Anne Urquhart (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Today I join colleagues in paying my respects to a great Australian, Bob Hawke. Bob was Australia's 23rd Prime Minister and former head of the Australian union movement, as the president of the ACTU. Winning four elections for Labor, he gave us Medicare, superannuation for all and access to higher education and training. He shaped our modern Australian identity, opening the Australian economy to the world, improving our ties with Asia and providing the international leadership needed to end apartheid and protect Antarctica. Without peer, Bob changed our country and our world for the better.

A key early memory of mine is not in industrial relations but in international affairs. Bob's outspoken advocacy against the Vietnam War was fundamentally a matter of workers' rights. Our sons and brothers were being conscripted to fight America's war in Vietnam. Too many lost their lives and those who returned faced misguided aggression and years of isolation. Always sensing an opportunity to heal, it was in 1987 that Bob declared 18 August as Vietnam Veterans Day. Since then, Australia has better embraced our Vietnam vets, including those conscripted for service.

Bob's firm stance on apartheid in South Africa was an inspiration to the world over—workers standing in solidarity with Nelson Mandela, himself a committed trade unionist, and all South Africans in their pursuit of self-determination and freedom. Some said at the time that sport and politics shouldn't mix. But sport is humanity's way of imitating battle and celebrating life, and the courage of banning the South African cricket and rugby teams was pivotal in changing hearts and minds.

As Prime Minister, Bob's leadership on the Antarctic is particularly special for us Tasmanians. As Australia's gateway to Antarctica, Bob's ability to deliver the Antarctic Treaty and conserve our great southern continent for science has given my state the ability to trade off our geographic advantages, inspiring thousands of young Tasmanians to study the Antarctic—her plants, animals, culture and climate—in the pursuit of greater knowledge about us as a species and our precious world. It is this long-term economic vision that comes back time and again when recalling Bob's achievements.

When Bob came to power in 1983, Labor failed to win a seat from Tasmania in the House of Representatives. We Tasmanians don't like to be told how to manage our state from inner-city Melbourne, but we do respect politicians of vision. Over the coming 15 years Labor would win every seat in Tasmania, in part due to Bob's and his team's policies that clearly improved the lives of working people. The Franklin River, one of the nation's wildest, is protected forever because of Bob, with many visitors every year enjoying a thrilling ride through her gorges. He's best known as the father of Medicare, Australia's precious public health system, envied the world over for ensuring that a single mum in Devonport, a farmer in Smithton, a factory worker in Burnie and a miner in Queenstown can all access first-rate health care.

Two further fundamental pillars of modern Australian society shaped by Bob's leadership are superannuation and gender equality. I started my working life in a factory in Ulverstone. The division of labour between men and women was clear, and it was fierce. Women were casuals, restricted to the roles in the factory that attracted the lowest pay. Men could drive the forklifts and operate the machinery, and, in return, take home the higher pay. Bob's workplace gender equality reforms, achieved in 1984 with Australia's first female minister for women, Susan Ryan, enabled my union to take forward and win equal-opportunity cases that removed some of those barriers, ensuring that women workers were employed and paid based on their skills, not their gender.

On the same note: for the first 12 years of my working life I received no superannuation. Some of my female colleagues who had been working there for decades had no savings for their retirement. Our same story was repeated over and again across the country. When Bob and Labor introduced compulsory superannuation, these women, myself included, had some financial independence for the first time in their lives. We were no longer just workers; through our own superannuation, we had a stake in the companies that ran this country.

Bob remained a committed unionist and Labor activist in his retirement from politics. Awarded life membership of my union, the AMWU, Bob would regularly attend conferences to share his stories and inspire the next generations. I was privileged to meet Bob on a number of occasions. His stories would entertain and enthral for hours—yes, literally hours. Of course, we would end with a passionate rendition of 'Solidarity Forever'. Underneath Bob's beautiful melodies, the words ring so true. The final lyrics sum up his impact on us, our nation and our world. As Bob sang on so many occasions:

In our hands is placed a power greater than their hoarded gold,

Greater than the might of armies, magnified a thousand-fold.

We can bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old

For the union makes us strong.

'Solidarity forever', Bob Hawke.