Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to reflect upon the passing of Joan Kirner, who passed away at the age of 76 on Monday. Joan Kirner, of course—former Premier of Victoria, the first woman Premier of my state—had a remarkable political record. I think it is very important to note before her entering parliamentary politics how active she was in community politics. Many people have already said since her passing that she was a great activist and she cut her teeth or forged her politics in the area of education. We have heard the fact that she was inspired by her father, a fitter and turner, as a passionate advocate for social justice. She was inspired by both her father and her mother, who was a music teacher, to advance the cause of education, the transformative power of education, the right of children to have a good education and to be able to contribute and have opportunities in life.

I knew Joan. I first met Joan when she was a minister in the Cain government, but I knew her as Dave's mum. I was a good friend of one of her sons, David Kirner, and she struck me as a remarkably strong woman, personable and very engaging. As people have noted, in her first role as Minister for Conservation, Forests and Lands she created a remarkable policy in the area of landcare—a policy that went beyond the bounds, ultimately, of Victoria, beyond that state, to become I think a bipartisan approach to landcare in this country. The reason for that and the reason for the success of that policy was that she brought people together, in many cases people that had competing interests, competing constituencies. She forged a partnership with the Victorian Farmers Federation, conservationists and others and developed a remarkable policy.

People who say of her that she was a member of the Socialist Left and she was a left member of the Labor Party believe that somehow she might have been partisan. But she had a remarkable capacity to stand in the shoes of others and to see things from their perspective. The Landcare policy, her first remarkable area of work—in parliamentary politics at least—was a testament to her capacity to think about the issue from every perspective, from farmers' and conservationists' perspectives, and to bring these competing, conflicting constituencies together. She did that. That is why, when she raised the policy with the then Prime Minister Bob Hawke and other federal ministers after she had made it a success in her own state, it was embraced not just by Labor governments but indeed by conservative governments as well.

People talk about her role as the education minister. She introduced the VCE into Victoria. Again, this was a remarkable policy that provided better opportunities for children in that state to access a good education. She got many of her ideas from being a teacher. She graduated from the University of Melbourne. She was a teacher at Ballarat Girls' Technical College. As we have heard, she was required by law to surrender her profession once she married her husband Ron. It is a remarkable thing to think today that a woman who married had to automatically relinquish her own profession. How could that not have an effect on one's views about gender equality in society? She may well have taken some time out of work, as she had three children, but she was constantly active. She became the President of the Victorian Federation of State School Parents' Clubs, a very powerful lobby group in the seventies. She held that position from 1971 to 1977 and then she became the executive officer of that organisation. That is where she got many of her ideas which later became policies of that state when she was Minister for Education. So in two portfolios she left a very significant mark in the areas of conservation and education in that state and, I believe, influenced national policy in both areas beyond that—a remarkable achievement.

What she is also remembered for is that when the government was in dire straits for a variety of reasons—not least of all the failure to regulate and prevent greedy people from doing greedy things—the Labor Party turned to her as a successful and senior cabinet minister to take the role of Premier. She discharged the functions of Premier very well—against the odds, if you like. We have heard the tributes from her then opponent Jeff Kennett. He was not providing too many tributes at the time that he was competing against her, but he has graciously provided some assessment about her formidable ability and has remarked upon her values. I think that is entirely appropriate. She endured enormous pressure. Even though Labor was defeated badly and it was a resoundingly successful victory for the conservative party, she still remained very popular in that state and she was very gracious in her concession speech on that night.

Upon leaving parliamentary politics, she set about rebuilding Labor. One of the ways she knew she could do that was to improve the opportunities for women in the Labor Party and to provide a party that was modern and that was more reflective of society. That is why she became the co-founder of EMILY's List. The concept for this organisation was borrowed from the United States. It really was about ensuring that women of calibre were given the same opportunities as men. I have to say our history back then was not good in terms of allowing women to participate fully in the party, and there is still more to do. But it is remarkable to note that 50 per cent of the cabinet ministers in the current Victorian Labor government are women. The same is the case for Queensland. I do not think it is a stretch to say that would not have happened so quickly and it would not have happened by this year if it had not been for the work undertaken by Joan Kirner and others in creating EMILY's List and cultivating and encouraging remarkable women.

I can use a lot of examples, but I will just confine my comments to Victoria, where I know the process better. Looking at three seats, Jagajaga was held by former minister, Peter Staples; Gellibrand was held by a former Treasurer and finance minister, Ralph Willis; and Lalor was held by former minister, Barry Jones. Their successors were Jenny Macklin, Nicola Roxon and Julia Gillard—three remarkable women. They are former cabinet ministers and, in the case of the latter, a Prime Minister.

The thing about ensuring that women reach the top in politics is that you have to ensure that they are able to compete for safe seats. People understand that in the two major parties. You have to have an opportunity that is not being defeated and going in and out of parliament. To succeed, you have to have a chance of building a career. All three women replaced remarkably capable men. They were also remarkably capable women. They went on to have very successful careers, become very important representatives and inspire other women to follow in their footsteps.

That would not have happened without affirmative action. People do not understand affirmative action. These preselections of Julia Gillard, Jenny Macklin and Nixon Roxon were still hard-fought preselections. In the case of Julia Gillard, it happened to be a hard-fought preselection of three women running for that safe Labor seat. One of the reasons why there are only two women in the current federal cabinet is because of the failure by the other major party to do similar things.

I just wanted to put that on the record and extend my deepest condolences to Joan's family, her husband Ron, her three children and her grandchildren.

Cathy McGowan (Indi, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Vale Joan Kirner. Her legacy goes well and truly beyond politics. Today, I would like to speak about the personal, community, national and international impact that I know she has had. I would like to begin with a quote:

The future is not some place we are going to, but one we are creating. The paths are not to be found, but made, and the activity of making them, changes both the maker and the destination.

Joan Kirner looked into the future and thought, 'We could do better.' She set about doing that. I think she made a significant impact on both the destination and the partners she worked with along the way. She made it better for women, she made it particularly better for the farm women, she made the future better for country communities and she made it better by far for this young, rural country woman.

That was me in my 30s, when I was a young staffer with the Victorian agricultural department. I worked for the Victorian Department of Agricultural and Rural Affairs. Minister Kirner was the Minister for Conservation, Forests and Lands. Together with Caroline Hogg, Kay Setches and Evan Walker, and managed by the amazing Frank McClelland, they headed up what was called the Rural Affairs Committee of Cabinet. Our job as rural affairs advisers was to report to that Rural Affairs Committee of Cabinet. There is a huge legacy right across Victoria, Australia and internationally of that particular model of doing work. Today, I would like to put on record some of the impact of and pay enormous tribute to that small team of people led by Joan. We have heard lots of talk about Landcare. Certainly, I personally was involved with it. I became the inaugural secretary of the Indigo Valley Landcare Group in 1988, which still exists.

Another huge contribution that Joan and that team made was the Victorian Rural Women's Network. Twenty-three years later, it is still active and connected, and communities are still engaged about it. I call on the Victorian government, as a legacy of Joan Kirner, to relook at the model of the Victorian Rural Women's Network. Let us empower it and resource it to continue to do good work. I talk about the Women on Farms gatherings where women are still meeting right across Victoria, coming together, networking, finding their voice and influencing government. I talk about the small town study that re-innovated towns and communities in my electorate, particularly Beechworth.

I talk about the Rural Enterprise Victoria workers, workers who were paid to go and do community work and economic development in rural towns. I talk about the structural adjustment that Joan, Carolyn and Kaye organised to be community centred, and the particular work that they did in the Mallee and Felton House, and how this model of putting resources into communities enabled and helped structural adjustment. I can remember particularly the fax machines that they paid for to go to our community houses. What a difference being able to communicate by fax made. To all my communities in north-east Victoria, we continue to benefit from the work of that Rural Enterprise Victoria program. We got economics, and we could see that it would be a driver for innovation and connectivity. Today, when I look around my communities, I can see the result of all that work.

I was a rural affairs adviser, and our job was to serve that committee of cabinet. There were 17 of us right across Victoria, and our job was to look at our communities and report to cabinet on what the issues were. I have to say that it is a daunting task. There was nothing easy about working for Joan Kirner. In fact, I would have to say that she made us scared. We had to be our best selves. She was not above handing back a cabinet paper and saying, 'Do it again'. She was not above saying, 'Well, that doesn't work,' or, 'Where's the logic? Where's the data? Where are the statistics?' and, 'We talked about this last time. Where's the follow up?' The thing that she made us do more than anything else was find those invisible people—where were the mothers, where were the young girls, where were the older women and where were the people with disabilities? From my limited experience of community work, it was a shock. We had said, 'They're not there,' and Joan would say, 'Go and find them, because of course they're there'.

I really want to talk both of the things that came out of the oversight that they had and the absolutely strong belief in community. We have heard a lot about landcare, and I am not going to talk too much about it, except to say that in my electorate of Indi landcare is strong and thriving. It is one of those fundamental planks that underpin our really strong communities. What I would particularly like to talk about today is the Rural Women's Network, and I pay particular homage Jenny Mitchell and Anna Lottkowitz and the work that they did in setting up the Rural Women's Network. Through the women's network, we went on to establish Australian Women in Agriculture. Australian Women in Agriculture went on to run international conferences in Australia, America, South Africa and Madrid, and we are currently working with India. All of this grew out of the commitment of that committee of cabinet to do good work.

The thing about the vision was that Joan absolutely believed in community. She taught us that if you actually see community, and you honour and support it, then anybody can come and work their way through the system—you do not have to start at the top. That is what the Rural Women's Network did. It brought us together in small groups, it taught us how to network in our communities and it taught us how to connect. It did not matter who you were married to or who your parents were, there was a place for anybody in the network. Then we were supported by this fantastic magazine called the Rural Women's Network Magazine. It came out four or five times a year and told our stories so that we could see each other. We absolutely grew in confidence as we knew that this cabinet committee was listening to us and our stories were reported back to us. Then the most amazing thing happened. This cabinet committee took actions on stuff that we thought was important: on telecommunications, on transport, on child care and on education, and they put resources into community-building.

So the Neighbourhood House Network grew and many of us have a career that we worked through the Neighbourhood House Network as we grew in strength and confidence, going on communities, becoming president, becoming secretary, taking delegation to ministers and having our voices heard. The network is still really strong. It is strong in Victoria, but it is also strong in New South Wales, it is strong in Queensland, it is strong in Western Australia, it is strong in South Australia and not so strong—a bit more subtle—in the Northern Territory. So that legacy really lives on.

I would also like to talk about what else has happened as a result of that Rural Women's Network. It gave women courage to stand up to form Australian Women in Agriculture. It gave us women courage to go across and work in Papua New Guinea, Ireland, India and North America, and take the message that women's ways of working in country Australia are strong and powerful. We do not have to be out there and compete with the blokes to do it. Our competitive advantage is our communities, our families and our networks.

I would also like to acknowledge the particular role that the Department of Agriculture played in supporting us women. Tim Reeves was our regional manager. He supported these changes and he gave us young staffers permission to go and do this community work. The Department of Agriculture I think will never be the same. We had these amazing days when Joan Kirner, Carolyn Hogg, Kay Setches and Evan Walker called us together to the Carlton Football Club, that hallowed of hallowed. There were all these ag women talking about what it meant to be a woman in agriculture and talking about what it meant to be a community and connected to our families. It was so different from the blokes' experience of agriculture. We looked at each other and thought, 'Yes, we have got a voice.' We heard our minister saying, 'Yes, not only have you got a voice; you have a responsibility to get out there and be part of designing the future.'

It gives me enormous pleasure today to stand here and say thank you. I acknowledge in this House that I would not be here without Joan Kirner, I would not be here without the Victorian Rural Women's Network and I would not be here without the support and the modelling that she and those women gave us. So, personally, thank you Joan, Kay and Carolyn for showing me that community is a place where I belong. Community gives me the support to come to this House and be a representative of the community. It is linked to economics, those rural enterprises in Victoria, and it is linked to environment—we have to get the Landcare stuff working and communities embedded in it all.

Let me turn to my political career. The fact that I am here is a legacy of Joan Kirner, but it is more than that. I also want to acknowledge the other Victorians who provided such support for me. I do not think it is coincidental that such great leaders come out of Victoria. Malcolm Fraser and Joan Kirner gave us rural people the support and the courage to be people of conviction based in the community and be good representatives. The proof I think is what we have just heard—the people who stand before us today.

The future will be a better place because people like Joan set about building partnerships. She had such faith that if we work together we can create a future that is inclusive. Thank you. I pass on my sympathies to all concerned and particularly acknowledge the work of those great women and thank them for what they have done.

Michelle Rowland (Greenway, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is with much sadness and immense gratitude that I rise to speak on the passing of a giant of the labour movement—Joan Kirner. I believe for a lot of us that Joan Kirner actually became more important to her party and to parliamentary representation of women generally after she left parliament. She did not just become a commentator; she stayed involved—you would see her at conferences and at party meetings. She was always in touch with people who were in the labour movement, in parliament or seeking to be in public office. She had an immense impact on the structures of the Labor Party and a passion for diversity in our parliaments. I and many other people I know often disagreed with her road map but it was impossible to ignore the fact that she was so authentic and genuine about what she wanted to achieve. She wanted to make all of our parliaments mirror our society.

I took the opportunity to chat with Amanda Fazio, the former President of the New South Wales Legislative Council. She was around during some of the really heady times in 1994 when significant changes were made within the Labor Party structures. They were sponsored very heavily by Paul Keating, which was so important, but Joan was integral to that. It is hard to believe that was 21 years ago and I had been in the party for only four years. Joan championed what then Prime Minister Paul Keating was seeking to do. I found this neatly summarised in a speech that Amanda made on 29 May last year. She made this speech on the occasion of 20 years since the introduction of affirmative action for women in the national rules of the Australian Labor Party, and it was driven by national Labor women's conferences, where Joan was such a figure not only of authority but of nurturing. Amanda said:

Then Prime Minister Paul Keating stated on 9 September 1994:

Last year, I called on the Labor Party to begin a process of reinvigoration. We needed to make the changes necessary to increase the number of women in State and federal caucuses.

…   …   …

At the national conference in Hobart, rule 12c was adopted requiring that women be preselected for 35 per cent of winnable seats at all elections by 2002. I was a delegate to the 1994 conference and was involved in the negotiations leading up to this decision. I must say that I was not wholly supportive of the model adopted because I felt that the 30 per cent of seats left for either gender would be taken up by men who would continue to promote men just like themselves. I wanted 50 per cent of seats for women. However, I was either too idealistic or hard line, and the more moderate viewpoint prevailed.

Amanda went on to note Paul Keating referring to the affirmative action decision after the 1994 conference:

One, in particular, which I think will be around when all of us are gone was the decision, a very historic one, to increase the representation for women in the parliaments. That is the keynote change of this conference. That will be the one that will change the character of Australian politics; it's the one which will lift the opportunities for women to participate in the parliaments.

Amanda ends this speech by saying:

I thank all the Labor women from across Australia involved in the development and passing of the affirmative action rules in 1994, including Joan Kirner and also then Prime Minister Paul Keating, who strongly supported this historic decision.

It needed individuals at this conference to take risks to make that change reality. It was never inevitable that this change would happen and that we would see the diversity that we have now in the Labor Party at all levels, I believe, of parliaments. However, we can never rest on our laurels; we always need to keep doing better. But this was never inevitable. Joan Kirner took a risk—she was a risk taker. It was highly contentious. I remember we even had to deal with the notion that women who were going to be elected to the parliament or were going to put themselves forward would simply be token women. We had men raising arguments that this would be discrimination against men. So this was a challenge to vested interests, to individuals, to factions and to power bases. I am sure Joan Kirner lost friends in this process. And one should never think it was unanimous. But she had the courage to make it a reality, and I thank her for that and I know Amanda Fazio does as well. As I said, we would often be on opposite sides of internal debates on how we were going to achieve this, but Joan was always authentic, she was always genuine and she really was a model of someone who did what they believed in, irrespective of who she had to offend or who she had to bring with her in the tent—she got it done.

I want to take this opportunity to read what I think is a very touching and very accurate message from someone else who I think needs to be on the public record, and that is in message from Carmel Guerra, the CEO of the Centre for Multicultural Youth in Melbourne. She writes that Joan Kirner:

… inspired and, knowingly or unknowingly, mentored many individual women by passing on her wisdom, knowledge and experience in making a difference.

Joan was a fierce supporter of the work of CMY and a strong advocate for the voices of young people to be heard. In our 20th anniversary publication "many voices one story" Joan spoke of the role the Ethnic Youth Issues Network (early incarnation of CMY) played in giving a voice to those young people whose voices are not often heard, "...the workers did have a background of experience, not just a set of opinions, and at most times you were able to assemble a group of young people who weren't just there as prize exhibits but who had been mentored or assisted to feel confident in what they were saying".

Joan gave graciously of her time to attend CMY events and spoke with young people about their experiences and journey to Australia. She would sit and talk with the young people, many who did not know she had been the Premier of Victoria, and encouraged them to speak their mind, participate in the democratic process and keep CMY honest. Until recently Joan, though frail, was a regular at our events and would make an effort to sit and listen intently to every person who sat next to her and ask inquisitive and insightful questions.

I end by saying that I found an email—I think the only email exchange that Joan Kirner and I had—from May 2013. I was having a bit of an issue with being a new mother and being judged by some people on how I did my job in this place. But she wrote to me, in part, 'Hi Michelle. I hope you and Octavia are recovering. Congratulations for taking the fight up to them. I have just heard,' and I will not mention the name here, 'hopeless attempts to justify his patriarchal conservative response. I hope your electorate continues to elect you as their forthright and effective representative. In admiration, Joan Kirner.'

I replied to Joan, thanking her for her response and sent her a photo of my little girl. This was almost exactly 2 years ago to the day—3 June 2013. Joan Kirner replied, 'She is gorgeous. Thank you and good luck, JK.' Joan Kirner: wherever you are, thank you. You have inspired many but, more importantly, you made a difference. The legacy that you leave will continue to make a positive difference in years to come.

Melissa Parke (Fremantle, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a privilege to pay my respects to the life and work of Joan Kirner. She was a trailblazer for women in public life, and a person who showed how politics could be meaningful and honourable, and packed with opportunities to make a difference. I offer my condolences to her family and her many devoted friends.

I am grateful to have heard throughout this debate a number of lovely and heartfelt reflections from people who knew Joan well and who worked with her in Victoria. I thank them for sharing those stories in this place so that they can be part of the national record. Joan Kirner was a figure of national significance for a number of reasons. I would like to take the opportunity to remember Joan specifically in the context of her great contribution to bringing women into politics.

Over the last three decades we have witnessed profound change in the opportunities for women to be involved in public life and to be involved at the highest level of government. As a member in this place I know, and I want all young Australian women to know, that Joan Kirner was a pioneer of that change.

Joan Kirner, like Carmen Lawrence, my predecessor in the seat of Fremantle, was asked by her party to take on the position of premier in very difficult circumstances. Make no mistake, both Joan and Carmen brought their integrity, intelligence and strength of character to the task of reinforcing state Labor governments in trouble. Their conduct and communication skills were critical in limiting the scale of what were, by that stage, inevitable electoral losses. In doing so, first Carmen Lawrence and then Joan Kirner broke through the political glass ceiling in order to prove the possibility and capability of female leadership at the highest level in their states of Western Australia and Victoria respectively. I acknowledge, of course, that it was Rosemary Follett in the ACT in 1989, the year before Carmen became premier, who first held a position of leadership in either state or territory governments.

The evolution of female political leadership in Australia has come a long way since those trailblazing achievements—and the story of that evolution is a distinctively Labor story. Since that time we have at some point seen a women as premier or chief minister of every state and territory government except South Australia, we have seen women as governors and as Governor-General, and of course we have seen Australia's first female Prime Minister.

Kristina Keneally and Lara Giddings, like Carmen and Joan, led their governments to elections, but lost. Anna Bligh and Julia Gillard fought elections from government and won. Earlier this year Anastacia Palasczcuk won from opposition. All these milestones have built steadily upon one another—not in some direct or structural continuum, of course, but rather in the way that culture has always developed: with first a concept and a principle; and then the pursuit of that concept and the argument from that principle until what was for the longest time theoretically possible but highly improbable, suddenly becomes realistic, then logical, then real.

Joan Kirner did a lot more than open the door and show the way. Joan had experienced gender discrimination; she knew it from her time as a teacher; and she knew it could only be defeated by an intense effort that would require women working together within the structures of power in this country.

Joan herself—as a number of the contributions to this debate have shown—was an active and powerful force of encouragement; she was an enabler of women at all levels and in all ways, from the personal to the practical. I was delighted and humbled to receive a congratulatory and supportive letter from Joan upon my first election to the House of Representatives in 2007.

When we look beyond government leadership alone as a marker of female political participation and we celebrate more widely the number of female parliamentarians—the number of women in the Rudd-Gillard ministries and cabinets; the first, second and, yes, even third woman to have the role of Speaker in this place—we should do so with the acknowledgement that in the last 30 years there have been few people who have done more than Joan Kirner to push and promote, to bolster and boost women to have—or know they should have—an interest in representative politics.

Others have spoken in detail about Joan Kirner's work through EMILY's list, and I do not need to explain again how crucial that kind of funding support is, or what the incredible vote of confidence that goes with that funding support means when you are in the early stages of a campaign, when you are on the brink of making a contribution to Australian policy and public life.

Joan Kirner was named a Companion of the Order of Australia for her eminent service to the parliament of Victoria and to the community through conservation initiatives, contributions to gender equality, development of education and training programs, and the pursuit of civil rights and social inclusion. On receiving this honour Joan said:

[Now] young women and their daughters know that they can be premiers, they can be leaders of the state, and they can be leaders of the nation.

Deputy Speaker, I am proud beneficiary of EMILY's list. I am one of hundreds of Labor women who owe a great debt to the work, energy and vision of Joan Kirner, and I know that Australian society as a whole is better for the increased participation of women that Joan Kirner made real.

Tim Watts (Gellibrand, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Joan Kirner was not just a former Victorian Premier and a former Labor warrior to me; she was a constituent, a branch member and, most importantly, a friend and mentor. Historians have written plenty about Joan's political legacy in recent days—the VCE, Landcare, fighting gender inequality—but I want to speak to her personal legacy to try and leave a small record of the wit and warmth, and commitment and kindness that she shared with so many of us.

Her loss has been felt keenly by many—many people across Melbourne's west, across Victoria and across Australia. I have ceased to be surprised at the extraordinary number and range of people who have told me in recent days that it was Joan who got me into politics, or it was Joan who got me through this, or it was Joan who opened this door for me.

Joan and I certainly did not agree on everything—her ardent support for the Essendon Football Club was embarrassing to the last—but she taught me an enormous amount. The issue she taught me the most about was gender inequality. She had experienced it and she had fought it in the community and in government.

Joan was a ferocious advocate of increasing women's representation in politics—she did not just talk about it; she lived it. She was instrumental in the adoption of affirmative action policies within the Labor Party, and in the establishment of EMILY's list.

Initiatives that have seen record numbers of women in Labor cabinets in recent years, including the government of our first female Prime Minister—Julia Gillard—and Australia's first cabinet with equal gender representation under the Queensland Palaszczuk government.

Joan was not just a critic of male dominance of our politics; she was a builder of female representation. Given this, I had some trepidation when, during my preselection, I went to see her as a bloke running against three women. I did not get her vote. In fact, at a branch member forum during my preselection she sat in the very front row of the hall—in front of 500 branch members—less than 10 yards away from me and directly in my line of sight. Every time I got up to speak, she glared at me and put the fire in me and the pressure on me. Every time I sat down, she was in the line of sight of the three women running against me, cheering them on and giving them the support that they needed. Despite playing this ballot extremely hard, in the first meeting I had with Joan after the ballot and after that she had nothing but endless cups of tea, mentoring and advice for me.

Given Joan's extraordinary support for women in politics, it can be lost somewhat the enormous support and mentoring she is given to men in politics also. For those men who are willing to listen, she was extraordinarily generous with her time and consideration. As Bill Shorten told the Labor caucus this week, Joan had plenty of advice for Labor men in politics too—it was often just a bit tougher than the advice she had for the women in the party.

I greatly value our correspondence and meetings. Her counsel on responding to family violence was particularly important to me. During our conversations on this issue she offered me the benefit of decades of experience in community organising and political strategy. She understood how gender inequality caused violence against women. Once, I complained to her at the end of a day's worth of meeting with advocates and service providers in this area, telling her that meeting with the people doing this extraordinarily important but extraordinarily hard work was psychologically and emotionally exhausting for me. She gave me a stiff kick up the bum and told me: 'You think you've got it tough now. You should've seen what it was like 30 years ago! We couldn't even convince people that this was actually happening then and, even if we could get that far, we couldn't convince people that it was an issue that was worth discussing in public, an issue that was worth being tackled by political leaders.'

She was right, of course—and not only that, but through the benefit of her hard-won experience she taught me that we can make progress on changing societal attitudes to these issues, that we have made progress however insignificant it may feel, however agonisingly slow it may feel and even if the amount of work required to inch this issue forward over the long-term seems all out of proportion to the gains that we realised. She was convinced that over the long term, over the long arc of history, we can all make progress. Immediately after making this point to me, she was straight back onto the politics of the day and asking me what she could do to help me keep inching the issue forward in the politics of the day.

We are increasingly finding that the way that elected representatives conduct themselves after they have left the political stage is a true mark of their character. On this measure, Joan wins the highest marks. She never compromised her integrity, her dignity or her commitment to the Labor cause. She might have retired from elected politics after losing government, but she never retired from the practice of politics. She kept turning up and giving of herself so that the party, the cause and others could succeed. She was a joiner and a doer: Joan did not just speak out, she offered endless practical support with fundraising, mentoring and networking to so many young people in the party. It is part of the reason that Joan's loss has been so keenly felt. She was not just a political legacy; she was an ongoing part of so many people's a lives.

Even now it is strange to think that she is gone. She never really retired and, despite her illnesses, every time that I spoke to her she retained a palpable sense of energy. Towards the end of Joan's life, I was proud to have been accused in a national newspaper of having fallen under her spell. I sent her a copy of this article, with a note telling her how pleased I was by this. Given how close to the end this was, though, I never heard back from her. But I hope that she was pleased by it, too.

Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Joan Kirner really was a remarkable woman, as we have heard. She was warm, she was funny and she was brave. She had been fighting her illness for quite some time, and now of course she is at rest. As we have all heard, Joan made her contribution in the community as a teacher, as a parent, as a minister, as a Deputy Premier and as Victoria's first female Premier. Her commitments to social justice and to gender equality were remarkable and are on the record, as well as her role in the establishment of Landcare. All of these things are really outstanding. But Joan as Victoria's first female Premier and because of all she has done to support, encourage and promote other women has ensured that she will not be the only one. For me, this is Joan's greatest contribution in our community—particularly the lasting legacy of EMILY's List, which she and others drove after she had formally left politics. Many of the women on this side of politics are part of Joan's legacy. She kept pushing until things changed. She crashed the glass ceiling and she encouraged others to follow her through.

I first had the privilege of meeting Joan during my time as a staff member for a former senator, during the 1997-98 establishment of EMILY's List. Joan was driven. She was determined that we needed a tangible vehicle to drive change to get more women into parliaments and into leadership roles in our communities. I was very honoured in 2006 when I first stood for parliament to have Joan Kirner as my appointed mentor as an EMILY's List member. Joan would call me at the end of every day, during the campaign, to talk to me about the personal and about the politics. She was always a great listener, but importantly she was ready with advice. She was so grounded. She gave great advice about managing and balancing family life and politics. I, like so many progressive women in politics, will be forever grateful for that advice and that support.

I am just one of many women from my home state of Tasmania who were influenced and encouraged by Joan. Others such as our first female Tasmanian Premier, Lara Giddings, who spoke to our papers this week about her relationship with Joan. The former member for Bass in this place and now Tasmanian Deputy Labor leader, Michelle O'Byrne, and former state minister Paula Wriedt, were also supported by Joan. Joan was also well known and loved by our former state ministers Fran Bladel and Judy Jackson. Fran was one of those who helped establish EMILY's list, with Joan and others.

Joan is so very well respected by so many. She has earned this respect, and I know she will be missed. But I also know that Joan and all she has achieved will never be forgotten. My sincere condolences to her husband, her children and her grandchildren. I want to thank them for the sacrifices that I know that they would have made to share Joan with so many of us. She is indeed a remarkable woman, who will be very sadly missed. My heart goes out to her family and friends at this very important time.

Sharon Claydon (Newcastle, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is with pleasure that I rise today to make a contribution that both honours and celebrates the life of the Hon. Joan Kirner AC. Joan was much loved, and she will be terribly missed by so many in our community. While perhaps most well known as Victoria's first, and so far only, female premier, Joan was, of course, so much more. For a generation of Labor women, including myself, Joan was a mentor and inspiration. She had a solid grounding in community activism prior to entering politics, and this was a passion and commitment that never waned for Joan, and one that she actively encouraged in everyone that she met along the way.

Just as important, Joan lived her life strengthened with the knowledge that women can indeed to do anything. In 2012, when accepting her appointment as a Companion of the Order of Australia, Joan spoke of the pride of being the first female premier of Victoria. She said:

[Now] young women and their daughters know that they can be premiers, they can be leaders of the state, and they can be leaders of the nation.

My mother used to say to me, 'You can do anything as a girl that you want to do', and I believe that.

Joan will be remembered for her passionate commitment to social justice, her unswerving belief in educational opportunities, her courage and determination for gender equality and her insistence on profound cultural change for Labor in the form of affirmative action.

Having founded EMILY's List in Australia in 1996, Joan remained a staunch champion of the key principles of equity, child care, equal pay, choice and diversity to the very end. Her ongoing work with EMILY's List has now provided an important financial, political and personal support network for some 400 women in their campaigns for public office, resulting in more than 200 progressive Labor women being elected to Australian parliaments. It is an amazing achievement in less than two decades. I am one of those women and a very proud member of EMILY's List, indebted to all those women who came before me to help pave the way for Labor women to actively participate at all levels of decision making both in the Australian Labor Party and in our local, state and federal parliaments. I want to thank Joan Kirner, along with Carmen Lawrence, Kay Setches, Helen Creed and Julia Gillard, for having the courage to fight for the inclusion of affirmative action policies in the ALP more than two decades ago—a matter to which I will return.

It was Joan's belief in the capacity of women to do well in whatever fields they chose to pursue—her encouragement, her warmth and wisdom, her commitment to ensure that there were always support structures in place when you needed them—that made your encounters with Joan Kirner unforgettable. I want to share with the House my recollections of Joan's visit to Newcastle in 2004. I was a younger woman thinking about the challenges of local government at the time, attending a large gathering of progressive women from across Newcastle and Joan was the special guest. It was an EMILY's List Australia function hosted by the then federal member for Newcastle Sharon Grierson. The room was packed with women who were really excited to meet Joan. She made every woman in that room feel special, that they were capable of doing whatever they set their sights on. It gave women like me the courage to say, 'Yes, I'm going to put my hand up for that next preselection round'. She had made sure that there were structures in my party, whether you needed them or not, to make sure that women had an equal chance of being a preselected to contest seats in Australian parliaments.

That night in Newcastle Joan inspired so many women of my generation—and indeed, the next generation—to take up membership with EMILY's List and to become active and vocal supporters of the organisation. The transformation of the Labor Party through affirmative action has in fact been immense. The Labor Party is now a place where women can succeed with the support of affirmative action; indeed, there is a very timely report on this matter out at the moment. It is now 20 years on since affirmative action rules were put in place and the proportion of elected Labor women in our parliaments prior ro the rule changes in 1994 was just 14.5 per cent. At the same time, the percentage of Liberal women was just 13.9 per cent, so we were both doing very poorly. Here we are 20 years on, following Labor's affirmative action rules which Joan Kirner was such a champion of, with 43 per cent of women in Labor held seats compated with the Liberal Party's 23.2 per cent of women in Parliaments. These figures demonstrate what affirmative action rules can achieve.

Affirmative action is important and it does matter in the fight for gender equality in this place and in other places around the country. We would see no better example than the current Queensland cabinet, under the leadership of the first Australian woman to be elected from opposition as Premier in Queensland, Annastacia Palaszczuk. Her cabinet now has a historic eight women to seven men. That was probably unimaginable 20 years ago, but that is an example of how affirmative action is influencing gender equality in parliaments in Australia. In Joan's home state of Victoria we see a record number of nine women in Daniel Andrews's Labor cabinet; that is to be commended as well. Beyond Premiers, we have Joan to thank for our first Australia woman Prime Minister, of course. Her tireless advocacy, support and mentoring helped the advancement of Julia Gillard to our nation's highest post.

Joan was a mentor to those she met but also a coach for those who she did not always meet firsthand. Through her partnership with Moira Rayner, Joan provided some real-life assistance to aspiring women with the very practical book that she produced as a tool kit: the Women's Power Handbook. It sits to this day on the bookshelf in my office in Newcastle. I often reflect on the lessons I learnt through that book and pass it on to other women who are looking for guidance on their own journeys to parliament or, indeed, other fields of endeavour.

Finally, when we learnt of Joan's passing on Monday night this week, it was fitting that many of us were gathered for our regular meeting of the Labor caucus Status of Women Committee. It was wonderful that we could be together on that night as we heard the sad news, to reflect on Joan's life, what she meant to each of us as individuals and to Labor women across the nation. So many of us have benefited from the amazing contribution of Joan Kirner. She really was the most extraordinary agent of change, and for that we are deeply grateful. My generation of Labor women will remain indebted to Joan's vision and her tenacity and today we say thank you, Joan Kirner.

I send my condolences to Joan's husband, Ron and her three children, Michael, David and Kate and their families at this sad time.

Sarah Henderson (Corangamite, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to take this opportunity to associate myself with the remarks about the honourable Joan Kirner. As a young journalist, I knew Joan Kirner both as education minister and also as the Premier of Victoria. I think Joan Kirner was a trailblazer in many respects. One of the most lasting legacies was Landcare, which vary lives very much strong and is a great reflection of her commitment to the environment. I too would like to extend my sincere condolences to her family and her friends.

Gai Brodtmann (Canberra, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Deputy Speaker Henderson, for those lovely warm remarks about the late and great Joan Kirner. I join with my colleagues today in rising to pay tribute to a great Australian woman, a great Australian leader, a great Labor leader, a great Labor woman, Joan Kirner. Victoria's first female Premier, Joan Kirner will be remembered for her trailblazing work in helping bridge the gender gap, as well as social justice. Like so many of my colleagues, I am only here because of the pioneering efforts of Joan Kirner.

Joan was Victoria's 42nd premier for only 26 months, but in many ways it was her work after this time that had the biggest impact. Joan was a founding member of EMILY's List. Joan and her Labor sisters were passionate about increasing women's representation and rights in Australia. Having seen the great work being done by EMILY's List in the United States, they knew an organisation dedicated to supporting progressive Labor-aligned women in and around politics would be warmly welcomed in Australia. The achievements of our members since have been immense. I am a proud member of EMILY's List.

So far, EMILY's List Australia has supported 155 progressive candidates in their election to state, territory and federal parliaments across Australia, and they also do great work in mentoring and helping out those in local elections as well. These include Australia's first female Prime Minister, the first female premiers in Queensland and Tasmania, the former ACT Chief Minister and now Senator for the ACT, Katy Gallagher, the Northern Territory opposition leader and the New South Wales deputy opposition leader.

I am incredibly proud to be one of those 155. The support provided to me in my first campaign from EMILY's List was just extraordinary. Not only was there financial support but I was given a number of mentors who were very strong, powerful, committed, very socially progressive women in Canberra who used to regularly, during the campaign, take me out for coffee and see how I was travelling physically and emotionally. They were also there to give me advice on who I should be speaking to, who I should be networking with.

They opened up so many doors to me in terms of people I needed to consult with to get their views on a range of issues around the Canberra community, particularly in the disability sector. They introduced me to these extraordinary incredibly strong women, disability activists who were not only doing exceptional work in advocating for women with disability here in Canberra and in Australia but were also playing of very large role on the international stage as well.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank my great EMILY's List sisters, who particularly helped me out in that first campaign in opening doors for me, in providing me lots of coffee and lots of emotional support when I needed it, for giving me advice, for looking after me. In a way it was a network of not just sisters but mothers as well. I really do appreciate their efforts and that would not have been possible without EMILY's List, and EMILY's List would not have been possible without the extra extraordinary Joan Kirner.

As we know, the 'EMILY' in 'EMILY's List' is an acronym. It stands for 'early money is like yeast'. But the support provided by EMILY's List is about so much more than money. It is about training and mentoring, providing support networks and giving women candidates the confidence to know that they deserve to be elected. It is always a challenge for women to believe that, Madam Deputy Speaker Henderson. I am sure you experienced that. I know my colleagues on this side and colleagues on the other side of the chamber have also experienced this. Women candidates need to have that self belief that they are entitled to put their hand up to run for parliament and to aspire to the great honour of representing their communities. EMILY's List also pushes our party to do better when it comes to gender equality by advocating for a target of 50 per cent representation of women.

Through EMILY's List I have benefited from the foresight of Joan Kirner and her sisters. Now, like they did, I give back. I mentored EMILY's List candidates in the last ACT and Queensland elections. I participate in training sessions. We had one just recently here in Canberra. One of the members of the audience here today was at that training session. It was a half-day. It was a pretty bitter, cold day, but we had a great turnout of women who are just thinking about throwing their hats in the ring for the ACT election and are still working out whether they can juggle their careers at this point in time with the requirements of being a political leader. They wanted to come along and hear about the process of being preselected, what you need to do when campaigning, how you get a campaign team around you, how you establish your views on particular issues—your platform, what you stand for and believe in—and clarify that in your own mind and then also, through that clarifying exercise, articulate that to potential preselectors and then to the broader Canberra community. It was a really wonderful afternoon, and it just highlighted the thirst for these sessions amongst women around Canberra—Labor Party members, of course, but also in the broader Canberra community—who have aspirations for a political career and just want to find out a bit more detail about it. As I said, training sessions such as that one give potential women candidates and campaign managers lots of food for thought, and there is a lot of shared knowledge from those who have been through the process themselves.

The EMILY's List members here in Canberra and I agree with the mantra of Joan Kirner and the other founding sisters that, when women support women, women win. That is a very important message to communicate. As Joan herself said:

No woman in politics can survive and be successful without a network of women … I would not have survived two years as premier of Victoria without the support of women colleagues and women friends.

But Joan Kirner's influence on women goes beyond EMILY's List, because Joan showed all women from all sides of the political spectrum that a political career is accessible to women and it is accessible to women from all backgrounds. Joan's path to the premiership in Victoria has been described as 'previously untrodden'. She was not a political staffer. She was not a lawyer. She was not a union official. She did not go to the right schools. She was not part of the right clubs. She was not a Rhodes scholar. Joan was a teacher, a mother and a passionate community advocate and activist. She was someone who refused to accept a second-class education for her children and so she did something about it.

I was speaking to my mum just before I came in here to make this speech, because I know that my mother was a great admirer of Joan Kirner's. My mother is a very proud Victorian, and Joan Kirner was a very proud Victorian and a very proud Victorian woman. My mother was a great admirer of hers. I asked her, 'Mum, what is it that you loved about Joan, apart from what she did for women?' She said, 'The thing I loved about Joan was the fact that she showed that you could track a path from the P&C and the canteen duties to being leader of the state.' That sends a really powerful message to all Australians but particularly to women that you can be engaged in those activities, that community activism, at the school level, at the canteen-duty level, at the P&C level and then use that experience to track a course to being the leader of the state.

In many ways, Joan broke the political mould and she paved the way for others to follow in her footsteps. As I said, she showed that you did not need to be from a particular political class, a particular background, the right school or the right education to actually aspire to be in politics. She showed that women from all backgrounds and from all experiences can actually aspire to be a political leader, aspire to represent their people and play an active role in public policy and in shaping public policy.

Today, we have a more diverse political system at every level thanks to Joan. I look to some of us here today, like the member for Lalor, like the member for Indi and a number of other people in this place, who—like me—are the children of single mothers and were the first in their families to go to university. I think Joan would be proud of that. I will be eternally grateful for Joan's pioneering spirit, tireless support for women and advocacy for women. I will endeavour to support progressive women candidates throughout my life, as she did.

I offer my condolences to her family; her husband Ron; her children Michael, David and Kate; Michael's partner Madeline; her grandchildren Ned, Sam, Xanthe and Joachim; and everyone who loved her and the many Victorians loved her. I want to thank Joan Kirner for everything that she has done for women and Labor women over many decades. She will be missed. Vale Joan Kirner.

Richard Marles (Corio, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Joan Kirner's life has been one which, from the perspective of my family, is a life that has been intertwined and lived in parallel to the interests and the lives of my family. Joan Kirner began her professional career as a person who was profoundly dedicated to education. She taught at Ballarat Girls' Technical College and essentially came onto the public stage as the president of the Victorian Federation of State Schools Parents' Clubs in the early 1970s. She went on to be an education minister in the Victorian government under John Cain.

My father was a school principal. Education has kind of been the family business in my family, other than me. I have been a disappointment to my family in that respect. I have three older sisters, all of whom have been educators at one point or another. My mother was an academic. Discussions around the household about the activism and the reform that Joan Kirner brought to bear in respect of education were discussions that were always very present in the dining room of my house. Joan Kirner was always someone who was respected and revered in that respect. She was someone who my father knew and had enormous regard for.

Joan Kirner entered the Victorian parliament and very quickly became a minister in the Cain government. She became the Minister for Conservation, Forests and Land. In that portfolio, she put in place Landcare, which the Prime Minister yesterday, or the day before, rightly described as one of the significant policy legacies of Joan Kirner. It demonstrated that Joan Kirner had a very wide policy interest and she was able to turn a very active mind to a whole range of areas and make a huge difference in the process. We all know that she served as Deputy Premier and, ultimately, in 1990 became Victoria's first female Premier and served in that role in difficult circumstances through until the 1992 election.

In her life after parliament, which was when I got to know Joan, she was an enormous advocate for women entering politics and entering parliament through her role in EMILY's List. In Geelong, there have been a number of women representatives of the Labor Party in parliament, all of whom have been the beneficiaries of EMILY's List and all of whom have drawn enormous inspiration from Joan Kirner.

Elaine Carbines, who was the member for Geelong Province; Lisa Neville, who is the current minister for the environment in Victoria and the member for Ballarine; Chris Couzens, who was the member for Geelong; Gayle Tierney, who is the member for Western Victoria in the legislative council; and even, as you would know, Madam Acting Deputy Speaker Henderson, Libby Coker, who has just been preselected by the Labor Party to contest the electorate of Corangamite—all have been the beneficiaries of Joan Kirner's inspiration.

Joan went to Geelong on many occasions and, as I speak to those people who are very much colleagues of mine, they see Joan as a huge mentor for them, as a huge inspiration for what they want to be. I think she gave them a sense of comfort that a more difficult road to hoe, as a woman in politics, can nevertheless be done, and be done with family, by virtue of the wonderful example of Joan Kirner. She was always there for all of those women, at the other end of the phone to answer a question, to give support, to deal with a difficult moment. She was tireless in that really personal dedication to them. In making this speech today, I really do it on behalf of that group of women as well.

But in making this speech I really want to talk about my mother. My mother was a lifelong friend of Joan Kirner. Mum was the first commissioner for equal opportunity in the state of Victoria. She was appointed, actually, by Dick Hamer under the Hamer government but served in this capacity through half of the Cain government and got to know many of the ministers of the Cain government well. But in fact prior to that Mum was of a generation of feminists in Melbourne and Victoria which was the same generation as Joan Kirner and the likes of Mary Owen. Through that, she struck up her lifelong friendship with Joan. I think for Mum it was an enormous source of joy to see a friend become the first female Premier of our state and to watch the incredible career of Joan Kirner unfold.

For me, with three older sisters and my mother playing that role, I saw the world as being in fact dominated by great matriarchs. I can remember going to the Mary Owen Dinner, which was a dinner for that generation of Melbourne feminists, often held in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne. It was a women's only event, except for the waiters, who could be the sons of the women who were putting on those events and often I was one of those waiters. That was the world of my youth. I grew up in that world and Joan Kirner was very much a part of that. Again, I am speaking here today on behalf of my mother in giving our condolences and our respects to Joan Kirner.

For my part, I got to know Joan Kirner after she became the Premier of Victoria. I knew her as a person who was always humble, who always had her feet on the ground, who never was overcome by the trappings of office, who always saw that her involvement in politics was about the change that she could make, not about what politics could do for her. She was passionate about the issues that she pursued, as I have described, but that passion for football was also one that I shared. She was a passionate supporter of the Essendon Football Club. I did not support that part of it, but she was very much imbued with the sort of passion that we have in Victoria.

She was always a class act in the generosity, in the friendship, in the support that she provided to all of us—men and women alike and I think across all persuasions of politics. She was just a wonderful person to be around, she made friends easily and she really wanted her community to be a better place. There is absolutely no doubt that her community—Melbourne, Victoria, Australia—is so much the better for the contribution that Joan Kirner made.

I would like to express, on behalf of my entire family—my father Don, my mother Fay, my sisters Vic, Jen and Liz—our deepest condolences to Joan's family: her husband Ron and her children Michael, Kate and David. You had in your midst an absolutely remarkable person. Vale, Joan Kirner.

Jane Prentice (Ryan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It being approximately 11:30, the time for statements has expired.