FLINDERS ELECTORATE LIBERAL PARTY LUNCHEON
MORNINGTON, VIC.
" IA 14 OCTOBER 1968
Speech by the Prime Minister, Mr. John Gorton
Mr. President, Mr. Minister, Councillors and Members and Workers
for the Liberal Party:-
I think perhaps the first thing I should say is that it is
more than pleasant for me to be here in an electorate represented by
Phil Lynch. I suppose it is not inappropriate for a Minister of the
Army to have begun his tasks by having to undergo a certain baptism
of fire, not only from the matters which happened in the Army, not
only from difficulties with the Opposition, but with various other
difficulties which many of you here will understand as well as I do.
He has overcome them all and he is accepted completely and thoroughly
as a hard-working and dedicated local Member and as a Minister
somebody who has met and overcome the problems so far inherent
in his portfolio, and who seems to me to be avoiding new problems
with great skill. I suppose before I say anything else, Sir, people here
would expect me to make one or two general comments, because I
have gathered from random remarks appearing here and there in the
newspapers over the last few weeks that there appears to be some
discussion or some speculation as to whether there is likely to be an
election before the due time at which an election has to take place.
Now, the one thing that I really want to say about that is that it is
quite fascinating that I have never said a word about it, one way or
the other, up until this point of time. And I don't propose to say
anything about it at this point of time:' But I will let you into this
secret. I made my mind up about it some time ago and I will be
informing my Party about it tomorrow. I think that is the proper way
for this information to be conveyed to a party meeting.
It has been quite fascinating to me to discover how people
can suggest and build on things, speculate about things without really
getting any indication whatsoever from people who have to decide them.
But we will find out about that all in good time.
What I do want to say to you, so many of whom I have
met before, so many of whom I have known over such a long period of
time, is this. Nearly two decades ago, you got tired of a government
which seemed to regard five per cent of unemployment as a reasonable
amount of unemployment, which seemed to regard controls as a substitute
for progress, which soemed to ra-rd stagiaatian as a substitute for
expansion. You suddenly got tirW-of that and you changed it. There were
people who came out and asked you to help them to-change it, and I was one
of them, but it waat you, ind people like you. throughout the whole of Australia
who made that change. I think you can take some satisfaction from the results of
that change, and in saying this I am speaking of the results under Sir
Robert Menzies and under the late Harold Halt, indeed under the
administration which you substituted in 1950 for the previous Administration. o / 2
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It is true to say that beginning then and progressing ever more and
more quickly, those old concepts have been discarded. So that now
we have, to all intents and purposes, every employable person in
Australia gainfully employed, so that now we have as this shire
indicates an upsurge of growth, an upsurge of development, throughout
the length and breadth of this, our nation; so that we have an
abandonment of oppressive control; so that we have more than was
ever possible then, an opportunity for that individual initiative of
which Phil Lynch spoke, the opportunity of people to take risks and
reap rewards if they are successful, take risks and reap the
consequences if they are not successful, but at least use their own
judgment and advance the nation in so doing.
And for nearly two decades this progress continued.
It continued without a great deal of basic change in Australia's posit ion
in the world or in the problems Australia had internally to face.
Things have changed now. We have come to a watershed in Australian
affairs. No longer can we, as we have done for I suppose two centuries
say, " We are Australian. We are protected by the British Navy. We
do not need to protect ourselves. We are available when a First War
or a Second War or a Korean War breaks out. We send our contingents.
We make what sacrifices are needed, but in the meantime, we are
protected by one of the great powers of the world."
Now that has gone, gradually at first, and then suddenly
and quickly with the decision by Great Britain to withdraw from East
of Suez altogether. So that now, besides the efforts we ourselves can
make, we are, for our own security, dependent more than ever before
on the United States Government providing the protection understood to
be provided under the ANZUS Pact. This is a change, a basic change
in the history of this nation, and it means, among other things, that
we must devote more and more, not of our gross national product,
but more and more towards building up our own defences, so that we
can, should the time ever arise when it is needed, meet any first.
shock of attack upon ourselves or the territories for which we are
responsible, meet it, hold it, perhaps beat it back by ourselves, but
if not at least meet it, hold it, until further assistance can come.
That is why the vote for the defences of this country has
risen from what for so long was about $ 400 million, to 250 million
this year. It is not something which can bring joy to the heart of any
of us because there are so many other requirements for this money,
and for what this money could provide. But while it cannot bring joy,
it is an -inescapable obligation. I do not propose to provide as much
as some of our opponents or some of our I don't know what they are
some of the people who stand between us and our opponents, would
require to be provided for defence because I believe we need to build
up the nation as well. But there is this requirement we are meeting
and there is this change in Australia's position in the world and what
it has to do. We have another change, I think, a change in social
conscience. Up until recently, even during Liberal administration,
we took the view that those who are old or ill or invalided or in some
other way the subject of the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune
should be helped, yes, but should be helped only to a certain degree.
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We expected that the families of those persons, the charities outside,
should contribute to what a government, a people was prepared to do,
and that therefore a government and a people were only prepared to
make some gestures of help towards those who were so handicapped,
towards those who were aged. I don't believe that any longer this is
a tenable philosophy. I have abandoned it myself and I have abandoned
it on behalf of the Liberal Party. I feel it is necessary to see that
people such as this are -provided with enough to live on without having
to depend on outside assistance, enough to live on in a simple, frugal
way, because after all, we do want savings to continue as well, and
self-reliance to continue as well, but at least enough to see there is
sufficient to eat, and that there is no requirement to donate blankets
in order to keep people warm. This is one of the things this Government
will seek to do, is seeking to do. It is a change in approach from what
was previously that of the Liberal Party.
We have another change. We have suddenly discovered
that it is possible to develop this nation far more quickly than ever
was thought possible before. I speak not only of the enormous mineral
discoveries which have been made, though they are of great significance
in the development of areas which previously had nobody living in them
at all, enormous significance in adding to our overseas earnings. I
speak also of the development of new industries. I speak of the increase
in production from each acre of farm land in Australia. I speak of what
new technology can contribute and is contributing. This is progressing
geometrically. It is not going slowly. It is bounding ahead, and this
requires enormous amounts of capital, and enormous amounts of
enthusiasm and energy and understanding from the Australian people.
This takes me, particularly at this Liberal gathering,
to a need to examine some of the basic tenets which, since 1949, have
not been examined at all. I speak of a need to stand and quite
dispassionately survey the relationships between the various levels
of government in Australia the Australian Government, the State
Government, the Municipal Government. There was a time, when
this party was formed, when it was believed, and when it was a dogma
and when it was unquestionable that all an Australian Government ought
to do was to hand out particular sums of money to Queensland, or to
Western Australia, or to whoever it may be and say, " Spend these in
the way in which you think best. I do not think that those conditions
prevail any longer. Is it or is it not necessary that an Australian
Government should be charged with the responsibility of seeing that
the economy of Australia as a whole is managed as a whole so that
inflation is kept under control, so that deflation is met by an infusion
of credit, so that overseas investment keeps coming in?
These are things that need to be examined and argued and
discussed. Is it necessary now and here I am going to put my own
views and say that I think it is to see that an Australian child, in
whatever part of Australia he is born, is offered uniform facilities for
education? Is it necessary to see that somebody who falls ill in any
division of Australia has the sam e opportunity for treatment in hospital,
has the same opportunity for care as he would have in any other part of
Australia? / 4
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It is my belief that the Australian people believe that
it is necessary to see that this should happen. But how it is to be
brought about is something for discussion by an Australian Government,
by State Governments, by Liberal Members and by workers for Liberal
parties. Because I do believe that while it is necessary to see that theie
things happen, it is also necessary to see that centralist administration
from Canberra should not take place, but rather the goal having been
set, the achievement of the goal is left to those governments closer to
the people than is the central government. This is not to be taken as
an abdication of the responsibility of setting the goal:
There is something else beyond that, something I have
been preaching and something I will continue to preach. That is I thin~ k
the time has come, indeed perhaps it is past time when we, wherever
we may live in this nation of ours, should begin to feel a real sense of
Australianism. We should begin to feel a pride in the nation to which.
we belong, begin to look ahead to what this nation should achieve in the
way of helping other nations abroad, in the way of compassion inside its
own boundaries, in the way of social justice between its people, f eel
a belief that whatever we may be we belong to an exciting country. We
belong to a nation which in a mere blink of an eye by the end of this
century will be 28 million, and then we will go on and on and begin to
think with a sense, not of chauvinism, but of national humility how we
in this lucky country, as Liberals and as Australians, can best use the
opportunities presented to us. We must see that when' we grow to that
size, we will not only have mighty industrial muscles, we will not only
have vastly increased defence potential, we will not only have, as I hope,
an internal compassion for our ill and sick which might not have been
seen in any nation before, but we will have also as we go abroad a light
in our eye, a fire in our heart, as we hold up our heads and say, we
are Australians. And this, in a sense, is a watershed. This in a sense is
a goal, and this is something with which you, as you have helped in the
past, can help immensely in the future.
What is it that Australians want? What is it that
individual human beings ought to want? Not only though this is
important the opportunity for material well-being, not only the
chance to improve the farm on which they live or expand the business
which they run or do better work in the factory in which they work and
receive more wages; not only that but also a belief which we must instil
in them and which we must make real a belief that in improving a
farm, in expanding a business, in working harder and getting more wages,
they are not only materially improving their position but they are
contributing to the sort of thing that I have tried to outline for you.
That they are contributing to that kind of country in which their children
can grow up, and in their turn contribute for their children. These are
the things, the tasks before us some easy, some hard, some specific,
some not easy to spell out because they are matters more of feeling than
of direct figures. These are what we are after. These are what I think you
are after, and judging by the success that you have so far had, if you
continue the help you have so far given, I will try to see in the short
time I am here that your expectations are fulfilled. They won't be
fulfilled without mistakes being made from time to time because all
people make mistakes. Indeed, one would need to be a superman not
to. But the attempt that will be made will be honest and I believe that
the team we've got will advance along that road which I've tried to
point out. I come now, Sir, to a remembrance of something my
wife always says to me before I make a speech. She says, " Always
remember that those people who are sitting in the room would thoroughly
endorse these four lines of poetry:-
" I love a finished speaker
I really truly do,
I don't mean one who's polished
I just mean one who's through.
I'm through