Well, it's great to be back.
Can I just, while the media are here, can I just say one or two very brief things. This is a very proud and also a very humbling moment for the Liberal Party of Australia. It's almost 60 years to the day Menzies convened the Canberra Conference which adopted the name Liberal Party of Australia and two months later at the Albury Conference the Party was formally launched. And there have been few victories in the 60 year history of the party which has been as meritorious as this one and everybody in this room has played a major role in it. And we are entitled to have a few moments, just a few moments, of quiet satisfaction - only a few moments and the satisfaction will be very quiet, because one thing that we have learned over the last eight and a half years is that unity and cohesion is critical to success, but also a sense that we are the servants of the Australian people. There is no such thing as a natural party of government in this country. No party is born to rule. Political parties are given Australia's support on the basis of the strength of their policies, what they deliver in government, and the quality of the men and women of Australia who they bring into the National Parliament. And we have been successful and we'll go on being successful if we continue to abide by those principles because once you start losing contact with the Australian people then you begin rightly to lose their respect and their support.
We won on the 9th of October because people believed in us, they believed in the team, they believed that we have done a good job for Australia, and they believed that we would go on doing a good job and they were not persuaded with the alternative.
So with those thoughts about the sense of privilege and honour above everything else, can I particularly say to the new members who are joining us today, in 104 years of Federation there haven't been many people elected to the National Parliament. To get elected to the National Parliament itself is an enormous honour and it's something that you should remember for the rest of your lives. And having been elected we hope to keep you, there are some people who have this habit of coming in and out!! But all I can say is we like the look of all of you and we want to keep all of you here and add more to you. But it is a great opportunity. I said at the Wentworth Hotel on the night of the election that this country stood on the brink of a new era of national achievement, I really mean that. The opportunities for this government in the next three years are truly exciting. There's been a lot of comment about what we might do if we are fortunate enough to have a majority in our own right in the Senate. The answer to that is very simple - we'll do what we promised the Australian people we'll do and that does mean reforming further Australia's industrial relations system. It does mean implementing other things which we have repeatedly taken to the Australian public. But we won't be allowing that circumstance to go to our head. I can promise the Australian people and I know I speak on behalf of all of you, that we do not intend to use the mandate we have been given recklessly or arrogantly or wantonly or indiscriminately or carelessly, we're going to use it very carefully and very soberly and in a way that advances the welfare of the Australian people. That's what we're elected to, we're not elected for any self aggrandisement or gloating or personal triumphalism, we are elected to do good things for the Australian people. And if we go on doing that we may again win their favour at the next election.
But the moment you start campaigning for the next election is today, I'm a great believer in perpetual campaigning and we sit for three weeks before Christmas and we have a lot of legislation to present. But finally before I close the meeting to the media can I express my personal thanks to all of you for what you have done, can I particularly express my thanks to Peter Costello. To all of the other members of the Leadership group and especially, and I'll say a couple of words to them in the privacy of the party meeting, to our new members. It's wonderful to see you all here, it's a great privilege, a great opportunity and a moment which we are entitled to savour, however soberly and carefully and privately and non-triumphally.
Thank you.
[ends]