Barnaby Joyce (Queensland, National Party, Leader of The Nationals in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

It is a great honour to be able to have the opportunity to speak on this condolence motion for Nancy Grace Augusta Wake. To go through the honours that Nancy Wake has received is to note what is really a representation of a spectacular life. There was an issue with her receiving honours from Australia. There were some concerns and I will not actually give the quote that Nancy Wake gave as to what she first of all considered in regard to receiving an honour from Australia, but those things were obviously resolved at the end of her life.

She was a Companion of the Order of Australia, she had received from the United Kingdom the George Medal and she received, obviously, the 1939-45 Star, though many people received that, the France and Germany Star, the Defence Medal and the War Medal 1939-45. The honours that were bestowed on her by the French included the Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneur—which is quite something for a person away from France to get—and being an officer in the same order and the Croix de Guerre with two Palms and a Star. She received the Medal of Freedom from the United States and also, from the French Republic, a highly unusual honour for an outsider to get, the Medaille de la Résistance. She was one of the few people not French who received that honour. Also, New Zealand gave her a badge of honour.

When we actually look at Nancy's life, we see it was one that started in New Zealand before she moved to Neutral Bay and, as has been represented, her father went back to New Zealand. For want of a better word, he deserted the family and her mother brought Nancy up. I think Nancy was the youngest of six children. Hers was an exemplary life. She had attended North Sydney Technical College, where her main subject was home science. She went on, after receiving and using an endowment from one of her relatives in New Zealand—an aunt, I believe—of about £200, to go to New York and from New York across to London and then to Paris, where she started as a journalist. In her role as a journalist she saw the start of fascism and her memories included seeing Jews tied to a wheel and being beaten and whipped. That built her resolve, she said, to do something about these rotten people. Her life was one of absolute stoicism. She had very little regard for her own safety. Those around her reflected that she always seemed like someone who would survive and live life to the fullest. She met up with a French industrialist, Henri Fiocca, who had no reason to be anything more at that point in time than a person who was pretty well set in life. I think she married him in 1939. But in Marseille they were involved with the French Resistance and lived a double life. As the Gestapo started to close in on them, Henri said to her that she had to leave. Of course, you would not disclose what you were doing so that is why she came to a conversation where she just said to Henri, 'I'm going out to do some shopping,' and she never came back. She left, and the deal was not to tell people what exactly you were up to as, obviously, that would put them at risk. Later on he was captured by the Gestapo and tortured and killed. She only found out about this much later. He was killed in 1943. Nancy then had to make several attempts—four, in fact—to get into Spain. Finally she got to Spain but even on that final attempt she and others were shot at as they jumped from a train and ran through a vineyard to get away. They then made their way to Gibraltar, and from Gibraltar they had a convoy back to England. Nancy was then trained in the Special Operations Executive. This was basically a group that worked behind enemy lines. For that purpose she was later parachuted back into France. When she was parachuted back into France, she got caught in a tree and the French officer who found her said, 'I hope all the trees in France bear such a beautiful fruit as this one.' Her typical reply in Australian form—and you have to forgive me for the profanity—was, 'Don't talk that French shit to me.' This was the character of the person. This person was at points in time responsible for the command of 7,000 people. She and others were also engaged on and off with a force of 22,000 people. At that point in time, Captain Ian Garrow was in a Montlucon concentration camp and Nancy went there and deceived the guard into releasing him. The bravery of this person is just beyond belief.

Then there is the story of the bike ride of 250 miles in 72 hours that we have all heard about. Nancy said that she did not do it because she was brave; she did it because she was the only one who could possibly have done it. Anybody else would have been killed. She rode 250 miles in 72 hours, and when she got off the bike she said that she was on fire; she was in that much pain. Nancy did it to get codes back that had to be destroyed. To retrieve the codes, they had to drive to another place and on the way people were engaging with her. They initially did not believe that she was part of the resistance. They did not believe the story of how she could have ridden that far.

I think she is a great example of how a human being and someone that all Australians can relate to could become not a saint but resolute in the purpose of destroying fascism and all that fascism represented—the evil that fascism was. Later on she had the same disdain for communism. She saw them as basically similar entities, with a similar purpose. At the end the war she engaged in a number of attempts at politics. I think at one stage she took Dr Evatt down to about 250 votes, which was quite remarkable given that Dr Evatt was a substantial figure in the Labor Party of the time.

Nancy married again and moved to Port Macquarie. She lived there for quite some time until the death of her second husband. I think she was married to him for about 40 years. She then decided to move back to England. She resided at the Stafford Hotel in England, where people noted that she preferred a gin and tonic. She liked to live life to its fullest, right to the very end. It was said that a lot of her accounts were paid for anonymously. There was a belief that one of the anonymous payers of her accounts was the Prince of Wales. She is a person who will go down in history not just as someone whom we all have a great affection for because of her time as an Australian and the fact that she resided in our nation for the majority of her life—although she was born in Wellington, New Zealand; I think she stayed there until she was about four—but for the essence of her character and for showing us what a person is capable of doing when the cause is right.

For me it is an immense honour to be able to have the capacity to stand here and, as a small token of appreciation, respect the life of a person who was responsible for saving thousands of allied service people, service men and women. Nancy's bravery was exemplary. She was courageous. She was ferocious and courageous. She was no wallflower. She clearly admitted to killing people herself in the delivery of grenades into certain areas. In fact, she killed a Gestapo guard with her hands. We are talking about a person who was ferocious but she was ferocious for a cause, and it was a war. It was a war against evil. She picked the side of right and she fought it to the nth part of her being, knowing that if she did not prevail then evil would prevail, and that was just not an option for her.

It is with great honour that we reflect on the life of Nancy Wake. I do not know what her faith was, but I hope she may rest in peace.

Question agreed to, honourable senators standing in their places.