Ed Husic (Chifley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to join the throng of many who express praise and pay tribute for Neville Wran. I do so not as a contemporary, obviously, and not as someone who had the high honour of being a friend, but as someone who, when he was very young, had political consciousness start to emerge very early. In that period Neville Wran loomed large. He was someone who dominated politics at that point in time.

I think it is important that in this place, where we tend to be clouded by the minutiae and the focus on daily skirmish, that we take the time to also regard, respect, acknowledge and celebrate the achievements of those people who have fundamentally changed the lives of others. Neville Wran can certainly, in all those ways, be recognised for that.

It is clearly an understatement to say that he was a giant and that he was a visionary. Born in 1926, he left us on 20 April this year after a battle, which, as the member for Wentworth reflected, was cruel when one considers the history of the contributions, the intellect, and the wit of the person who was forced to succumb to dementia. It is truly cruel.

He spent four terms—16 years—in New South Wales politics, with 10 as premier. He left an unforgettable legacy. He was fittingly described by one eulogist as the architect of modern Sydney. Those of us who had the privilege of living in New South Wales are the beneficiaries of his foresight and tenacity.

As we were reflecting earlier, we in this House would love to end our political careers having made a mark for the betterment of our constituencies. We all hope, in some way, that we will. But Neville Wran would have absolutely no difficulty in seeing the mark he left on his home state. You can easily see the wide evidence of the things he did to make life better in New South Wales. He achieved this by demonstrating the power of a simple agenda—getting transport working better, shifting hospital beds and resources to where they were needed most, balancing the tension between cities and the regions. These types of programs would proudly be described as bread and butter. They improved the quality of life for people across the state, but especially in the part of the world that I grew up in, in western Sydney.

It was not always easy, and the breadth of his leadership talents had to be applied in bringing in contentious, long-lasting reform—the introduction of random breath testing and the phasing out of wood-chipping and sand mining while also increasing the number of national parks, which caused grief to many in the labour movement. He championed race and gender equality. He pushed for the development of Darling Harbour and built the Sydney Entertainment Centre, transforming run-down land into a magnet for tourists and for civic life.

It is almost impossible now to think of Sydney without that massive entertainment quarter, and all those achievements took courage and leadership; qualities that Neville Wran had in spades.

A critical ingredient in his success flowed from his ability to relate—something that was reflected upon by the member for Brand. He revealed through his focus on improving community life and opportunity that ability to relate. From the regions of New South Wales to an emerging metropolis from boardrooms to bus shelters, Neville Wran not only brought his words but he brought his ears, taking stock of diverse views and melding those views into a compelling vision. Not only could he relate to the people he represented but they also could relate to him, because it was his tenacity that attracted and the way he applied that tenacity to improve the quality of his own life.

A Queen's Counsel prior to entering the political sphere, Neville Wran was able to use his obvious sharp intellect to be a political strategist without peer—the Balmain boy done good. Before the label became politically passe, Neville Wran showed us what it meant to be aspirational. Yet, having achieved this, he remained faithful to his past, never forgetting where he came from or his own working-class background. It shaped his policy platform, making sure that people who might not be wealthy themselves would have a richer quality of life. For instance, it was Neville Wran who in 1982 was present with Queen Elizabeth opening Mount Druitt Hospital, a facility that has helped provide people with quality health care for generations, delivering better services to people who needed it most.

As much as Neville Wran had, as I said, a compelling agenda, he also had raw political talent to bring that agenda to life. He was tough. He never took a backwards step, quipping, 'Confession is good for the soul, but it is bad for the reputation.

Wran pioneered changes to the way in which politicians conducted themselves mediawise. For example, he was a master of using the power of media at key points in time—and never a better example than that day in March 1976 when then coalition premier Eric Willis went to announce an early election. Both were campaigning in Monaro, and it was Neville Wran who seized the moment, racing to Canberra to try and steal Willis's thunder via the media. But there was a problem: Neville Wran was not a federal politician and was not entitled to use the television studios inside parliament, and those were the rules of the day. Enter the late, great Peter Harvey who, according to former Wran advisor and author Brian Dale, masterminded a plan to have Wran's message broadcast back to Sydney. It was Peter Harvey who figured that, if you could not get the New South Wales opposition leader in Parliament House, he would broadcast him on the roof of Parliament House—and that was exactly what he did, perching Neville Wran on the beams of the roof of the now Old Parliament House.

If he was not talking politics from the roof of federal parliament, he would be holding press conferences on New South Wales trains, in hospitals—wherever he would have the chance to get his message out. He refashioned the way politics intersected with the media.

Another interesting story I picked up from Brian Dale's memory carries as much weight today as it did back then. According to Dale, almost 40 years to the month, it was another conservative leader proposing a measure that would put pressure on families, particularly those in New South Wales, by introducing a state based fuel tax. It took all of a nanosecond for Wran to knock that idea on the head, vowing Labor would oppose any plans that would impact on New South Wales families in that way. Not surprisingly those plans became an election issue raising anger amongst voters, particularly those who had a high dependency on private transport. The rest, as they say, is history.

It was the combination of all those factors that I have mentioned that propelled Neville Wran into a position to dominate three state elections, most notably being referred to as the 'Wranslides'. In 13 years of leading New South Wales Labor, he never lost an election, he never lost a seat at a by-election. All of those things merged at a critical focus point: the powerfully simple agenda shaped by a vision of what was needed to be done for New South Wales; a desire to shake off the lethargy gripping the state after yawning periods of conservative government melded by a common experience; and a premier relating to his community and they being able to relate to him.

Neville Wran is survived by his wife, Jill, and his five children. New South Wales has survived and prospered largely because of Neville Wran and his Labor values, and we thank him for that.

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