Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I welcome this opportunity to move that the speech given by Her Excellency the Governor-General at the opening of the 43rd Parliament be agreed to. History was made yesterday as our first female Governor-General marked the opening of the Australian parliament with an address that outlined our new government’s plans for the future, a government headed by Australia’s first female Prime Minister.

Like our Prime Minister, Australia’s first female political candidate, Catherine Helen Spence, hailed from South Australia. Spence ran for the Australasian Federal Convention in 1897. Today she is better known as an advocate of women’s suffrage, but in her own day she was best known as an advocate for effective voting, or what we call ‘proportional representation’. Spence wrote:

The fundamental principle of proportional representation is that majorities must rule but that minorities shall be adequately represented. An intelligent minority of representatives has great weight and influence. Its voice can be heard. It can fully and truly express the views of the voters it represents.

Spence hoped that more effective representation would reduce the bitterness of party strife and strengthen independent thought and the integrity of our electoral system. She said:

The minority represented is the true sharpener of the wits of the ruling powers, the educator of the people and the animator of the press.

She looked for an end to ‘war by election’, where the winner takes all no matter how slim its majority. She wanted to restore to representation ‘its true meaning, that the elected body, the parliament, should be the mirror of the convictions and aspirations of the whole people’.

In this place we have some experience of what the weight and influence of an intelligent minority of representatives can mean in practice—more experience, I venture to say, than many of those in the other place. It sharpens the wits of the ruling powers, as any government without a majority in the Senate and any minister who has been grilled at estimates can attest. It can engage the public in parliamentary processes, as evidenced by the Senate committees’ robust system of public inquiries. And when the fourth estate deigns to focus on our proceedings, the result is often more issues based reporting and less obsession with personalities and political conflict.

In this place, we also know that effective representation of minorities is compatible with stable and effective government. We know that about 85 per cent of legislation is passed in this place with bipartisan support. Why is this the case? It is largely because many matters that come before the parliament are not controversial; they do not divide the nation or its major parties to any significant degree. On these matters, it is appropriate that the view of the overwhelming majority should prevail—and it does. It always has prevailed in this chamber and in the other place, and will prevail in this parliament—provided that ‘Her Majesty’s loyal opposition’ acts in good faith.

Where bipartisan support is lacking or unstable, and where public opinion is unclear or divided, the adequate representation of minorities becomes important. It is then that genuine consultation and good faith negotiation becomes critical if a way forward is to be found. It is then that the nation most needs a parliament that is a mirror of the convictions and aspirations of the people. On many such matters in the last parliament, the Labor government was able to negotiate with a diverse crossbench in the Senate to secure important reforms and gain support for vital initiatives. Where such negotiations failed, this more often than not reflected a lack of any deep lasting consensus in the community.

Those who maintain that strong minority representation is incompatible with effective government simply fail to comprehend what Spence grasped over a century ago—namely, that the effective representation of minorities can work to enhance majority rule, not undermine it. As a Labor government senator, I look forward to the continuing opportunity to work with all my parliamentary colleagues to this end.

It is ironic to say the least that some of those who seek to portray the current parliament as unworkable and the new government as unstable and impotent are the very same people whose government was fatally weakened when it mistook a majority in both houses for a mandate to act with impunity. The fate of the Howard government and its Work Choices legislation in 2007 illustrates just what happens when ruling powers mistake a majority for a mandate, ride roughshod over dissent and institute radical changes without community support. Neither the government nor the legislation survived. There is no stability, and no real potency, in making changes that are swiftly reversed because they lack real support. That is not strong leadership; it is simply a waste of time at best and dangerously destabilising at worst.

On the other hand, there are many examples of minority governments that have worked. And, reassuringly, some of the best examples are drawn from jurisdictions that share our political culture. We have seen such governments work in our own states. For a national example, we need only look across the Tasman. New Zealand’s first elected female Prime Minister led minority Labor governments for almost a decade, becoming the fifth-longest-serving Prime Minister in her nation’s history.

I am proud to be part of a government led by Australia’s first female Prime Minister—a government that welcomes the opportunities which this finely balanced parliament presents to be more open and more accountable, to build bridges, to think laterally and to lead by virtue of the power of our ideas and the persuasiveness of our arguments, not by weight of numbers alone. That is why it was so gratifying yesterday to hear the new government’s plans outlined by Her Excellency the Governor-General. Our plans for this parliamentary term make clear the strength of our vision for this country’s future—a vision founded squarely on Labor values that have broad appeal and wide application. Our plans offer a firm foundation for reform. They offer a sound basis on which to build the bridges necessary to bring real and lasting reforms to fruition.

The cornerstone of these plans is the sound management of our economy. Sound economic management will secure our prosperity by providing for sustainable growth—growth that endures, growth that is compatible with the preservation of our planet and our continent’s natural assets rich and rare, growth that delivers benefits for all Australians regardless of the circumstances of their birth or where they now live. This is not just because this outcome is more equitable, but also because it is more efficient.

A modern nation like ours, which competes in the global economy, cannot afford to waste the talents of its people. Such wastage breeds frustration, marginalisation and social dysfunction; more specifically, it breeds unemployment, poverty, crime, child abuse and neglect. We want the opposite. We want all shoulders to the wheel. And if we want all our citizens to take real responsibility for building a better future we must give everyone a real stake in the outcome—a real chance to benefit from the rewards that flow from hard work, initiative and innovation. Entrenched inequality and opportunity curtailed are incompatible with a peaceful and prosperous nation. That is why Labor is committed to a high-productivity high-participation economy that engages all our citizens in the economic life of the nation, develops their potential, fully utilises their talents, maximises reward for effort and minimises barriers to innovation, initiative and achievement.

This is why we are committed to a prudent fiscal strategy. It is a strategy that will see us returning to surplus in three years—long before most of the rest of the developed world—so that public sector debt does not become a drag on our economy. As the recovery picks up speed and the private sector expands, the strategy is about creating new businesses and new jobs. It is why we are committed to further micro-economic reform and deregulation—a process begun under the Hawke-Keating government and continued through our COAG reforms. These reforms are designed to create a seamless national economy and drive competition so that private sector initiative and enterprise is rewarded rather than stymied by arbitrary or unnecessary regulation.

Our commitment to sustainable prosperity is also why we support a price on carbon. A carbon price will not only help save the planet but will also keep us ahead of the game when it comes to investing in the infrastructure, skills and technologies needed to secure the jobs of the future so that Australians win rather than lose as the world shifts to a low-carbon economy. Our belief in a high-productivity high-participation economy is fundamental to our passion for health reform. It is unjust that the burden of ill health falls unevenly on Australians and it is a human tragedy that so many in our community suffer from preventable illnesses. It is also a colossal waste of human potential—a waste that costs our economy very dearly in terms of both medical expenditure and lost productivity. That is why when we weigh up the worth of the NBN we must take into account the benefits of the e-health services it can deliver—economic as well as social benefits that are no less great for being hard to calculate.

Our commitment to sustainable prosperity is why we believe we should accept the extra tax that our most successful mining companies say they can pay. That extra revenue will help fund much-needed infrastructure, especially in our mining regions. It will help fund tax cuts for all businesses and tax breaks targeted at small business—tax relief that will maximise rewards for enterprise and help drive private sector job creation and innovation.

Furthermore, the minerals resource rent tax will help support improvements to superannuation. Improvements in super will help secure better retirement incomes for working Australians and reduce public expenditure on income support as the population ages. They will also increase the pool of national savings, reduce reliance on foreign capital and facilitate further investments in our economic capacity. These investments are critical to both maximising the rewards of this mining boom and to minimising its risks—risks that threaten to divide us into winners and losers, not just between the boom states and others but also within the states that generate our mining wealth.

In many ways the risks posed by the mining boom are greatest in states like my own state of Western Australia. It is there that skills shortages will be most acute if we do not act decisively, and it is there that such shortages are most likely to put upward pressure on wages. Such pressure feeds inflation and can undermine the viability of businesses in the non-mining sectors, where most people are employed, even in Western Australia. Anyone who lived through the last mining boom in WA can testify to its impact on housing affordability throughout the state. That is why we must invest in the infrastructure and the corporate tax relief that will help ensure that all our industries, all our regions and all our citizens can prosper. That is why we must act decisively to confront looming skills shortages.

Above all, our belief in a high-productivity high-participation economy necessitates a commitment to continuing the education revolution and building first-class facilities for our schools and tertiary institutions so that they are equipped to prepare the next generation for life and work in a highly competitive 21st century globalised economy; a commitment to greater transparency and a focus on quality in our schools and universities so that failures can be addressed and success recognised and rewarded; and a commitment to training and immigration strategies that more tightly target current and emerging skills shortages. We should give preference to equipping our own citizens for the jobs of today and tomorrow wherever possible. This is the best way to ensure that more of the jobs created by the mining boom benefit all Australians. It is about ensuring that we stand ready to take advantage of new opportunities as they emerge over the long term.

If we get the management of the economy right, more of our citizens will enjoy the benefits and dignity of work, and we will be able to spend less on the social ills that unemployment and poverty bring. It will leave more room for further tax reform and further investment in all those things that enrich Australians’ lives and lighten the burdens of our neighbours. As a nation we can invest in sport and culture and in being good global citizens while making our fair contribution to peace and prosperity in our region and beyond.

I conclude by reiterating how much I welcome and appreciate this opportunity to move the address-in-reply and how proud I am to be part of a government that stands ready to lead through the strength of its values, the quality of its ideas, the persuasiveness of its arguments and the inclusiveness and integrity of its processes.