Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

It is with great sadness that I speak about Peter Walsh in these circumstances, but it is with great pride that I am able to do so holding the portfolio within my party that he is so renowned for. I think a lot of mistakes are made in respect of Peter Walsh's manner and his determination to deal very seriously with issues at the Expenditure Review Committee. He was determined to ensure that there was not waste; he was not determined to ensure that government spending be curtailed at all costs. He was determined, when making choices about where cuts needed to be made, that the cuts would find themselves with the people who could most afford to be able to do with less, and that sense of priority was at the core of how Peter Walsh viewed the finance portfolio.

It is important to remember with Peter Walsh that he was somebody who was largely self-educated. There is something that often forms its way into the newspapers where they deal with members of parliament, or sometimes with our staff, and judge the quality of who we have around us by the level of tertiary education that individuals have. Tertiary education is something that deserves to have the highest level of respect, but it should not be turned into a form of snobbery. We need to remember that when the budgets were being formed then, we had that period were neither the Treasurer nor the finance minister were in situations where they had had the benefit, for various personal circumstances, of tertiary education. They did their jobs well, they applied their intellect well, and we need to ensure that we do not regress and change a level of respect for tertiary education by turning it into an unfortunate form of snobbery.

Peter Walsh entered parliament as a senator for WA in May 1974. He had not expected to make it into parliament that early. Because it was a double dissolution he found himself on the ticket when he had not expected to be—somebody else had ended up being not eligible because of an age rule that Western Australia had in place within the party; he found himself at No. 4 on the ticket at an election where we had five elected. He served with distinction as the Minister for Resources and Energy and assisting the Prime Minister on public service matters, but it is his time as Minister for Finance where Walshie really made his mark and cemented his legacy in those Hawke-Keating years.

The finance portfolio is, without doubt—and I learnt this years ago, listening to an interview that Kim Beazley did on Triple J when he was finance minister—the job where, by definition, you are guaranteed to be hated by all of your colleagues, and Walshie managed to fill this role pretty well. He would be the person saying no, and he would be the person applying principles absolutely rigidly. Bob Hawke said that 'his highly principled, no nonsense and at times acerbic approach as finance minister made him ideal for the position'. His long-time friend Bill Hayden said, 'I'm one of his best friends, as he is one of mine, but I knew better than to ask for mercy or favour in the pre-budget process.' That is important because, when we form the friendships and allegiances that we have as members of parliament, ultimately every decision is about the people outside the building—and Walshie made sure everybody knew that.

Peter Walsh's book Confessions of a Failed Finance Minister was a tribute to his success. He kept an absolute focus—not on whether something is in government ownership or not, not on whether there is a particular mechanism being used or not, but simply on the outcomes and how decisions will affect the rest of the community. When I was agriculture minister I had the absolute privilege to visit his farm when we were discussing wheat deregulation and doing away with the old AWB monopoly. I had the privilege to be there at the property that Peter Walsh called his own. This was no hobby farm—as some members of parliament have and then tick the box as farmers—it was a serious agricultural operation.

Peter Walsh established the practice of budgeting over the forward estimates, something we now presume in the whole lexicon of budget week and the ongoing debate. His passion for economic and fiscal reform continued long after he had retired. When he retired from cabinet, The Australian ran the headline 'The man who made Keating look soft'. That says a lot. When Gary Punch came to see Keating with a submission for the Museum of Australia, Keating said, 'I'm not your problem, it's Sid Vicious over there'—pointing to Peter Walsh. People would make fun of just how hard this person was. But let us make no mistake, it was because he had an absolute heart for social justice. That drove him, it drove his passion for his own state and for the rest of the nation, and it found him a natural home in the Labor Party. He is someone the Labor Party is very proud to have called our own and to have provided the pathway for him to be a gift to the nation.

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