John Hogg (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is with deep regret that I inform the Senate of the death, on 17 December 2010, of Charles Ronald Maunsell, a senator for the state of Queensland from 1968 to 1981 and during this time a chairman of committees. I call the Acting Leader of the Government in the Senate.

Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—I move:

That the Senate record its deep regret at the death on 17 December 2010 of Charles Ronald (Ron) Maunsell, former Senator for Queensland and a chairman of committees, and places on record its appreciation of his long and meritorious public service and tenders its profound sympathy to his family in their bereavement.

Ron was born on 8 May 1922 in Cairns. He was educated at Malanda State School and at All Souls School at Charters Towers. Ron joined the Royal Australian Air Force Reserve in 1941 and the RAAF in 1942. He served as a pilot in Australia and was part of the occupation forces in Japan, reaching the rank of Flight Lieutenant, until being demobilised in June 1947. When he returned he purchased a 10,000-acre farm near Longreach and became a grazier.

Ron became active in the Country Party during the 1950s and served as campaign director for state and federal seats as well as vice-president of the party’s Queensland division. Ron gained his party’s endorsement for the 1967 half-Senate election and went on to secure a seat in this place, representing the state of Queensland. As a senator, Ron was a strong advocate for residents of rural and remote Australia including, in particular, primary producers. He served on a number of committees, including the landmark Select Committee on Drug Trafficking and Drug Abuse in Australia and the Joint Select Committee on Defence Forces Retirement Benefits Legislation. Ron was Deputy President of the Senate from February 1980 to August 1981. He was National Country Party whip in the Senate from 1973 to 1980 and deputy leader from 1980 to 1981.

During his time in this place, Ron played a celebrated role in what became known as the ‘night of the long prawns’—part of the high drama surrounding Prime Minister Whitlam’s appointment of then Senator Vince Gair as ambassador to Ireland. Whitlam planned to appoint Gair to the post to free up an extra spot in the Senate, which he expected Labor would win at a coming half-Senate election. Before the resignation could be effected and the vacancy created, a counterplan was hatched involving then Premier Bjelke-Petersen. His role is important, because any casual vacancy caused by Gair’s resignation would be filled by the state parliament, controlled by Bjelke-Petersen. Without the intervention of Bjelke-Petersen and the hospitality of Ron, there would have been six and not five vacancies in Queensland at the half-Senate election due on 18 May 1974. In the way of these things, the Gair appointment was leaked to Laurie Oakes at the Melbourne Sun newspaper on 1 April 1974. On 2 April, a Senate sitting day, Ron invited Gair to his room for a drink and something to eat—as it turns out, an abundance of Townsville prawns.

Ron Boswell (Queensland, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The night of the long prawns!

Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That’s what we’re just talking about, Bos. Interrupted only by the division bells, Senators Maunsell and Gair spent a pleasant night together, leaving Premier Bjelke-Petersen time to advise the Queensland government to issue a writ for five vacancies, thus denying Whitlam the chance to gain an extra seat. For the record, Ron gave a personal explanation in the Senate two days later in which he denied hijacking Gair in his room, though he did acknowledge he knew about Gair’s intention to lodge a letter of resignation. In the end, it really did not matter. On 11 April both houses were dissolved ahead of the double dissolution election on 18 May 1974. Ron unsuccessfully contested the 1980 Senate election and his term ended in June 1981. In 1983 Ron made an unsuccessful bid for preselection. In the following year he and his wife, Joan, retired from Cairns to the Sunshine Coast, where he planted fruit trees. On behalf of the government, I offer condolences to his wife, Joan, his children—Joanne, Margaret and Barbara—and his family and friends.

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Charles Ronald ‘Ron’ Maunsell served as a senator for Queensland from 1968 to 1981, representing the Country Party and later the National Country Party. He served as Deputy President and Chairman of Committees and in the positions of both whip and then deputy Senate leader of his party. Ron Maunsell came from pioneering stock. The story of his family’s life in Far North Queensland is like something out of the film Australia but totally authentic, and the story of Ron Maunsell’s life provides a link to Northern Australia’s early settlement. The life of his mother, Evelyn Evans, was recorded by Hector Holthouse in S’pose I Die. She was described as ‘an English rose on a world tour as a companion for a wealthy matron’ but met Ron’s father, Charles Maunsell, who was on a brief visit to Sydney before taking up a position as manager at Mount Mulgrave Station on the Mitchell River near Mareeba. They decided to marry within a week and, after five months waiting for her father’s permission, they married in Cairns and began life together in a tin shed with a concrete floor, where Evelyn learned to cope with flood, snakes, sickness and isolation. Evelyn ran a small school for Aboriginal children on the property, but once, when Charles was away mustering, she had to hide under a bed to elude hostile Aboriginals while an Aboriginal woman saved her life by telling them she was away.

Ron was born in Cairns in 1922. Evelyn had already lost two babies in the bush and was determined not to go back, especially in the wet season, to get malaria again and have another miscarriage. Five weeks later, Evelyn took Ron home to Wrotham Park, where Charles was now manager—first to Chillagoe by train, then by buggy with Charlie, with the bassinet hanging at the back of the buggy seat due to the heat. At night, Charlie and Evelyn camped outside on a bed of branches and long grass, their clothes rolled up to make pillows, their new baby between them, and thanked God for His blessings. When they arrived home, the Aboriginal women, who had never seen a white baby before, were fascinated and kept saying over and over ‘Missus bringem back white piccaninny’. That night, the Aboriginals asked Evelyn and Charlie to come to the creek to see the big new corroboree about the arrival of the first white baby at Wrotham Park.

Later the family cleared a small dairy block near Malanda on the Atherton Tableland. Ron Maunsell attended the local state school before boarding at Charters Towers. Describing himself as a dairy hand, Ron enlisted in the RAAF as soon as he was old enough and served as a pilot in Australia until 1945, then went with 77 Squadron to Morotai Island and with the occupation forces to Japan until 1947, rising to the rank of flight lieutenant. After his discharge from the RAAF, Ron went dam sinking and then in 1951 went into partnership with his parents in the purchase of Rio, a 10,000-acre sheep station near Longreach. Ron became involved in local community organisations and the United Graziers Association and was active in the Country Party. As president of the division of Kennedy, he helped Bob Katter Sr win the seat and after eight years on the Country Party central council, including several years as the party’s vice-president, in 1967 he won preselection for the Senate.

In 1969 Evelyn and Charlie, together with Ron’s wife, Joan, and their three daughters, came to Canberra to see him take his seat. They must have been immensely proud. In his time in the Senate, Senator Maunsell raised issues which concerned people living in remote areas, including access to medicine, transport and communications, taxation concessions, decentralisation and support for pastoral industries. His maiden speech dealt with the fact that 85 per cent of the continent did not have television. He opposed death duties, concerned at the impact they had on the estates of primary producers. No doubt if he were still here he would be amazed that at least one party in this place still retains this policy. He took up defence and veterans issues. He served on the landmark Senate Select Committee on Drug Trafficking and Drug Abuse in Australia and was a member of the 1973 Australian delegation which visited the Soviet Union.

Ron’s genial and laid-back exterior, as evidenced by his well-known friendly chuckle, belied a sharp political mind. He had a great sense of humour, painting an old rabbit trap with words to this effect: ‘The Maunsell patented reps trap to keep our staff intact.’ This was to protect the Country Party senator’s female staff from receiving too much attention from male House of Representatives staffers whom he had noticed hovering in the vicinity of his office. He was very good with his hands, making his own cruet set from miniature Dimple Haig bottles, the contents of which had refreshed him on many trips between Cairns and Canberra. Needless to say, he made a leather case to go with it. I have both these artefacts in my office for anyone who would like to inspect them.

However, Ron Maunsell is perhaps best remembered for his role in the night of the long prawns, the best account of which is in Paul Davey’s very recent book Ninety not out. Frustrated by its position in the Senate in 1974, the Whitlam government enticed Queensland DLP senator Vince Gair to accept an appointment as ambassador to Ireland. The aim was to have the Senate vacancy contested at the upcoming half-Senate election rather than by a vote of the Queensland parliament, giving Labor the chance of increasing its representation. The catch, as Doug Anthony realised, was that Gair had to give his resignation to the President of the Senate, Magnus Cormack, before Queensland issued writs for the half-Senate election which Whitlam had called. Ron Maunsell volunteered to keep Gair occupied until after Premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen had writs issued for the half-Senate election in Queensland. In what became immortalised as ‘the night of the long prawns’, Maunsell invited Gair to his office to partake in some scotch, beer and prawns, which Maunsell was renowned for bringing to Canberra from Cairns. As Ninety not out states:

According to Maunsell, Cormack had known what was going on and ‘kept disappearing on the verandah all the time … I’m pretty sure he—

that is, Gair—

twigged as to what was going on, but he didn’t want to move. The scotch bottle interested him more than anything else.’

Maunsell steered Gair to the chamber for a vote just before 10 pm, stymieing government attempts to argue Gair had effectively resigned when the Governor-General had approved his appointment. According to Davey, Maunsell stuck to Gair like glue, leaving no opportunity for Murphy or any other Labor senator to get close enough to haul him before Cormack. He then spirited Gair back to his office, where the two remained ensconced until an hour or so after Joh Bjelke-Petersen announced to the Queensland parliament at 1.40 am a special gazette for the election of only five senators at a half-Senate election.

The end to Maunsell’s career came not uniquely as a result of internecine Queensland politics. Following the Liberal Party’s decision to run a separate Senate ticket in Queensland, Premier Joh Bjelke-Peterson arranged for his wife, Florence, to seek the top position on the National Country Party Senate ticket. By one account:

This caused some heartburn in the party: it meant dumping Ron Maunsell, hero of the Night of the Long Prawns … but Lyons stitched up the numbers for Florence … in a tight race at the party conference. The Joh & Flo Show was an instant media success; Bjelke-Petersen was perceived to have executed another political masterstroke.

Maunsell made a further bid for preselection in 1983 but was unsuccessful. In 1984 he and his wife, Joan, retired from Cairns to a property on the Sunshine Coast hinterland where he became an orchardist. In 1981 he was made an honorary life member of his party.

Ron Maunsell passed away in Cairns, the town where his parents were married and where he was born, on 17 December 2010. With his departure, we lose yet another of our living links with Australia’s pioneering past. Our heartfelt condolences and respect go to his wife, Joan, his children, Joanne, Margaret and Barbara, and his entire family, together with our gratitude for Ron Maunsell’s public life and service to the Senate, the Country Party and regional Australia.

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

Obviously I rise to concur with the remarks of Senator Conroy and Senator Abetz and also to pay tribute to one of the greatest senators of the Country Party and the National Party. The intrigue of this person still has a connection here because you might find that the person sitting behind me had something to do with the reason Ron did not actually get preselected! Ron lived an extremely colourful life. For so many of us, long after we leave here, when they give our obituaries they are really going to be scratching for things to say. But that is not the case with Ron. Ron had a remarkable pioneering career both as a grazier and serving our nation in the Air Force. He was part of the occupying forces, I think, on Morotai Island, which is now part of Indonesia.

He is well known, of course, by reason of a certain night, and what happened next will go down in conjecture. It is funny how things change. We now suggest that it was well planned and that those on the conservative side of politics knew exactly what they were up to, but Ron adamantly rejected that. In his speech he said he was just having a night with a friend and things that happen happen.

I thought Senator Conroy might have been more interested in Senator Maunsell’s position on television and the statements that he made about getting television out to regional areas by coaxial cable, which he mentioned in his maiden speech. I will be so polite as to quote him:

As 1 said, 85% of the continent does not have television. 1 do not suggest that television stations should be built in the Simpson Desert, on the Nullarbor Plain or in places such as that. Referring particularly to Queensland, the railway lines run directly west from the coast and towns are dotted along the lines. To give people in those towns television per medium of a coaxial cable would not cost a fortune. I hope that the Government when it has the funds available in the future will see fit to provide television for such areas.

One might suggest that Senator Conroy is now endeavouring to fulfil Senator Maunsell’s dream for broadband but not so much for television. Rather than coaxial cables, he is going to do it by optic fibre. So Senator Conroy, in a fashion, is a living legacy of Ron Maunsell. It is interesting how these things move on.

Another thing Senator Maunsell was known for is something that is very dear to my heart and dear to those in the National Party and, I am proud to say, is now part of the coalition platform, and that is zonal taxation. He said even back in the 1970s that the party’s position on zonal rebates was way out of date. If it was way out of date in 1974, I do not know what it is in 2011. It would be great to see this parliament updating the zonal rebate system to make it a better reflection of the privations of those who live in remote areas.

Ron was always a champion of the people who lived in remote areas. He also believed in a more egalitarian role. As an ex-serviceman, he tried very much to bring officers and other ranks into the greater largesse of government and to involve them in changes he pursued in regard to veterans’ affairs entitlements. Ron was also a great advocate and a fervent fighter against the advent, as he saw it at that time in the early 70s, of drugs coming into Australia. That is a curse that is still with our nation, but it was very fortuitous of him at that point in time to look over the horizon and see the problems that this was going to cause for the youth of Australia.

What we see with Ron Maunsell is a person who was a dynamic tapestry of the things that made him up. He was not easily pigeonholed as a person holding certain views. A lot of the things he did were quite visionary in how he pursued them. He was obviously a person who was very engaging—Vince Gair would have vouched for that—and who had an extremely good tactical mind. He was also a fundamental part of the tactics committee—now they meet in the morning but then they met the night before—and played a dedicated part in how coalition tactics were going to play out the next day in the chamber.

Ron passed away peacefully in Cairns, as has been stated, aged 88 years. He was a loving husband to Joan, a father to Joanne, Margaret and Barbara and a grandfather to Richard, Catherine, Alexander and Elizabeth. Ron has earned his place in the annals of this nation. As I think he was a committed Anglican, no doubt he has gone to a better place. I am sure, if he is watching us now, that he is involved in some intrigue where someone is going to be tossed out from upstairs and sent downstairs, but he will just be having a scotch and a few prawns while it happens.

Ron Boswell (Queensland, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I join in this condolence motion with the Acting Leader of the Government, the Leader of the Opposition and the Leader of the National Party. Ron died at age 88. I knew him very well. When I became a member of the party he was already a senator and after the Senate ticket was dissolved and the party split—which necessitated the National Party running a separate ticket—there was a huge commotion as to whether to put up Florence Bjelke-Peterson or follow the traditional ticket. It was a matter of life and death for the National Party at the time. We had to make a decision and the party decided that they wished Florence Bjelke-Peterson to lead the ticket, which was the reason that Ron Maunsell fell off the bottom of the ticket. But he was well liked and he was well known. He was a dairy farmer, a pilot, a flight lieutenant, a grazier and a senator, and all those roles he fulfilled very well.

The Leader of the Liberal Party has mentioned his mother’s story, Suppose I Die. It was a message that she gave to an Aboriginal woman. She told this Aboriginal woman—and they were alone at the station—that she had malaria and she was giving instructions on ‘how to bury me, supposing I should die’. The Maunsells were the absolute pioneers of the North. They were managers of Mulgrave Station, after which they went to another station, the name of which escapes me at the moment. Just before the war, because Ron’s father never had the money to establish his own station, they established a dairy farm at Milanda. From there he went away to war and the book reflects how every time someone went to war the farmers of that age would have a meeting or a party for them in the town hall. He went away and came back and then, as other people did, took an interest in politics. Before I was involved in the party, he was promoted to the Senate where he served for a good 15 or 16 years and served particularly well.

We could not go past this condolence motion without mentioning the night of the long prawns. People have gone into it in a great deal of detail—far more detail than I want to go into. There will always be speculation about whether he knew what he was doing or it was just one of those coincidental meetings where you had a few prawns and a few scotches. Maybe we will just leave that to speculation, but there are many people who thought that it was a well-planned and well-executed campaign to control the Senate, and that is what happened. The repercussions from it were that there was an election, Senator Bjelke-Petersen got a very good vote and the government changed, and maybe you could put it down in some ways to Ron Maunsell.

But he was a good man, a man who absolutely, to the bootstraps, stood for rural Australia, primary industry and all those people who lived in the non-metropolitan areas of Australia. I wish to pass on my condolences to his wife, Joan. I know this will be a very sad time for her, her children and her grandchildren.

Jan McLucas (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities and Carers) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I wish to add my condolences to those that have been expressed here in the Senate today on the passing of former Senator Ron Maunsell. Senator Ron Maunsell was well known to my family, and my father was deeply saddened to hear of his passing. He was a very well respected representative of Queensland and, in particular, Far North Queensland, and I want to pass on my condolences to Mrs Maunsell and her daughters.

Question agreed to, honourable senators standing in their places.