we made the first great installment on changing Australia.
• During the first year of the government I was closely involved in a number of critical issues.
• Finally I worked as the PM’s principal private secretary in the five months before the coup.

And coup it was, make no mistake about that.

A coup which was successful because of one of the PM’s most enduring qualities – an assumption that people would behave properly and constitutionally.  During the crisis, which was totally engineered by typical dishonourable acts and subterfuges by the Right, the PM’s central focus was to preserve Australian (and British) parliamentary tradition, namely that governments are made in the People’s house.  This belief mirrored his commitment to ‘one vote one value’.

He assumed, wrongly, that his determined opponents, and especially the Governor General, would be similarly motivated. A person with a more cynical view of people may have been less trusting.  But then that person wouldn’t have been Gough Whitlam.

His approach to policy reflected this.

Gough Whitlam believed that governments can do good things for people. This was a view shared by others in the days which were before the Right launched its propaganda war to convince everyone that governments were the problem rather than the solution.

Gough Whitlam’s approach to policy also reflected the realist tradition of Sydney University:  a thing is a fact only if it exists; any number particulars do not prove a general proposition.

He therefore was a shining example of The Enlightenment.

As such, he had difficulty in accepting those who would not face the facts – those whose views were driven by love of the past, superstitious dogma or cyclical political advantage.

This, and his prodigious capacity for work and his legendary (and, for staffers, disquieting) memory for detail, drove The Program.  During the long years of Opposition he worked on it: rational, transforming, exciting.

Assuming others would share his analysis, The Program was to be implemented. Unfortunately the quantity and quantity of his front bench too often meant some were not up to the tasks he set.  The Program was too rational for some, too rushed for others, not sufficiently flexible to respond to changing economic settings.

But enough was achieved to make a real and beneficial difference to many lives.  Nobody else in Australia’s short history can claim to doing so much good.  For that we can be grateful for Gough Whitlam’s long and productive life.

 

John Mant is currently a Councillor on the City of Sydney Council.

The Honourable (Edward) Gough Whitlam, AC QC

State Memorial Service

The Honourable Antony Whitlam QC

Sydney Town Hall

5 November 2014

 

Auntie Millie Ingram gave a moving Welcome to Country. I also wish to acknowledge the Gadigal people of the Eora nation on whose land this notable building stands. I pay respect to Gadigal elders – past and present – and to so many other indigenous Australians we are honoured to have join with us today, including members of Vincent Lingiari’s family.

This is a celebration of the life of Edward Gough Whitlam. I shall try to remember that.

Gough himself, when speaking on occasions like this, had a tendency to become so enthusiastic in his advocacy of projects associated with the departed person that the subject of the proceedings rated only a cursory mention.

I am Gough’s eldest child. The only advantage primogeniture appears to have given me upon my father’s death, is this speaking slot.

Gough, of course, would have loved to speak today, but the rules of the game necessarily disqualify him. That is just as well because I gather the Town Hall is booked tomorrow!

There can be no complaint about Gough’s family cycle. True, his dear wife of nearly 70 years, our mother Margaret, predeceased him. But they both far exceeded all actuarial estimates for their generation.

Gough’s only sister, Freda, survives him and we are delighted that she is here today.

All Gough’s children are here today. There are four of us – and that is now the final count. I say this because, not so long ago, when Gough was growing older and more frail and, as Catherine says, more lovable, a visitor to his office politely asked how many children he had. Gough looked up and answered: “Four” and then with a cheeky smile and eyes glinting he added: “…….. so far”. Gough was also a much loved patriarch for his grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Today’s speeches remind us of Gough’s purpose in life. They were delivered with power and beauty that leave us all in awe.

Cate is a woman of courage and conviction who refuses to be boxed in by her talent in theatre and in cinema. Noel is an iconoclast of great forensic skill, with a poet’s gift for language that he employs tirelessly in the interests of all Australians. Coming from a younger generation, their assessments of Gough’s impact are especially satisfying. Cate and Noel have added great lustre to this occasion.

Graham and John are, of course, of the Labor Party. Graham was Gough’s collaborator from the time he became Leader. John was Gough’s closest friend and confidant in the last years of his life. They are both family, and they know how grateful we are to them for what they have had to say.

Gough’s time in government was the pinnacle of his career. It is a particular pleasure, therefore, that Doug McClelland, Les Johnson, Kep Enderby and of course, Paul Keating, are here with us today. Unfortunately Bill Hayden and Tom Uren are unwell and cannot attend. Bill’s moving tribute to Gough is etched in our hearts and minds.

For Gough, public service remained the most noble pursuit and there was no more important or honourable occupation than being a member of parliament. All his life he placed his faith in parliamentary government, responsible government and the two-party system.

To the end of his days Gough was conscious that he owed everything that he had been able to achieve in government to the selfless efforts of members of the Australian Labor Party and to the confidence placed in him by so many of them.

The media coverage of Gough’s death has been generous, and we have been greatly touched by the affection and respect from the public.

There has, of course, been an information overload about the details of Gough’s life. However, I will flesh out two subjects.

First, the matter of religion. Gough’s irreverent wit should not be misconstrued. It is true that Gough himself was not a religious person. However he grew up in a strongly religious household. His mother came from a prominent Baptist family in Melbourne. In Canberra Gough’s parents and his sister became Presbyterians. At the Canberra Grammar School, Gough repositioned himself as an Anglican. He married our mother Margaret in the Church of England, and he was astute to have each of us baptised and confirmed.

Gough’s sister, Freda, was moderator of the Uniting Church in this state.

Gough’s love of history informed a broad knowledge of religion. As children we were aware of this early. To keep us occupied on long car trips there were no video games or sing-alongs. Rather we were bombarded with the most exquisite detail of the doctrine and liturgy in different rites of the Christian Church. Gough did not claim to be a scholar, but he did have a lifelong fascination with religion.

Gough employed religious imagery in his speech. Many of his attempts at self-parody about matters divine have been recalled with evident amusement during the past fortnight.  As I have said, Gough himself was not a religious person, but by his background and disposition he did not scoff at people who were religious and he was genuinely respectful of their beliefs and moral values. They included many of his closest friends.

In every way, Gough was ever keen to inculcate in his children the virtues of religious tolerance. Plain courtesy and consideration for others was a big part of that. And of course, this was more than just religious tolerance. It was a quality that informed so much of what he aspired to do for our society as a whole.

Now a little more biography and geography.

In 1947 our family (comprising Gough, Margaret, me and Nick) moved to Cronulla. When Gough entered parliament in 1952, his seat of Werriwa included the whole of the Sutherland Shire and extended all the way down to Helensburgh and right across to Liverpool. My favourite boyhood memory of election campaigning with my father is of him trawling for votes, armed with a loud speaker, not being driven along streets in a flat-bed truck or a van, but motoring along the Woronora River in a “tinny”.

In 1955 there was a redistribution, and the Shire and points south were cut out of Werriwa. The new seat extended along an axis north from Liverpool to the western edge of Parramatta at Wentworthville. So at the end of the school year in 1957 the family (now increased with the addition of Stephen and Catherine) moved to a new house at Cabramatta. That is where Gough and Margaret lived until he became Prime Minister. He never had a flat in town. During the whole of that time (for the last 13 years of which Gough was successively Deputy Leader and Leader of the Parliamentary Labor Party, with functions to attend all over the metropolis), if he was in Sydney, Gough slept at home in Cabramatta.

Against that background, you can imagine my surprise, in the wash-up of Gough’s death, to read one of the more antic commentators thrillingly expose “the myth that Whitlam was a western suburbs kid made good”. I had never heard of such a myth. Has anyone? I did know that he had lived most of his adult life far from the centre of town in two houses built on unsewered blocks of land.

I did know that for 20 years he had been an energetic local member in western Sydney where he had witnessed the problems of its rapid development, and where, with his vast knowledge of European culture, and the history of the Mediterranean people, he accorded unfeigned respect and dignity to all the area’s many immigrants.

After parliament Gough remained vigorously engaged in our national public debate on many issues. Constitutional reform and equality of electoral enrolment spring to mind, but it is difficult to think of a significant topic on which he did not feel obliged to express a view.

It was a brilliant decision of Bob Hawke’s government to send him to UNESCO. It got him out of the way and it allowed Gough to employ his great talents in the interests of world heritage and culture.

Many talented and dedicated men and women have served on Gough’s personal staff. Until he became Deputy Leader in 1960 there was only his electorate secretary, the late Norma Thompson, whom we always knew as Miss Thompson. She operated from a corner in his office in the old Federal Members Rooms in the Commonwealth Bank’s “money box” building in Martin Place.

Of the others engaged over the last half century, it would be invidious to single anybody out. They all endured his occasional changes in temperament, but at the same time they will all know how much he valued the contribution of each of them. It is truly gratifying that so many of them have taken the trouble to join us here today.

Stamina is an essential ingredient in the make-up of any successful politician. Gough was lucky enough to have it in spades for most of his life.

For the past few years, Gough has lived in an aged care facility at Lulworth where he was wonderfully looked after by everyone.

Until the last couple of months Gough continued to go into his office four times a week. There were also increasingly frequent attendances upon all kinds of health professionals. Again I will not single anybody out. They know how grateful we are to each of them for their skill and care.

The grace and serenity with which Gough accepted the decline in his health were quite striking. My brothers and I owe a particular debt to our sister, Catherine.

The man whose appearance always brightened up his demeanour and to whom all his children are forever indebted for his devotion and love, is his driver, Michael Vlassopoulos.

This is a State Memorial Service. Prime Minister, we are most grateful to you for authorising this occasion.

We are also conscious of the great honour done us by the presence of HE the Governor-General, HE Lady Cosgrove and so many other distinguished persons and representatives of foreign governments who have gathered with Gough’s family, friends and supporters here today.

It is a particular pleasure to welcome so many from Papua New Guinea, including Prime Minister O’Neill and Gough’s old friend, Grand Chief Michael Somare.

At the start of today the genius of William Barton reminded us that we are here in Australia, a land where the indigenous peoples have lived for thousands of years. The road to reconciliation and recognition started with the Whitlam government, but it should be remembered that its land rights proposals were in substance implemented by Malcolm Fraser’s government.

The attendance of representatives from the Gurindji people is a truly humbling testament to Gough’s legacy.

Events at Wave Hill are the subject of the moving song written and performed today by Paul Kelly and Kev Carmody. This song was written in the early 1990s around the time of Paul Keating’s great Redfern speech. Soon after, a brilliant young aboriginal lawyer called Noel Pearson came to public attention in the wake of the Native Title cases. The road ahead may be tortuous and difficult for all Australians but we need not be divided on partisan lines.

The artistry of the orchestra and choirs today has been sublime and utterly spellbinding. Gough’s idiosyncratic predilections in the music for this occasion have been brilliantly vindicated.

The next piece, Jerusalem, was the recessional hymn at Margaret’s memorial service. William Blake was, just like Gough, a radical. An Oxford theology professor has written that the words of this poem “stress the importance of people taking responsibility for change and building a better society”.

In that spirit, it is a fitting piece to end the celebration of Gough’s life, and the symmetry provides a neat memory for us.

Thank you all for coming.

The Honourable (Edward) Gough Whitlam, AC QC

State Memorial Service

Noel Pearson

Sydney Town Hall

5 November 2014

 

Paul Keating said the reward for public life is public progress.

For one born estranged from the nation’s citizenship, into a humble family of a marginal people striving in the teeth of poverty and discrimination, today it is assuredly no longer the case.

Rather, my signal honour today on behalf of more people than I could ever know, is to express our immense gratitude for the public service of this old man.

I once took him on a tour to my village and we spoke about the history of the mission and my youth under the Government of his nemesis, Queensland Premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen.

My home was an Aboriginal reserve under a succession of Queensland laws commencing in 1897.

These laws were notoriously discriminatory and the bureaucratic apparatus controlling the reserves maintained vigil over the smallest details concerning its charges.

Superintendents held vast powers and a cold and capricious beauracracy presided over this system for too long in the 20^th century.

In June 1975, the Whitlam Government enacted the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders Queensland Discrimatory Laws Act.

The law put to purpose the power conferred upon the Commonwealth Parliament by the 1967 referendum, finally outlawing the discrimination my father and his father lived under since my grandfather was removed to the mission as a boy and to which I was subject the first 10 years of my life.

Powers regulating residency on reserves without a permit, the power of reserve managers to enter private premises without the consent of the householder, legal representation and appeal from court decisions, the power of reserve managers to arbitrarily direct people to work, and the terms and conditions of employment, were now required to treat Aboriginal Queenslanders on the same footing as other Australians.

We were at last free from those discriminations that humiliated and degraded our people.

The companion to this enactment, which would form the architecture of indigenous human rights akin to the Civil Rights Act 1965 in the United States, was the Racial Discrimination Act.

It was in Queensland under Bjelke-Petersen that its importance became clear.

In 1976 a Wik man from Aurukun on the western Cape York Peninsula, John Koowarta, sought to purchase the Archer Bend pastoral lease from its white owner.

The Queensland Government refused the sale. The High Court’s decision in Koowarta versus Bjelke-Petersen upheld the Racial Discrimination Act as a valid exercise of the external affairs powers of the Commonwealth.

However, in an act of spite, the Queensland Government converted the lease into the Acher Bend National Park.

Old man Koowarta died a broken man, the winner of a landmark High Court precedent but the victim of an appalling discrimination.

The Racial Discrimination Act was again crucial in 1982 when a group of Murray Islanders led by Eddie Mabo claimed title under the common law to their traditional homelands in the Torres Strait.

In 1985 Bjelke-Petersen sought to kill the Murray Islanders’ case by enacting a retrospective extinguishment of any such title.

There was no political or media uproar against Bjelke-Petersen’s law. There was no public condemnation of the state’s manuover. There was no redress anywhere in the democratic forums or procedures of the state or the nation.

If there were no Racial Discrimination Act that would have been the end of it. Land rights would have been dead, there would never have been a Mabo case in 1992, there would have been no Native Title Act under Prime Minister Keating in 1993.

Without this old man the land and human rights of our people would never have seen the light of day.

There would never have been Mabo and its importance to the history of Australia would have been lost without the Whitlam program.

Only those who have known discrimination truly know its evil.

Only those who have never experienced prejudice can discount the importance of the Racial Discrimination Act.

This old man was one of those rare people who never suffered discrimination but understood the importance of protection from its malice.

On this day we will recall the repossession of the Gurindji of Wave Hill, when the Prime Minister said, “Vincent Lingiari, I solemnly hand to you these deeds as proof in Australian law that these lands belong to the Gurindji people and I put into your hands this piece of earth itself as a sign that we restore them to you and your children forever.”

It was this old man’s initiative with the Woodward Royal Commission that led to Prime Minister Fraser’s enactment of the Aboriginal Land Rights Northern Territory Act, legislation that would see more than half of the territory restored to its traditional owners.

Of course recalling the Whitlam Government’s legacy has been, for the past four decades since the dismissal, a fraught and partisan business.

Assessments of those three highly charged years and their aftermath divide between the nostalgia and fierce pride of the faithful, and the equally vociferous opinion that the Whitlam years represented the nadir of national government in Australia. Let me venture a perspective.

The Whitlam government is the textbook case of reform trumping management.

In less than three years an astonishing reform agenda leapt off the policy platform and into legislation and the machinery and programs of government.

The country would change forever. The modern cosmopolitan Australia finally emerged like a technicolour butterfly from its long dormant chrysalis.

And 38 years later we are like John Cleese, Eric Idle and Michael Palin’s Jewish insurgents ranting against the despotic rule of Rome, defiantly demanding “and what did the Romans ever do for us anyway?”

Apart from Medibank and the Trade Practices Act, cutting tariff protections and no-fault divorce in the Family Law Act, the Australia Council, the Federal Court, the Order of Australia, federal legal aid, the Racial Discrimination Act, needs-based schools funding, the recognition of China, the abolition of conscription, the law reform commission, student financial assistance, the Heritage Commission, non-discriminatory immigration rules, community health clinics, Aboriginal land rights, paid maternity leave for public servants, lowering the minimum voting age to 18 years and fair electoral boundaries and Senate representation for the territories.

Apart from all of this, what did this Roman ever do for us?

And the Prime Minister with that classical Roman mien, one who would have been as naturally garbed in a toga as a safari suit, stands imperiously with twinkling eyes and that slight self-mocking smile playing around his mouth, in turn infuriating his enemies and delighting his followers.

There is no need for nostalgia and yearning for what might have been.

The achievements of this old man are present in the institutions we today take for granted and played no small part in the progress of modern Australia.

There is no need to regret three years was too short. Was any more time needed? The breadth and depth of the reforms secured in that short and tumultuous period were unprecedented, and will likely never again be repeated.

The devil-may-care attitude to management as opposed to reform is unlikely to be seen again by governments whose priorities are to retain power rather than reform.

The Whitlam program as laid out in the 1972 election platform consisted three objectives: to promote equality, to involve the people of Australia in the decision-making processes of our land, and to liberate the talents and uplift the horizons of the Australian people.

This program is as fresh as it was when first conceived. It scarcely could be better articulated today.

Who would not say the vitality of our democracy is a proper mission of government and should not be renewed and invigorated.

Who can say that liberating the talents and uplifting the horizons of Australians is not a worthy charter for national leadership?

It remains to mention the idea of promoting equality. My chances in this nation were a result of the Whitlam program. My grandparents and parents could never have imagined the doors that opened to me which were closed to them.

I share this consciousness with millions of my fellow Australians whose experiences speak in some way or another to the great power of distributed opportunity.

I don’t know why someone with this old man’s upper middle class background could carry such a burning conviction that the barriers of class and race of the Australia of his upbringing and maturation should be torn down and replaced with the unapologetic principle of equality.

I can scarcely point to any white Australian political leader of his vintage and of generations following of whom it could be said without a shadow of doubt, he harboured not a bone of racial, ethnic or gender prejudice in his body.

This was more than urbane liberalism disguising human equivocation and private failings; it was a modernity that was so before its time as to be utterly anachronistic.

For people like me who had no chance if left to the means of our families we could not be more indebted to this old man’s foresight and moral vision for universal opportunity.

Only those born bereft truly know the power of opportunity. Only those accustomed to its consolations can deprecate a public life dedicated to its furtherance and renewal. This old man never wanted opportunity himself but he possessed the keenest conviction in its importance.

For it behoves the good society through its government to ensure everyone has chance and opportunity.

This is where the policy convictions of Prime Minister Whitlam were so germane to the uplift of many millions of Australians.

We salute this old man for his great love and dedication to his country and to the Australian people.

When he breathed he truly was Australia’s greatest white elder and friend without peer of the original Australians.

Noel Pearson is an Aboriginal Australian lawyer, land rights activist and founder of the Cape York Institute. This is the full text of the speech he gave at Gough Whitlam’s memorial

 

The Honourable (Edward) Gough Whitlam, AC QC