Don Farrell (SA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Special Minister of State) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Wong for allowing me to start the contribution of the Labor Party on this condolence motion regarding former Senator Dominic Foreman. Dominic John Foreman died on 17 July 2020. Dominic was possibly one of the last blue collar workers who toiled his way up through the trade union movement to be a shop steward and organiser and secretary of the Vehicle Builders' Employees' Federation of Australia, being almost one of the last of the blue collar workers to represent Labor in either house of the federal parliament or even the state parliament.

Dominic John Foreman was born in Clare on 6 August 1933. He had one brother and four sisters. As a young man Dominic worked in the family restaurant in Clare, but he was eventually educated at Rostrevor College, which was a considerable expense for his family at that time. However, Dominic was grateful for this. Dominic went on to work as a welder. He worked at General Motors Holden and at the old Woodville plant that has long since gone—now a Bunnings store, if I'm correct.

Dominic became a member of the Vehicle Builders' Employees' Federation and was an active trade unionist, being a shop steward. He represented the union to the membership and slowly but surely worked his way up through the trade union movement. It was during this period, in 1976, that I first met Dominic. I was a young trade unionist myself and we would meet after meetings of the trades and labour council in the basement of the old Trades Hall in South Terrace. My first impression of Dominic was of a quiet and humble man, and that impression never changed throughout all of the years that I knew him subsequent to that. Eventually, he was an organiser with the VBEF and, from that time, became the state secretary of that organisation.

Dominic was a lifelong trade unionist and through that became an active member of the Australian Labor Party. He made friends with a large number of other trade unionists, but mainly ones of blue-collar origin, of that particular generation, one of whom was the late Mick Young. Dominic was always seen as part of Mick's gang, and the two were inseparable until Mick's death in 1996. Dominic was convinced by Mick that he should seek a parliamentary career and he was seriously considering the seat of Bonython, which was going to be vacated by the then member, Martin Nicholls, in 1977. However, Mick Young prevailed upon Dominic to put his plans on hold so that Neal Blewett, then a professor at Flinders University, could take the seat. Blewett was seen as a prize catch for the Labor Party, and he would go on to be the architect of Medicare and other things within the Labor Party. Dominic was happy to stand aside in the interests of the Labor Party and the labour movement as a whole. He eventually was preselected No. 1 on the ticket for the 1980 federal election to be a senator for South Australia, and was duly elected, although he didn't take up his seat until July 1981. He would then go on to be a federal senator until 1997. Dominic resigned his position in 1997 when the Labor Party preselected John Quirke to fill the vacancy. Quirke was then a state member of the South Australian parliament and previously had worked for Dominic as a staffer and a speechwriter.

In the Senate Dominic held a number of positions, including chairman of the Joint Standing Committee on Public Works and the Standing Committee on Infrastructure and other committee positions. Dominic was a very good committee performer, and many projects in Australia would go through that rapid scrutiny and reporting process under his watchful eye.

Dominic was married to Maggie and they had two children, Luke and Lindy. In turn, Luke and Lindy would provide many grandchildren and, now, great-grandchildren, all of whom mourn the passing of Dominic. Dominic married Shirley in 1986 and they had a happy life together until Shirley's passing in April 2007.

Dominic's parliamentary career was not without its ups and downs. There was a serious attempt to deselect him in 1992 and give the seat to another sitting senator. The problem for the Labor Party was that at the next election, due in 1993, there would be three sitting senators, with the prospect of returning only two to Canberra. Dominic faced the combined opposition of certain sections of the ALP—the then South Australian Premier, John Bannon, the former Premier, Don Dunstan, and others who were friendly to the other particular senator—who were seeking to replace Dominic up the ticket. On 2 February 1992, Dominic Foreman stared down the opposition and won the ballot three to one. He would go on to serve in the Senate until 1997.

Dominic was a lifelong fan of Australian Rules football. He played with that great South Australian team West Adelaide, of which I'm also a member. He would have gone on to play serious league football—he was in my Uncle Joe Heptinstall's generation at West Adelaide—but he was concerned that if he was injured his young family would have to survive without a breadwinner. However, this did not stop Dominic from being a strong supporter of Westies through thick and thin, and through the very many years that they were in the wilderness. One of his Port Adelaide supporters makes this claim about him, which I have been unable to verify but which I will repeat: they say he was an initial supporter of the Adelaide Crows but he changed his allegiance to the Port Adelaide Power because he believed it represented more of his trade union, working-class origins. I don't personally believe that myself, but I'm told this is true. The passing of Dominic represents almost the end of the blue-collar era within the Australian Labor Party. Dominic went from the tools on the floor through various levels of the trade union movement into parliament to represent the working people of South Australia.

Question agreed to, honourable senators standing in their places.