Damian Drum (Nicholls, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is with a heavy heart that we have the opportunity in this House to pay tribute to the great Doug Anthony. I do so largely on the fact that I have a very strong working relationship with his son, Larry. I have enormous respect for Larry. Here is an opportunity to share someone's thoughts who grew up in a non-political house. My own father had such high regard for Doug Anthony. He was the voice of reason and the Leader of the Country Party for so many years. This man, with the voice of reason, now has his character exposed as someone who had a loving relationship with his wife and with his children. He lost his mother at a very, very young age and therefore went on the adventure of a lifetime with his dad, who was a Gallipoli and World War II veteran and then a politician. Young Sir Doug headed off to parliament, lived in the Kurrajong and used Old Parliament House as his playground. It's quite a story when you see all of this come together. Doug Anthony was a genuine farmer with a genuine love of the land. He started careers, on the land with dairy and then moved to beef cattle. It brings together a bigger picture. I would like to put on the record that, at a very, very young age, whilst we weren't in a political family, we did have incredible respect for the Leader of the Country Party over those years.

History now shows the support that he was able to give Black Jack McEwen. He was able to strive to make the decisions that have actually had long-lasting impacts on this great country. It's great to see that Doug Anthony has been acknowledged genuinely as a man of purpose, someone who didn't necessarily seek the office of the parliament, but the death of his father more or less thrust him onto the political stage at the age of 27. There are stories around running the country from a caravan and stories about having bedtime stories read to him by John Curtin. It makes for a man of humility. It's an enormous story of a genuine icon of the political landscape in this country.

It's not that this man was all nice, all friendly and so forth. It's been pointed out that, when the issues needed to be debated, when the points needed to be made, this man was also fierce and unwavering in his thoughts. What an incredible setting. We can now look back and reflect on all of the various leaders that came together and how he was able to perform in the role that he had. The accolades keep coming back to the strength he was given by his wife of so many years. It is just incredible that he was able to run the country as the stand-in Prime Minister, the Acting Prime Minister, over the summer months, and effectively did that from a little shack on the beach and then did it from a caravan, in the early days without a phone and later with a phone. It certainly goes to an era that is very hard for us to understand today, when all of our leaders are effectively working 24/7.

I want to pay tribute to Larry and his siblings. To have three generations of Anthonys to represent their electorate in this parliament is something that's very, very special. Larry Anthony did all of this and retired by the age of 54. I have a belief that you can always tell a lot about an individual from what they do post parliament. Doug Anthony, along with his wife, was certainly a continuous contributor to his community outside of parliament for the many, many years he was in great health. I think that's a great record for him to have. I would like to, again, send my wishes to Larry and his family and to acknowledge that we really have lost one of the great political leaders of our lifetime.

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