Deborah O'Neill (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I know that we're waiting to hear a contribution from another departing senator, but these moments come and, if you don't make a contribution right now, they go, and I didn't want to miss the opportunity to acknowledge you while your family are here, Lou. To Lou's family, particularly Jasper, it's nice to have been on this journey with Louise long enough to remember her with that beautiful bump, and her delight and joy in moving around the place and sharing the pregnancy with all of us, as a working mum, and then the many, many times that I've travelled with her to places far and wide, often in the northern parts of Western Australia, and experienced her joy in reconnecting with her family. Jasper, she's such a fun person. I know that, and I see her having such fun with you, and I know that you'll be absolutely delighted to have her back with you at home. I have had the privilege, perhaps more than any of the other contributors here, to work very, very closely with Senator Pratt on so many important pieces of work that we've done, both in opposition and now, more recently, in government.

Personally, I want to thank you for your time sharing with me your insights as an assistant minister, when I took on the role as shadow assistant for mental health and for innovation. That was profoundly personally helpful, and I think the stories that we're hearing from everybody show that, somehow, Louise Pratt has a homing beacon for finding people at a moment where there's a learning opportunity for them to pick up on her wisdom and her insight, but it's just this feeling of kindness. When everybody forgets everything that you do, what you produce and what you create, if the last thing that they remember about you is how kind you were, you're in that club. I believe that is part of why you have been so successful as a senator. What's driven Louise is not personal interest, not professional path-making to a particular personal end but a deep and abiding belief in people who have been done wrong. I would put it in the Christian tradition, the language that brings me to this place. The option for the poor in theology is manifestly obvious in you.

What we see through the work in the Corporations and Financial Services Committee is Louise's determination. I see Senator Scarr here, who has been your partner in profound endeavour on behalf of people who were unbelievably exploited by financial instruments that were established determinedly to exploit people in the Sterling matter. People talk about a dog with a bone or, 'She was like a terrier,' but that is about the explosive energy of keeping on going, and you certainly have that. But Louise has a very secret weapon, and it is this very, very deep and authentic sense of her responsibility as a servant of the nation in this place to stand up for people who have no-one else to stand for them. Thank you for your remarkable contribution. She's a serious person, but she's also incredibly funny. I hope that you have a wonderful, wonderful time in the years that follow your contribution to the Australian nation through your role here in the Senate. Thank you.