Judi Moylan (Pearce, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

How does one summarise 20 years in parliament while doing justice to all those who have been so pivotal to that service? I have been deeply touched by the extraordinary generosity at every turn by a host of people too numerous to name individually. But no member could have been better supported and I wish the same good fortune for the new candidate for Pearce, Christian Porter.

My staff, past and present, particularly my personal assistant, Jana Allan, and electorate officers Anne Bagot, Simon Hall, Janie Brown and Jess Laidman have been superb. Kirsten Mardardy memorably guided me through the early political turbulence in my first terms, as did my friend Jeremy Buxton. Over the years, I have had several excellent campaign chairs but none were more effective and dedicated than my long-term friend Lane Taylor, ably supported by his beautiful wife, Julie. His good judgement has ensured the smooth running of seven election campaigns. The support of the division of Pearce, led by successive presidents and an army of volunteers, was crucial to our shared success.

The staff of the parliament, the Clerks and the Library have unfailingly assisted me in negotiating the mysteries of the form and function of this place. I acknowledge the contribution of committee secretariats and in particular the Committee on Social Policy and Legal Affairs, of which I am currently deputy chair. It has been a pleasure to work with them and the chair, the member for Moreton. Comcar and the Perth office of parliamentary services have no less smoothed the way.

Perhaps my warmest memories of this chamber and this place will always be the deep associations forged with members past and present. In particular, the member for McMillan, has been a great friend, as have the former members for Cook and for Kooyong—and, indeed, the current member for Kooyong. Our friendship was forged in the tough political battle over immigration policy. Equally, the member for Moore, the 'doctor in the House', has administered his special brand of medicine, pro bono, to the entire population of Parliament House and probably beyond. He is a friend without peer.

My parliamentary life had its genesis year in 1993. It followed the retirement of the Hon. Fred Chaney, a stellar parliamentary performer and a great mentor and friend. In the beginning, there was neither light nor form in the reputed wasteland called 'opposition'. Yet, like so much in the Australian landscape, there was treasure to be had in the most unpropitious of circumstances. I recall a certain nervousness on entering the chamber and taking my seat within sight and sound of the government benches for the first time. As I confronted the enemy, in its serried ranks, I wondered whether I would acquire the necessary combative spirit. I need not have worried. It was soon plain that I would receive plenty of encouragement—from both sides. It was the beginning of 20 fascinating years.

Whether serving on the environment committee or the public accounts committee, or designing a breast cancer campaign, the years in opposition were a symphony of delight and stimulation. As shadow minister, I wrote policies for small business and women. Small business was a major plank in the 1996 victorious election campaign under John Howard. Within government, I served as Minister for Family Services and as the first dedicated Minister for the Status of Women. They say that certain portfolios mark a minister so profoundly that he or she never quite recovers their capacity for simple optimism, at the least their lives are irrevocably changed. Family Services is of that order. It brings one directly into contact with those points at which our society shows its most glaring and disgraceful wounds, which, by their very intransigence, challenge and threaten our capacity for empathy and for compassion.

I must, though, declare a deep personal satisfaction to have been able, whilst still a member of this parliament, to join in the universal support for the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill, which was enacted on 28 March in a rare display of unity. To paraphrase another epic event of our time, 'It is one small step for the parliament, one giant leap for humankind.' I cannot pass without pointing out that the great majority of carers in our community are women. In this, as in so many areas of human endeavour, 50 per cent of our species carries the greater burden whilst submitting to lesser opportunity and still less reward.

I remain committed and fiercely proud of the 370-page act over which my departmental colleagues and I laboured so as to reform standards of accommodation and duty of care toward the ageing. There was controversy and opposition aplenty in this House and in the media, indeed so much discord that I was forced to depart the portfolio. Yet, this pales into insignificance against the ongoing satisfaction of observing our older citizens accommodated in facilities that afford them privacy and dignity.

I shall never cease to be grateful to Mr Howard for the opportunities afforded by my ministerial experience. My ministry embarked on earnest programs to mitigate homelessness and violence against women, crucial issues back in 1996 and crucial issues still in 2013. The pathologies that beset our society remain impervious to catch-all diagnoses and certainly to simple optimism. Abundance of goodwill and earnest endeavour on both sides of this House are the first requisite. After that, we sorely need new ideas for the social ills of today's brave, new other world.

The electorate of Pearce, as you may know, is varied and large. One day after a particularly harrowing week in my office, of encounters with sick electors, the truth was borne home to me. Diabetes has fulfilled the direst of medical predictions: It has become a national epidemic. I had in short order been confronted with blindness, cardiac failure, kidney and liver dysfunction, and limb amputations; to say nothing of the tragedy affecting children with type 1 diabetes, to say nothing of the effects on family life and cohesion, to say nothing of economic hardship, to say nothing of the unaffordability of vital medications.

Diabetes affects people from all walks of life, including some distinguished members of this House and their staff. Since its inception in 2000, the Parliamentary Diabetes Support Group has achieved a unique response to community concerns. Our model is being emulated by parliaments abroad. I have been invited to share our experience with delegates to the forthcoming World Diabetes Congress in Melbourne this coming December. They will hear of the difference it makes when sufferers know that in their national capital, at the seat of government, an alliance exists that preaches and cajoles, and when need be, is clamorous on their behalf.

One of the unexpected benefits for me has been the pleasure of working closely with colleagues across the benches, the members for Moore, Lyons, Isaacs and Senator Claire Moore, all members of the executive, and of course all the colleagues in this parliament who have been members of the group. In latter weeks, the member for Hasluck has taken the reigns of leadership and the Parliamentary Diabetes Support Group is in very good hands. Former colleagues Cameron Thompson and Guy Barnett were members of the first executive and former health minister Michael Wooldridge gave early support. Equally, our many associations with doctors, researchers and non-government organisations, particularly Diabetes Australia and the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, have been fruitful. Who of us can forget Kids in the House and the profound emotional impact that that event had? Then there was the early and notable success of the group securing the listing of insulin pump consumables on the National Diabetes Services Scheme. Then there was the response of this parliament to the pleas of the children participating in Kids in the House when they said, 'Promise to remember me.' And we did, by allocating or contributing $27 million for research to find a cure for type 1 diabetes.

I should like to close this farewell speech on an interrogative note. As one leaves the stage of active intervention, there is inevitably heartache, mostly stemming from issues in our body politic that persistently resist amelioration. Poverty is one: 600,000 children are living below the poverty line in Australia today. In some parts of the electorate of Pearce, the impact is devastating. Why have we not been able to do better? Was it not a body blow to the capacity of sole parents and their families to shift them on to Newstart while cutting Job Network funds? Are we not denying them a chance to forge a better future? The 'Fair Incentives to Work Bill'? When will the mythologies stop?

Another mythology is privatisation. Is it always the answer to efficient delivery of services? Let us ask those on a fixed or low income about their essential services bills. In general terms, though, the answer is yes. Privatisation can be beneficial providing due diligence is applied. However, as chair of the Public Works Committee for nine years, let me assure the House that the rush to sell off assets is almost never submitted to impartial cost-benefit analysis. And what is new about that?

And what of the level playing field, another mantra? Trade inequities abound, with combined subsidies paid to farmers in the European Union and the United States totalling around $350 billion per annum. Our near neighbours of Japan, Taiwan and South Korea continue to have among the highest subsidies for farmers. Is it a welter of self-hatred that causes us to endanger some of our proudest and most efficient producers? The Australian people have forged by dint of prodigious labour, innovation and stubborn self-belief a peaceful and prosperous civilisation in the most arid continent on the planet. It ought to be a personal agony for everyone here when our economic savants sanction admission of goods from nations that continue to pay subsidies, do not pay decent wages, do not impose occupation health and safety regulations, have no superannuation schemes and do not apply standards of food hygiene and strict controls over additives. Unsurprisingly, these goods enter this country at a cheaper price than we can produce them. But at what cost to our future, social and economic? Day in, day out we dream of being a future food bowl for Asia while simultaneously destroying our existing industries. Meanwhile, frank and shameless subsidies and protections proceed unremarked whilst our own administration has withdrawn subsidies and continues to heap the burden of more and more 'red tape' on the breaking backs of our producers and our manufacturers. Is this pragmatism or an amiable madness on our part?

While the House ponders this conundrum, I turn to my six years as Chair of the Australia-China Parliamentary Group. It proved to be miraculously serendipitous. I led several delegations to Beijing, Shanghai and some of the remote regions of the Middle Kingdom. Thus, I was a personal witness to a unique event in human history as China emerged and, to the astonishment of the world, forged for itself the iron mantle of a great economic and military power.

With each successive visit, I was led to study a little more of Chinese political history. My impression is that China, with the arguable exception of Tibet, has been averse to pursuing territorial expansion and focuses above all else on improving the living standards of its people through trade. Certainly, in terms of the current economic downturn and with the prospect of alternative suppliers massing on the horizon, our trading relationship with China will need to be culturally sophisticated, intelligent and sensitive.

There are also other significant nations sharing with us the great Indian Ocean — a region whose time has come. Our ability to navigate amongst these competing interests will be a test of our political maturity and the efficacy of our educational institutions.

Two years ago, I was fortunate to secure a gifted intern from ANU to research a paper on the case for an Australian Cen tre for Indian Ocean Affairs. It makes compelling reading. Commerce and cultural exchange are the enemies of poverty and the great facilitators to peace and growth along the Indian Ocean littoral . Why have we waited so long? But the signs are we may not have to wait much longer. The recent announcement by the s hadow m inister for f oreign a ffairs, the m ember for Curtin, of a prospective re-incarnatio n of the original Colombo Plan is profo undly welcome.

If we are to learn anything , though, from the political and social problems of the region it must surely be the necessity to engage with our neighbours t o manage the flow of refugees in the Indian Ocean region. This is not a situation Aust ralia can manage in isolation. It is not.

If we are committed to stopping the deaths at sea, in this most intransigent of political arenas, our parliament must find a way to forge a n ational consensus before we can possibly entertain any hope of ac hieving a regional consensus. Th is is the only way we will find a lasting and humane resolution to one of the enduring human horrors of war and civil strife in our midst , and my feelings on this matter have been expressed frequently both w ithin this c hamber and without. I remain stridently opposed to indefinite mandatory detention and the continued detention of children, 2,000 of whom are currently in detention under our management. These practices have gone on in our name and will sta nd as a matter of great shame.

In conclusion, I cannot help reflecting that as legislators, the m embers of this House exerc ise a glorious responsibility. It is no small thing to contrive, con sider and ultimately create new law for a great nation. It is no small thing to rigorously uphold the separation of powers that tempers the potential excesses of executive government. Equally it is no small thing to defend the sanctity of free speech, especially in that essential organ of democracy, the fourth estate.

An abundance of good fortune has attended my political life both in the electorate and in this chamber. I thank the House for the numberless courtesies extended to me since my election in March 1993. Further, I thank the Pearce division of the Liberal Party for its unquenchable optimism in endorsing me seven times. In politics the mind and the heart must move as one, otherwise chaos ensues. For me the Liberal Party has, as it was established by RG Menzies, offered precisely that possibility. It has never failed. In fact, my political survival over these 20 years has depended on the principle that an elected member would always have the right to vote according to their conscience. It has been tested in this place many times and remains the great distinguishing characteristic between the Liberal Party and its opponents, and I am grateful for that. I thank the House.

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