Jenny McAllister (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Cabinet Secretary) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to join with so many others today in offering my sympathies to Bob Hawke's family. We know that you grieve the loss of a dearly loved husband, father and grandfather. Like my Senate colleagues who've already spoken, I also wish to record my admiration for the Hon. Robert James Lee Hawke, Australia's 23rd Prime Minister. The breadth of Hawke's contribution has already been reflected in the remarks offered by others today, and I intend to confine my remarks to reflecting simply on Hawke's environmental record, for two reasons: because it was important to me growing up as a girl in the eighties and because of the importance of that record to modern Labor.

In 1983, Hawke was given the opportunity to lead Labor on a campaign back to government, and the campaign coincided with an unprecedented community campaign that aimed to prevent the dam on the Franklin River in Tasmania. Hawke opposed the dam and was determined to act where the Fraser government would not. At a pre-election rally in Melbourne in February 1983, Hawke noted the significance of the campaign. He said:

Environmental issues have become more prominent in this campaign than in any previous election, through the bitter and divisive controversy over the proposed Gordon-below-Franklin dam, the building of which will irreversibly damage a key part of Australia's and the world's natural and cultural heritage.

And so one of the first acts of the Hawke government was to introduce the legislation that would protect the Franklin River. The World Heritage Properties Conservation Bill was adventurous and creative, from both a policy perspective and a legal perspective, and it was ultimately tested in the High Court.

The Hawke period is often remembered as the golden age of consensus, but these debates were bitterly fought. The introduction of the legislation to resolve this dispute was faced with uproar from the then opposition. The then Liberal member for Franklin interjected, 'You hate Tasmania, the lot of you.' These ideas were controversial, but Bob had the foresight to look past the day-to-day political debate and look to the future. It took conviction, creativity and leadership to secure the national interest, and these first steps laid the groundwork for his government's approach to conservation. The passage of the World Heritage Properties Conservation Act allowed the Commonwealth to protect Australia's World Heritage sites from external threats. From the forests of Tasmania to the Daintree, Australia's ecosystems were listed on the World Heritage listing and preserved for the future.

Bob also went on to convince global leaders of the importance of protecting the Antarctic from mining, and he prevailed in cabinet to stop the mine at Coronation Hill, listening to the Jawoyn people and understanding this as an issue of both cultural and environmental significance. Without his determination, Tasmania, the Northern Territory and North Queensland might look very different to how they look today. I've camped and hiked and visited in all of these places, and they are amazing. It's a legacy of our natural heritage that I seek to share with my children.

Bob not only renewed our national story, but he also expanded and renewed the story of the Labor movement. The Labor movement has always known what the power of government can do for working people, but also the significance of collective action to secure the interests of working people. Bob saw the environmental movements of the seventies and the eighties as collective action and he embraced that broader vision of what collectivism might mean and what it might mean for the Labor movement to be part of it. Our shared interests as a community can be more important than the profits of a single company. This ethos applies to both our shared economic interests as a community and our shared environmental interests. When there was a tough fight to be had on the environment, Bob did not shy away.

Three decades later, that commitment to the environment and to understanding our natural heritage as a shared legacy that we all have a stake in is a core part of Labor's story. Bob embodied the best of the Labor movement. He defended those who were most in need of defending and he understood that Labor's vision must be large. We have to form a big tent and invite everybody in. We owe Bob a great deal. Vale, Bob.

Question agreed to, honourable senators standing in their places.