Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

When I started primary school, one of the few things I knew was that John Kerr was not a very nice fellow. I could not have picked him out of a line-up, but I knew that in my house he was a person who had done a bad thing to a very good man. My early political education largely consisted of watching my father shout at the television, worried that the dreams of a generation were being dashed. My dad earlier today, as someone who was the son of a post office worker, told me that he had never dreamed that he would complete a university degree and go on to complete more than one and that the only reason he could do it was because of Gough.

I have already heard from many people today who have shed a tear because they were politicised by Gough, because their lives were made better by Gough Whitlam and, for those who have come much later, who know that as progressive Australians they are now following in his footsteps. In many ways he was the author of progressive Australia: he put this country on the global map in a way that we had not been before, and his commitments to social justice, education and the arts are of course legendary; he helped improve Australia's humanitarian and cultural standing in the world by ratifying the human rights convention as well as the World Heritage Convention, something that has laid the groundwork for significant expansions and environmental protections in times to come. But he was also a champion for the environment, establishing the National Parks and Wildlife Service as well as protecting the Great Barrier Reef. He ended conscription, oversaw the end of our involvement in the war, oriented us towards China, helped establish the Department of Aboriginal Affairs and was instrumental in the creation of land rights.

But it is the commitment to free education that will have a lasting impact on not only our society but also our economy. I still believe in many of Gough Whitlam's values, and I believe that they should be at the heart of our political system. I think equality and a progressive Australia should become the cornerstones of our debate. I understand I am not the only one; I understand, via Twitter, that today some students at La Trobe University are staging a 'lock on for Gough' in support of free education on their campus.

I think there has been, as has been mentioned, at times certain mythologies about the government. One of those mythologies about that time is that he was an extraordinarily big spender. I was reminded this morning that at the end of the Whitlam government, they were spending less than we are currently doing now and many governments since have done. Truly, it was a reminder that it is not necessarily how much you raise but what you do with it, and it can change a country. In the decades intervening, I think it is fair to say that politics has become smaller even if government has not. Rest in peace, Gough Whitlam. On behalf of the Australian Greens, I send our deepest thoughts, sympathies and thanks to the Whitlam family and to all those who knew and loved him.

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