Barnaby Joyce (New England, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

The last time I had merely started and have had to stay in abeyance until this point in time. In starting again, to Margot, to Dugald, to Jane and to Larry, and to Doug Anthony's grandchildren, I'd like to first and foremost offer my condolences, but condolences in a spirit that reflects the great life of Doug Anthony and what a great person he was not just for his family but for his nation.

There is an unverified but I believe very true story that really epitomises the character of Doug Anthony. When they were going to get rid of the single deck in its first iteration, Doug Anthony saw the then prime minister Billy McMahon and he said to him, 'Prime Minister, you're not going to do this.' And the Prime Minister said, 'Well, yes, I am.' And he pulled from his pocket the resignation papers for the coalition and said, 'The government falls at six o'clock tonight.' They kept a single desk! The reason it is unverified is that it happened, obviously, in the room. It was kept within the room. But it shows that Doug Anthony was fair dinkum. When he said something he meant it. And that's the reason that in politics—I imagine Billy McMahon didn't really like him, but I bet you he respected him.

Of course, there are other ones too—this one is on the record. Coming back jaundiced, Doug Anthony had to deal with the fact that they were going to have one vote, one value, and this, of course, was going to decimate many regional areas, many regional centres, because we have the geographic weight in our area, but we don't have the demographic weight. And we don't have the demographic weight because we can't get the services that will bring the people in because we don't have the population. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy. We did have a weighting of the vote, but that was being removed. And Doug Anthony said: 'This is not fair. You will have all the power. All the democratic power will then reside in the capitals. That's where everything will happen and that's where all the investment will be, too.' He said he wasn't going to accept it. Then, when they pursued it, he said, 'Well, then we must have more seats in the parliament so that regional areas have a chance to basically have a local federal politician.' The joint party room went off their mind about it—were basically openly hostile. Remember that he was sitting in the Deputy Prime Minister's seat. They were openly hostile. They were taunting him. But he just took it. He wore it, and he continued to fight so that we did get more seats. It's yet another example of his character and why he is held in that sort of pantheon of the gods for the National Party, which is the second-longest existing party in Australia. It is not the easy road; it's the hard road that is the one that is remembered by the history books. It's not the jolly, good times; it's the tougher times that they actually write the chapters about.

The Anthony family themselves are like the Kennedys of Australia—three generations of ministers, three generations of people who have served in the highest offices of this country. In meeting the grandchildren at the public service for the Rt Hon. Doug Anthony, I would say that there's a strong possibility that others may follow in their father's, their grandfather's and their great-grandfather's footsteps.

Doug Anthony was a child of the Northern Rivers, that very particular and beautiful part of the state of New South Wales and our nation. Doug Anthony had to deal with the transition of more people and people with different views to what would have been Country Party views moving into his area. One of those classic towns was the former very strong dairy town—a place called Nimbin. You might have heard of it. One of the stories that was relayed to me was of Doug Anthony having to go to the festival of Aquarius, I think it was, and dealing with a sea of naked people smoking marijuana and asking them if he could get their vote. But he turned up! He said: 'These people are here. We've got to acknowledge it, and we've got to reach out to them and work out what's the connection; how do we make this work?'

So, in closing, I would say this: of all the things that Doug Anthony achieved, the fact—I think he retired at 54 years old. Many people start their political career there. He was the longest-serving Deputy Prime Minister and he retired from politics at 54! But his greatest success was this: despite his stature and the political grandeur that he inevitably had by reason of his career, he never let the shade from that mighty tree shade out his family and leave them in a poorer light. He made sure that the centre of his life was his family. And the discussion and the photos that we saw in the service were of his family. His family was the centre part of his life. I think that is possibly the most pertinent lesson that we can take back to this place—that ultimately, when you leave here, there will be no politicians waiting for you at home, but what there will be are the ones who are closest and dearest to you. For Doug Anthony, that was his family.

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