Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy Speaker Scott, I congratulate you on your election to your office. Can I start by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet here today. There has been no greater recognition than the events that have taken place in this House in the last couple of days, for the very first time in Australian history. Firstly, there was the welcome to country, which I found deeply moving and, in fact, quite emotional. It seemed to have a nice fit in this place. It seemed so natural and so much a part of the way this House should have always been and yet, starkly, it was the first time it had ever happened. Secondly, there was the apology. The apology was a long time coming. It was something that this nation as a whole had to do and something that I think we wanted to do, but we needed the leadership to carry it out. That took place today and, for all the fear that surrounded it, it was a day of happiness. It was a day where people were smiling. It was a day where, as a member of parliament in this place, I felt in a way complete about what our role is and about the things that we need to do to make this an even better country. Those were two very significant events. I will have more to say on both of those and some other significant issues in relation to the first Australians at a later time.

I also want to take this opportunity to acknowledge the Indigenous peoples and elders of my local region, the Ipswich region and the Inala region and surrounds. I am great friends with all of them. I deeply respect them. I love working with them and want to continue that relationship in the future. We have some wonderful Indigenous folk in our area, who contribute so much not only to their own people but also to the greater good and to everyone else in the community. I wanted to take the time to acknowledge them.

Being elected to this place is always a great privilege. It is not my first time, obviously. This is my fourth election. I am deeply honoured and deeply privileged, as is everybody, to be elected to this place. Being elected for the fourth time is of course an even greater honour. In saying that, I wanted to let the people of Oxley know that I feel more committed, more energised and more prepared to work even harder for them today than on the very first day I was elected.

I feel this new energy. You might say that that is just because we have got into government—finally. I was elected to opposition in 1998 but I have finally got into government here now. But, it is more than that. It is about a new agenda, about a new government with fresh ideas. It is about the great opportunities that we have. I cannot think of a time in our history when we have been in a better position to make those significant changes that will carry us forward in the 21st century and deliver all those things that need to happen. There is a whole century ahead of us, a whole heap of things that we have to do. When I contemplate those thoughts, and that I can be a part of an Australian parliament that has acknowledged the original Australians, along with the Australians that came on the first fleet and all Australians today, I think this is a great honour for me as well as for everybody who has been elected here.

I very much want to thank the people of Oxley for the trust that they have placed in me. I want to reassure them that the fact that they have given me an almost doubling of my margin will only drive me to work even harder. The challenge is there: can I possibly increase it one more time! Having a solid margin in a seat, I can assure you, is no excuse for not working very, very hard. I continue to do that. I have always believed in that and I have very strongly believed in the view that if you are a good local member and you work hard then you have a very good chance of being re-elected.

I would also like to take this opportunity to thank everybody who helped me get re-elected. As we in this place all know, you cannot be a one-man team, as it were—there are just so many people involved. Let me start by acknowledging and thanking my family: my wife, Margie, and my three children Tim, Emily and Madeleine. They might only be young—Tim is 12, Emily is nine and Madeleine is eight—but they are incredibly good campaigners. There would not be a day at school during an election campaign when they are not telling their young friends that they should be voting for their dad. It is a wonderful thing to see. My wife, Margie, who is an incredible campaigner herself, very diligently did a lot of work on my campaign to make sure that it flowed and that we did all the things that we promised that we would do. I think it is a really important thing that, when you get out into the community and you promise to do a whole heap of things, you actually do them.

It is very hard to do that when you are a member of the opposition. I experienced that, as many of my colleagues have in this place, for many years as an opposition member. To go out there and to be able to deliver for the community while not being in government is very hard. Can I assure them here tonight that, now being a member of the Rudd government, I will be doing my utmost to ensure that every single one of the election promises that we made during the campaign will be honoured. I am very comfortable and I feel at ease in saying that, because I know that, through the Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and all of our ministers, we have made an absolute commitment that we will honour all of our election promises—and for that I am very grateful to my party. Mr Deputy Speaker Scott, you would know from your experience over many years, perhaps more than mine, that it is often the case that governments make promises during election campaigns but find that they just cannot keep them for whatever reason. I am very proud to say that I am going to be part of a government that honours and keeps all of its election promises.

I also want to thank very deeply the Australian Labor Party in the Oxley region for all the hard work that they did—but not only them. I want to thank ALP members everywhere who came and gave support, not only in my seat but in other seats; my FEC and FDE that worked so hard; all of my local branch members; my campaign committee—which sometimes you do not know how many people are on, there are so many people out there working for you—and to all the young people who came and assisted and made my job so much easier and allowed me to focus on getting out there on the street, talking to people, whether it be in their homes, at shopping centres, at railway stations or on the side of the road. I am deeply in their debt for helping me to be re-elected one more time.

I also want to thank Kevin Rudd and I want to thank all the members of our caucus. We did a great job, but it is by no small means through the leadership of now Prime Minister Kevin Rudd that we actually managed to do what we did. The strong message of fresh ideas and change is not only a slogan but a reality and something that we will experience through this place in the coming term.

I want to particularly make mention of something that I think is significant. We tend to do this at the end of a parliamentary term rather than at the start, as they are all marked by a significant thing or event, something that truly marks what they are about. I will not tread through history, because I do not have time tonight—I will do that on other occasions. I think this parliamentary term will be remembered for a number of very significant events—I won’t number them—but I think the turning of the corner, the most significant event, as I have mentioned, is the apology to the stolen generations and Indigenous people in this country. I think that will go down in history in 20, 30, 50 years time as: why did this not this happen earlier? Why did it take so long? I think that this is one of the things that will mark this term of the Rudd government. The other is, very importantly, the issue of those promises that I mentioned earlier. They will be honoured. I can assure you of the work that I will do, and that I know all of my colleagues will do, to ensure that all of those commitments are honoured. We will ensure that we will be remembered as a government that had only one type of promise: a core promise, one that was actually delivered for the people we wanted to help and we promised we would help.

I also want to acknowledge and thank the new members. I have to say they would have to be the best and brightest class, and some of my most favourite people in the world. I say the best and brightest—possibly except for the class of ‘98, which is the class I came in. But they come very close!

I mention the following people in no particular order. Brett Raguse in the seat of Forde, giant killer, did a sterling job, always had faith that he could win the seat and worked like there was no tomorrow, and for that he has been well rewarded. Yvette D’Ath in the seat of Petrie, another giant killer, went out, worked very hard and wore out several pairs of shoes, as I understand. Jon Sullivan in Longman did a brilliant job. Chris Trevor, ‘CT’, in Flynn is in a tough part of the world but he is a tough character and he deserved his seat. There is James Bidgood up north in Dawson. My very good friend Shayne Neumann from Blair fought a wonderful fight—one that he had had some experience at fighting in the past—and won a great victory. He never lost faith, he never lost his belief in the party, the ALP, or the people of the region—the people he was going to help—and I think that is part of the reason that he got here. There are also Jim Turnour in Leichhardt, Kerry Rea in Bonner and Graham Perrett in Moreton. Congratulations to you all—I am only going to mention the Queenslanders—for a truly well-deserved victory and for being a very significant reason that we now have a great Labor government with Kevin Rudd as the Prime Minister.

I also want to take this opportunity to thank a number of members who are no longer with us. At the top of my list is the Hon. Kim Beazley, the former member for Brand, an incredible public servant, an incredible person who gave his whole life—everything of himself—to his electorate, to his party, to people. He did a wonderful job and he has got so much more to contribute. It is very sad not to see him in this place, because of all the great things he did, but in the end he left at a time that was right for him and right for other people. I congratulate him on that decision.

Still in Western Australia, I also want to make particular mention of my very good friend, who is no longer a member of parliament, Kim Wilkie in Swan, who fought incredible fights. Swan is not a seat traditionally held by Labor. Kim Wilkie actually won that seat in Western Australia against the trend, against all odds and against all betting, I would say, but he just could not quite do it a fourth time. It was so close, it was incredible—a very hard one to call. But Kim, I know, will contribute in a whole range of ways and will continue to contribute to public life, so I wanted to make particular mention of him. He was a great member of parliament, he did a lot of good work in this House and he will be well remembered.

I also want to mention Senator George Campbell, who did some very good things in this place—in the Senate—and who will be leaving us at the changeover, along with Senator Linda Kirk. Ann Corcoran in Isaacs did a fantastic job; she was an incredible team player. My very good friend Graham Edwards retired but he will always be in our memories. There was no more unique or colourful a character in this House than Graham Edwards. His exploits were so many and there are so many tales to tell I would not have the time tonight, but he is a great man, a truly inspirational person who will be well remembered.

Michael Hatton, a good friend of mine—we sat close to each other—is a man of boundless energy and boundless speeches, and I see Michael Danby, the member for Melbourne Ports, having a laugh. Nobody made more speeches—apart from maybe John Murphy—than Michael Hatton, so good luck to him in the future. Kelly Hoare followed in some great traditions, and Dr Carmen Lawrence in Fremantle had an incredible career. Senator Robert Ray will leave us a little bit later on. Bob Sercombe in Maribyrnong did a wonderful job of looking after the portfolio of the Pacific islands, and I was very proud of the work he did. Rod Sawford from Port Adelaide was the voice of sometimes reason but certainly the voice on many different issues and a person that never feared speaking out. I want to mention all of those people because I think it is important.

There are many opportunities for me to speak in this House and I have made many speeches, so I am not going to talk on a whole heap of other traditional things. I have left one person to last that I want to make a particular mention of and to honour—the late Peter Andren, who was an incredible person, a wonderful person in this House, who brought a unique perspective, a different colour to this place. He had an incredible work ethic. He was well loved by many people in here and well disliked by many others. He was not disliked because he was not a hard worker or a great MP but perhaps because of some of the realities that he thrust in all of our faces. Peter is a great loss to many people, and a lot has been said about Peter already and will continue to be said in this House, but I want to make particular mention of him.

As I have said, I have made a number of speeches and I will not follow the traditional protocols but I want to make mention of a couple of things. I took it to heart when the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, asked us to go out and visit schools and a homeless shelter in our electorates. I thought it was a really great idea. I took it to heart so much that that very afternoon I organised to visit not four but six schools. I went and visited two independent schools in my electorate, two public schools in my electorate and also my local TAFE. I saw a great institution called Education City in Springfield and had a talk to them about the difficulties and challenges they face in delivering excellent educational services for young people. I learned a lot and I will use that knowledge to help guide our education policy into the future.

I also visited one of my local youth homeless shelters at Goodna and caught up with some great friends there and some great people. I had a good look at some of the real issues that young homeless people face. There is so much more we can do. The words ring in my ears when I hear the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, talk about a bipartisan approach and that we have to take the politics out of some issues and work together in a bipartisan spirit to achieve things. I think the issue of homelessness is another one of those issues. These people need our help. These people need us to do more for them. That is certainly one of the things that I will be working very hard to ensure we deliver on.

I will quickly mention some of the issues I campaigned on not because they helped me get elected but because they are issues of great importance to local people in my area. I campaigned on the full upgrade of the Ipswich Motorway versus the Goodna bypass, and I have done that for many years—for a decade, I have campaigned for this road.

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