David Jull (Fadden, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Old Bob Katter was the member for Flinders; his son is the member for Kennedy. Sir James used to delight in telling how he managed to get to Mount Isa most years on the same weekend as the Mount Isa Cup was run. He and Bob Katter Sr used to go to the races, and he tells the story of one night when they stayed on for some refreshments after the race meeting. It became rather late, and at about 11 o’clock Bob Katter offered Jim a lift back to the hotel he was staying at in Mount Isa. The fog had come in. They hopped in Bob’s car and drove around and around and around and did not seem to be getting anywhere. Jim said to Bob Katter, ‘Bob, do you know where we are?’ Bob said, ‘Frankly, Jim, I’m lost.’ And Jim said: ‘Don’t worry. There’s a sign up ahead; we’ll have a look and see what that says.’ They pulled up at the sign and Jim got out of the car and got back in the car and said, ‘Bob, it says five furlongs.’

The other area that I should mention about the service of Sir James was his contribution to the Anglican Church. The relationship between Sir James and the bush extended very much into the bush brotherhood of the Anglican Church. Almost to the day of his death, if there was anything that the bush clergy needed—and money was always tight—Sir James would be there to help them. Whether it was organising race meetings in Toowoomba or special fundraising dinners, Sir James would always help the bush brotherhood. He was a High Anglican; he was very much a traditionalist. I can remember having a couple of discussions with him regarding the Book of Common Prayer, which I personally think is probably the finest piece of English literature in existence. Sir James lamented the decline in the use of the Book of Common Prayer in the Anglican Church. I remember him referring to some clergy who had virtually thrown it out completely as being absolute vandals. I could not agree with him more.

He was a regular communicant at St John’s Cathedral; he was there most Sundays. He certainly loved the church and he loved the traditions of the Anglican Church. He had a tremendous relationship with the clergy—not only the clergy of the Anglican communion but those of other denominations as well. This was exemplified by the fact that Archbishop Bathersby, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Brisbane was at St John’s Cathedral at the time of Sir James’s state funeral.

Theirs was a very special relationship that developed particularly after the death of Jim’s daughter Rosemary, and that really affected Jim to a very great extent. I know that people like Bishop Adrian Charles and the Dean of Brisbane, John Parkes, provided tremendous support and help to Sir James during some of those very difficult times. In that respect, I suppose it was appropriate that the dean took the services of the state funeral of Sir James. Archbishop Bathersby was there and Bishop Adrian Charles preached the sermon, and what a magnificent sermon it was.

Jim Killen, above everything else, was a man of very generous spirit. He was first and foremost a parliamentarian and I do not think that we will ever see his like in this place again. He very much lamented this new House; he did not like it. I think I am correct in saying that he only visited this place on one occasion following his retirement from the parliament. In some ways that was a bit of a pity. There is no doubt that there is a great difference between the conduct of business in the parliament today and what it was in the old chamber. Sir James loved that old chamber, and the repartee and some of the interjections that went back and forth across that chamber were really absolutely magnificent. The archivists are going to have a wonderful time when they finally get access to eight filing cabinets of Sir James’s personal documents. He has kept virtually every note that was passed across the chamber, every letter he wrote. They are filed in the most magnificent way that anybody could, and the amount of history that will be forthcoming when those archives are opened will be absolutely stunning.

I have great memories of Sir James in the chamber, and I mentioned the Governor-General’s address-in-reply speech of Sir James when I was first elected. He was one of the sharpest minds, and there were many on the other side as well. Sir James could be absolutely cutting, but he was never really cruel. He was never really nasty. To give you an example, at one stage we had a gentleman from Victoria who had not been in the parliament very long. He had black curly hair which sat on his head a bit like a triangle. He was interjecting on Sir James and Sir James just looked across and said, ‘Pipe down, Pythagoras.’ From that time, that particular member was known—on our side of parliament, anyway—as Pythagoras.

See this speech in context