David Jull (Fadden, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

When speaking of the campaigning capacity of Sir James Killen, due recognition should also be given to the late Joy Killen. As a husband and wife team in the division of Moreton they were unstoppable. But I think we should also give due tribute to the tremendous work they did for and the contribution they made to the Liberal Party of Australia and in particular the Queensland division of the Liberal Party.

Sir James has been recognised as the foundation president of the Queensland Young Liberals, but the late Joy Killen also made a tremendous contribution inasmuch as she was the first president—and president for many years—of the women’s division. She took her politics very seriously; she worked unceasingly for the promotion of the Liberal Party, and together they were such a dynamic duo.

I have mentioned previously the nature of Killen while campaigning and his capacity to get down to all levels in his electorate, but I do not think anyone would have ever seen Sir James Killen happier than when he was at the racecourse. That was his great love. I do not go to the races terribly often, but on one occasion it was one of the funniest afternoons I have had. On most Saturday afternoons at Doomben or Eagle Farm, James would be found with his friends the late Brian Sweeney, the late Vince Curry and people like Jim Kennedy. They would have a marvellous time. He owned horses, and I think—I stand to be corrected—one of his most famous proteges was Wellington Road.

Paul Neville (Hinkler, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It came fourth in the Melbourne Cup.

David Jull (Fadden, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It came fourth in the Melbourne Cup. From memory, those four gentlemen were the owners of Wellington Road, and there were great tales about that horse.

Later in his career, Sir James also served the racing industry as a member of the Queensland Racing Appeals Tribunal. Tribute should be given to Sir James because, after he retired from the parliament, not only did he go back into his legal practice but he also made a very real contribution in a number of organisations. For example, he headed the judge’s salary tribunal in Queensland, and he took that very seriously. I remember him telling me that he had very great difficulty getting judges to allow him to approach them in court, but when he was reviewing their salaries and conditions he had never been invited to lunch by so many judges in all his life. He also said that, if people were critical of parliamentarians and the way they approached some of their conditions of employment, parliamentarians were rank amateurs compared to the judiciary—but I am not quite sure whether I should say things like that in this place!

On coming to government in 1996, the Howard government appointed Sir James to the Council of the Order of Australia. That was another position that he took terribly seriously. I was the minister responsible at the time and I remember speaking to Sir James about the council. He was worried about the way that the council met and the way they conducted their business, and he suggested some very good reforms. People do not realise that there are about 14,000 to 15,000 nominations a year for awards under the Order of Australia and it is a major achievement to work out who gets what. He made some very real suggestions and there has been some great reform of the work of that council. Sir James should be acknowledged for that.

He also told me a story of the first time that the council met. The nominations arrived for his perusal, at his home in Chapel Hill, in three suitcases, and the suitcases had combination locks on them. They arrived on a weekend and nobody had told him what the combination was. He rang Government House but there was no answer. Then he remembered that, when he was Special Minister of State, Government House used to send him quite a number of boxes and they also had combination locks. So he went to one of his old diaries and found the old combination lock number, tried it on the suitcase and it opened immediately. Nothing had changed.

Gary Hardgrave (Moreton, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

He loved tradition.

David Jull (Fadden, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

He did. He made a tremendous contribution to that council and we should be very thankful for the work that he did in reforming it.

Reference has also been made to his great love of the bush. We know the story of his difficulty at Brisbane Grammar School: he allegedly ran away from school, went bush and became a jackeroo. I suppose one of his most famous quotes in this place was about swimming ‘bare-arsed across the Condamine with Aborigines’. That is often quoted. He maintained a love of the bush, and in non-sitting periods he quite often went around and worked the country circuits to ‘keep his ticket’, as I think he used to say.

Of course, some of the stories of his work in the bush were also quite legendary. He was great friends with the late Bob Katter Sr, the father of the present member for Flinders. Old Bob Katter, as we used to call him—

Paul Neville (Hinkler, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Kennedy!

David Jull (Fadden, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Old Bob Katter was the member for Flinders; his son is the member for Kennedy. Sir James used to delight in telling how he managed to get to Mount Isa most years on the same weekend as the Mount Isa Cup was run. He and Bob Katter Sr used to go to the races, and he tells the story of one night when they stayed on for some refreshments after the race meeting. It became rather late, and at about 11 o’clock Bob Katter offered Jim a lift back to the hotel he was staying at in Mount Isa. The fog had come in. They hopped in Bob’s car and drove around and around and around and did not seem to be getting anywhere. Jim said to Bob Katter, ‘Bob, do you know where we are?’ Bob said, ‘Frankly, Jim, I’m lost.’ And Jim said: ‘Don’t worry. There’s a sign up ahead; we’ll have a look and see what that says.’ They pulled up at the sign and Jim got out of the car and got back in the car and said, ‘Bob, it says five furlongs.’

The other area that I should mention about the service of Sir James was his contribution to the Anglican Church. The relationship between Sir James and the bush extended very much into the bush brotherhood of the Anglican Church. Almost to the day of his death, if there was anything that the bush clergy needed—and money was always tight—Sir James would be there to help them. Whether it was organising race meetings in Toowoomba or special fundraising dinners, Sir James would always help the bush brotherhood. He was a High Anglican; he was very much a traditionalist. I can remember having a couple of discussions with him regarding the Book of Common Prayer, which I personally think is probably the finest piece of English literature in existence. Sir James lamented the decline in the use of the Book of Common Prayer in the Anglican Church. I remember him referring to some clergy who had virtually thrown it out completely as being absolute vandals. I could not agree with him more.

He was a regular communicant at St John’s Cathedral; he was there most Sundays. He certainly loved the church and he loved the traditions of the Anglican Church. He had a tremendous relationship with the clergy—not only the clergy of the Anglican communion but those of other denominations as well. This was exemplified by the fact that Archbishop Bathersby, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Brisbane was at St John’s Cathedral at the time of Sir James’s state funeral.

Theirs was a very special relationship that developed particularly after the death of Jim’s daughter Rosemary, and that really affected Jim to a very great extent. I know that people like Bishop Adrian Charles and the Dean of Brisbane, John Parkes, provided tremendous support and help to Sir James during some of those very difficult times. In that respect, I suppose it was appropriate that the dean took the services of the state funeral of Sir James. Archbishop Bathersby was there and Bishop Adrian Charles preached the sermon, and what a magnificent sermon it was.

Jim Killen, above everything else, was a man of very generous spirit. He was first and foremost a parliamentarian and I do not think that we will ever see his like in this place again. He very much lamented this new House; he did not like it. I think I am correct in saying that he only visited this place on one occasion following his retirement from the parliament. In some ways that was a bit of a pity. There is no doubt that there is a great difference between the conduct of business in the parliament today and what it was in the old chamber. Sir James loved that old chamber, and the repartee and some of the interjections that went back and forth across that chamber were really absolutely magnificent. The archivists are going to have a wonderful time when they finally get access to eight filing cabinets of Sir James’s personal documents. He has kept virtually every note that was passed across the chamber, every letter he wrote. They are filed in the most magnificent way that anybody could, and the amount of history that will be forthcoming when those archives are opened will be absolutely stunning.

I have great memories of Sir James in the chamber, and I mentioned the Governor-General’s address-in-reply speech of Sir James when I was first elected. He was one of the sharpest minds, and there were many on the other side as well. Sir James could be absolutely cutting, but he was never really cruel. He was never really nasty. To give you an example, at one stage we had a gentleman from Victoria who had not been in the parliament very long. He had black curly hair which sat on his head a bit like a triangle. He was interjecting on Sir James and Sir James just looked across and said, ‘Pipe down, Pythagoras.’ From that time, that particular member was known—on our side of parliament, anyway—as Pythagoras.

Gary Hardgrave (Moreton, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Poor old Andrew!

David Jull (Fadden, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There were quick one-liners, like: ‘The honourable member has many endearing qualities. It’s a pity intelligence isn’t one of them,’ or, ‘If brains were water, the honourable member would be declared a drought area.’ Interjections like that would fly across the chamber. As I said, they were always effective but they were never nasty and they were never vindictive. He was a great parliamentarian.

Probably the best thing that happened to Sir James, particularly in his later life, was his meeting with Benise, the present Lady Killen. Special tribute should be made to Benise and all she did for Sir James, including the way she looked after him during his declining years. She is a wonderful woman, and I think a great tribute was paid to her at the state funeral when one of Sir James’s daughters indicated that she was probably the best thing that happened to Sir James.

In closing, may I extend my personal sympathy to Lady Benise, to Diana and Heather and particularly to Sir James’s granddaughter, Dana. I think Sir James always wanted a grandson. Dana presented a great-grandson within days of the passing of Sir James Killen. Sir James Killen was a great Australian and a great Queenslander, but above all he was one of the finest characters and one of the finest parliamentarians I have ever met.

Gary Hardgrave (Moreton, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am enormously in debt to the honourable member for Fadden for his tremendous contribution to this condolence debate. Before I explore, on behalf of the people of the electorate of Moreton, some views and some tributes for Sir James Killen, I would like to place on record my condolence to the family of Sir Robert Cotton, a former senator, on his passing. I did not know the gentleman. It has not been my privilege to have ever met him, but I would certainly like to associate myself with the remarks made earlier by other members about him.

With regard to Sir James Killen, and to follow on from the remarks made by the member for Fadden, this is a delicious set of circumstances for me. The member for Fadden has just passed Sir James’s record as being the longest-serving Liberal in this place elected from Queensland. It is important to pay that tribute to the member for Fadden, whom I first met in 1974. Do not worry, Member for Fadden, this is not a eulogy for you! I simply make the point that I would not be here today if it were not for the positive influence of the member for Fadden on me in those very early days and the direction that he showed me. He showed me the way in which good individual conduct should be rewarded, that people should be trusted, that a society should be organised around the fact that most people do the right thing—that sense of trust, that commitment, that covenant that we have with the people of Australia.

My earliest connection with Sir James Killen, even though as a young bloke I lived in the electorate of Moreton, was in about 1980, when he wrote to me. I had been appointed as a delegate to a national youth conference that was convened by the Fraser government. I was not appointed by the Liberal Party; I was appointed by the community. Sir James wrote me a very nice letter, which is framed and has been on display in my office for many years simply because it struck me as a wonderful example of how this man, as a local member, despite how busy he was as a senior minister, lived up to the mantra he lived by and passed on to me, as one of his successors in the seat of Moreton. That mantra was to always put the parish first, to always remember that the parliament equals the people, that your conduct in the parliament must be on behalf of those you are elected to represent and that there is no importance associated with this job other than the importance afforded to you by those who support you at a critical time of election but that you must still work for everybody, regardless of whether they have in fact voted for you at an election.

Sir James Killen did not miss the point of emphasising the importance of the parish to me at any given opportunity I had to be with him, to meet with him or to speak with him. Looking back, those meetings and discussions were too infrequent for my particular liking. He assisted me in gaining selection from the Liberal Party to be the candidate for Moreton a dozen years ago. He assisted me during the election campaign in 1996. I remember knocking on a door in Ness Road, Salisbury, and saying to a very pleasant lady whose name I will not enter on the record, ‘Hardgrave, Liberal, running for Moreton.’ She said, ‘I remember Sir James Killen well; what a terrific man he was.’ The next thing that happened—and you would not believe it, Mr Deputy Speaker Adams—my mobile phone rang, door-knocking etiquette 101 was out the door and I had Jim Killen on the phone saying, ‘My boy.’

Paul Neville (Hinkler, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My boy!

Gary Hardgrave (Moreton, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That was his way, Member for Hinkler—‘my boy’. That was the way he spoke to me—a wonderful form of endearment from his lips that I can hear in my mind right now. I said to the lady at the door: ‘Excuse me; I will just take this call. It is Sir James Killen.’ She said, ‘Tell him I think he is marvellous and that I said hello.’ Sir James, as quickly as anything, said, ‘And tell her I think she must be adorable and attractive as well as a completely sound person.’

The member for Fadden’s observation about the race track is correct, except that I think there was nothing that made Jim smile even more than the affection or adoration of a beautiful woman. He did have a great deal of love and respect for all people, I agree, but he did not mind having the company of attractive people around him—and good luck to him. It was very innocent, very decent and very gentlemanly but nevertheless very enjoyable from his point of view.

On the night of the 1996 election win we were at Don Cameron’s house in Greenslopes—Don being a former member of this place and one of the unique five people who have been representatives in three or more electorates. He was the member for Griffith from 1966, the member for Fadden from 1977 and the member for Moreton from 1983 until 1990. We were at Cameron’s house and Sir James was there. He shook my hand and said: ‘My boy, well done. Congratulations. It is all ahead of you now. I pray that one day the Prime Minister will have the good sense to appoint you to a higher office, but don’t forget that, no matter what may happen, it is always the parish.’ He never, ever let me forget the parish. The point of all authority for all of us in this place comes from our respective parishes.

The member for Fadden was also right in observing that he did not like this place; the physical structure of this place offended him. I understand why. He came here for the Liberal Party’s anniversary function in 2006. It was a fine night and I remember him using my office as his base. I offered my office and ensured that he was transported appropriately—that he and Lady Benise and Dame Margaret and Stan Guilfoyle got back to their hotel. It seems extraordinary to me that these great people of enormous stature and great community service are not well looked after by the system these days. They more or less have to fend for themselves and are forced into cabs and so forth. None of this really fussed Jim too much, but I made sure we had a more appropriate form of transport to get him back.

I know what his trouble with this place was about. There is still a lot of genuine wit and ability amongst colleagues in this place. I think there is still an ability for people to make great comments, to interact and to make interjections that are worthy of being placed on the record, even though we all know they are unparliamentary, but this place does not afford that opportunity. I think Sir James would have liked the Main Committee more, because you can actually see the whites of the eyes of the people opposite. You can have a discussion and a debate in a much clearer environment than the very anaesthetic environment of the House of Representatives chamber, which has been styled more for television presentation than good parliamentary debate.

Sir James Killen maintained his sense of connection with Moreton all the way through, even though he lived in another part of town. Lady Joy has been mentioned. She stood and handed out how-to-vote cards for me in 1996 and 1998 at the Wellers Hill primary school, which was the home base of the Killen support group, if you like. They lived just around the corner from there for many years. He maintained his connection with the Tarragindi-Wellers Hill RSL, even though they as an organisation no longer exist and are now augmented under the Yeronga-Dutton Park RSL. He was always the special guest on Anzac Day. On some occasions he was not there. The member for Fadden will know some of the faces there. Muriel Watson, that wonderful doyenne of Brisbane theatre and television from many years ago, is a constituent of mine. Muriel and her late husband would be there every Anzac Day. There would be Jim and Dawn Slaughter—Dawn Slaughter being Sir James’s sister. A bit of a reunion would happen every Anzac Day at the memorial. It was always a very happy time to hear some fine words from Sir James Killen.

I think Sir James Killen showed that, from his point of view, community service was never something he was going to shy away from. Many people may not remember—the member for Blair is in the chamber and he will remember this—that at one stage Sir James Killen offered himself for election as the member for Blair to take on the then member for Oxley when she tried to continue her parliamentary career. He thought she was repugnant to Australia’s standards and repugnant to the way in which Australia operated. He was ready to take a stand against her. It showed the great strength of Sir James Killen for having that view.

At the end of it all it has come down to this enormous high honour for me, as the incumbent member for Moreton, to note his passing, to lament his passing and to thank him for his community service. When I was a young bloke growing up, the great figures in my local area around Sunnybank—apart from David Jull—were people like Geoff Chinchen, the then state member for Mount Gravatt. He has sadly left us. He was indeed a war hero and a fellow who, with his wife, Heather, helped start the Sunnybank Red Cross, maintaining his connection with that organisation. There was also the very sad passing just prior to Christmas of Bill Kaus, the former member for Mansfield. His daughter, Andrea West, was the member for Bowman between 1996 and 1998. And then there was the passing of Sir James Killen. For me, three powerhouses of local community focused representation were taken in just the last year or so.

I say to Diana and Heather: we thank you for the work that you allowed your parents to do. To Dana and to the rest of the family: we know that you will live up to the legacy of this wonderful man, Jim Killen. To Lady Benise: I join with the member for Fadden in publicly acknowledging the great strength and dignity that you brought to Jim’s latter years. The opportunity for us to deal with Jim in a more direct and open way because of your efforts is something for which we are forever indebted. Jim came and witnessed the opening of my electorate office in November last year. He patted me on the back and said, ‘You’ve done well’—high praise for me. Lest we forget—what a great man.

Tony Smith (Casey, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is my honour to associate myself with this motion and to speak about Sir James Killen. It is a particular honour to follow the member for Moreton, whose seat Sir James represented with such distinction over his 28-year career, and also to be here with the member for Fadden, who I know had a very long and close relationship with Sir Jim.

I do not stand here today as someone who knew Jim Killen at a personal level. I met him once or twice and, like everyone who met him, found him a thoroughly engaging person. When I was in my final year of school, I had given to me his autobiography. It was one of the first books I read about parliament and politics. I had not heard of Jim Killen until I was given that book by a family friend, someone who had not been involved in party politics but who had followed political debate and public affairs and thought that Jim Killen was the model of a community representative and a parliamentarian. Knowing my interest in public affairs and politics at that time, they gave that book to me as a gift. When I got the book I thought: ‘This will be interesting; I have never heard of this person.’ But it was captivating reading and I read it cover to cover. You could not help but feel that this was a person who was a quintessential Queenslander and a quintessential Australian. For those of us here, all of us representing all views within this parliament, he was a great local member of parliament, he was a great minister for defence, but most of all he was a great parliamentarian.

The life of Jim Killen spanned one of the most difficult and interesting times in Australian history. He was born in 1925 in Dalby and worked as a jackeroo from the age of 13 or 14. In the Second World War he joined that wonderful generation of veterans from the First World War who came back wanting to make sure that their country, Australia, could be the best it could be. He was one of those who decided that they wanted to have a stake in the decision-making right here in Canberra. People like Jim Killen probably would not have considered parliament had it not been for the adversity they endured. He was born in Dalby in 1925, when Australia was 25 years young. He then grew up through the Depression and experienced all the difficulties of life outside the major cities to become a self-made man and to make a difference—with people from the Labor Party as well.

We know that he was a man of great intelligence, a man of great wit, a man with whom you would never want to get caught in a verbal exchange. I say this as a member of the Liberal Party: he was fundamental in the creation of the Queensland division of the Liberal Party. He very much laid the groundwork and helped create the division from nothing in the days after the Second World War. The member for Fadden—my friend, who knew Jim Killen—knows that he was critical to the establishment and success of the party and to its representation here in Canberra. Given the diverse nature of our country—and I say this as a suburban Victorian—this ensured that the Liberal Party represented the breadth of Australia in all its guises.

I say as an observer that Jim Killen conducted himself with complete distinction all the way through his career and, just as importantly, also in his retirement. He stayed true to the cause he believed in. He recognised that in politics there would be ups and downs and disappointments but at no point was there ever any evidence of bitterness in him. He remained a servant of the people of Queensland and of the Queensland division of the Liberal Party for every day of his parliamentary life and his retired life. I just wanted to place on the record my tribute to him.

Debate (on motion by Mr Cameron Thompson) adjourned.