Thank you very much Chris for those very generous words of introduction, Tony Smith, Mitch Fifield, Mr Speaker, Senator Julian McGauran, my other parliamentary colleagues, ladies and gentlemen. This is the fourth occasion that I've had the pleasure of coming to this dinner which apart from doing very good and practical things for the Liberal Party in this part of Melbourne, honours a magnificent by-election victory on Bastille Day, the 14th of July 2001. And as somebody who follows that football code that's played in heaven, rugby union, it was also the night that Australian magnificently defeated the British Lions at Telstra Stadium. And can I say that the sense of enthusiasm and hope that Chris' victory on that occasion gave to the Coalition, remember the middle of 2001? Things weren't looking all that flash and people were starting to say that we might lose, and people were starting to entertain some doubts, although we had begun a significant recovery through a couple of decisions we took earlier in the year and through the way in which the Federal Budget of that year had been put together. But that was a challenging by-election and the quality of Chris as a candidate, the enthusiasm and energy of all of those who got behind him was quite awe-inspiring and there is no doubt when the political history of that period is written it will properly be recorded that the tide really began to turn back in favour of the Government on the 14th of July 2001. And I thank Chris and I thank all of the Liberal Party members in his electorate and here in Victoria for the tremendous effort that they gave. And in extending that thanks to Chris, I extend to Tony and to Mitch and to David and to Julian and to all my other federal and state colleagues who are here my thanks, my gratitude for the wonderful contribution that the Victorian Division made to our election victory on the 9th of October last year. The margins that are now represented by Liberal majorities here in Victoria are the best we've had in probably a decade and every seat in Victoria recorded a significant increase in the Liberal Party vote. And that is a tremendous tribute to the work of Helen Kroger and Julian Sheezel and Julian is here tonight and I acknowledge with gratitude the tremendous work that everybody did to produce that outstanding result.
Chris quite rightly spoke in his introduction of the fact that we are a team, and I attribute the success of the Government over the last nine and a half years to the fact that we have been a strong and united and very purposeful team. We know from our sporting analogies, from our football and cricketing and other analogies, how tremendously important it is that we have team work and we have coordination. And that has been one of the enormous strengths of this Government - the teamwork between the Liberal Party and the National Party. We may occasionally have our differences, but at the end of the day the unity between those two parties has been fundamental to our success. The unity amongst the members of the Government, the fact that I've been the fortunate beneficiary of tremendous colleagues, and none of course better than the contribution that Peter Costello as Treasurer and Deputy Leader of the Party over the last nine and a half years has made to the strength and to the performance of the Government. But I extend those thanks to all of my other senior colleagues because together we have been a very effective team and together we have produced some outcomes for the Australian people and I was reminded of these outcomes as I put together some remarks for a conference on skills that I attended this morning in Melbourne organised by the Australian Financial Review. And in my remarks I told the audience that our unemployment rate now is the lowest it has been for 30 years. The participation rate, that is the number of people who want a job, who want to be involved in the labour market, is at a record high of just under 65 per cent. That the number of people who are long-term unemployed is about a third of what it was in the recession of the 1990s. That over the last nine and a half years we have seen real wages rise by just under 15 per cent. Together all of those things tell us one very important reality - and that is that more than ever before in the economic history of this country we now live in a workers' market. In other words, the conditions and the opportunities for people wanting work, wanting to change their job, wanting to improve their opportunities in their present job, those opportunities are now arguably better than they have been at any time in this country's history.
Now I know that a lot of people will say that is terrific and the Government has done a fantastic job and we're all getting the benefit of it and isn't that great? Why doesn't therefore the Government just go away for a while, go over into a corner and don't bother us any more with any talk about reform? You've got unemployment down, you've created this situation where it's a workers' market, why don't you now just leave us all alone, go away, don't talk about reform any more, don't upset people with any suggestions about further change and further improvements, just leave it where it is and it'll tick over and it'll go on forever like a well-timed clock? Now that's very tempting, it's very enticing, but of course it would be the most foolhardy thing that this Government could possible do. I constantly, in speeches I make around Australia, I employ the metaphor of somebody who is participating in a foot-race towards an ever receding finishing line to describe the nature of economic reform in Australia at the present moment. We know that we will never reach perfection, no country ever does, no government ever does. But we have to keep moving towards that ever receding finishing line because if we don't the other participants in the foot-race are going to catch up with us and going to go past us. And if you think I've just invented that metaphor for the purpose of arguing my case for further economic reform in Australia at the present time, can I just refer very briefly to the experience of a country that's been a bit in the news politically over the last few days and that's Germany. When I became a junior minister in the Fraser Government in the middle-1970s, the country that was held up as the example to be followed when it came to economic management, the exemplar of economic discipline and performance and achievement, was the then Federal Republic of West Germany. And German ministers used to travel around the world effectively giving lectures about the German economic miracle, and it had been a German economic miracle - out of the ashes of defeat and devastation in 1945, Germany in the space of 30 years had rebuilt herself and become arguably, or certainly the strongest economic power in Europe and an example to be envied. And people said America's in decline, Britain of course, this is long before Margaret Thatcher came along, was practically written off, some people were calling her the 'sick man of Europe', and so the list went on. And people said if you really want a demonstration of how to do it, have a look at West Germany. That was true then and the Germans had come a long way. But they then made a crucial error, having reached that pinnacle they made the mistake that I said a moment ago we shouldn't make - they thought well we've done all we need to do, we should now sit back, no more economic reform, we can just relax, we can take advantage of what we've previously done and things will just go on in a very enticing and attractive fashion. The reality is that that didn't occur, and now some 28 to 30 years later because Germany did not embrace further economic reform that country now faces major economic challenges. Unemployment there is just under 11 per cent, the total number of people unemployed in Germany now is almost the same as it was in the early 1930s at the height of the Great Depression. And the other difficult thing is that having for so long neglected the need for economic reform and having assumed that it was no longer needed, it is now incredibly difficult for that country to embrace economic reform. And the ambiguity of the election outcome in that country is a powerful demonstration of the conflict that is felt in that country about the need or the desirability for further economic reform. Now some of you may think that's an unreasonable analogy, can I say it's not. It's a classic reminder that you can never take the maintenance of economic prosperity for granted and the more successful you are as a country the greater the imperative to go on striving for even greater success. And that is why, despite having built over the last 10 years the strongest economic conditions we've had since World War II, having seen those great improvements being seen around the world as an example of a strong, low inflation, low debt, low taxation, low interest rate economy, a nation that is very attractive to business investment, a nation that is properly taking advantage of our vast natural resources, having come all of that distance, it is important that we keep going.
Now last week the Parliament passed the legislation finally to privatise Telstra. Now I know that the majority of the Australia people when they are asked in isolation "do you favour the sale of Telstra?" I know the majority of people have said no to that. We've argued for it, we've been quite transparent, we went to the people at the last election and we said if conditions, telecommunications conditions in the bush are up to scratch we'll go ahead with the sale of Telstra. We haven't deceived the Australian people, we've never pretended that we didn't believe in the privatisation of Telstra. We believed in the privatisation of Telstra not because we wanted the money, not because we're interested in a distress or a fire-sale, and there won't be one, but because in the long run it is fundamentally absurd, it's uncompetitive, it's unrealistic and it's unfair to the private shareholders to have the second largest company in Australia half-owned by the Government. And it creates a fundamental conflict of interest - a government can't be both a regulator and an owner. And I believe that now that we have got the legislation and ultimately when all the shares in Telstra are sold, then we will have the conditions for a far more competitive and a far more efficient and therefore far more beneficial to the consumer, telecommunications market in Australia.
But undoubtedly the biggest exercise in economic reform for the remainder of this year is the passage of the Government's industrial relations legislation. And it is precisely because we are living in a workers' market like none other in the history of this country and that the conditions are so beneficial for employees in Australia at the present time, it's precisely because of that that I believe and the Government believes that we must press ahead with these changes because these changes are going to underwrite a maintenance of the workers' market in Australia. The best way to guarantee that those conditions will continue is to embrace further reform. And these reforms are not designed to cut the living standards of Australian workers, they are designed to maintain and improve the living standards of Australia's workers. Why would a Government that has presided over an unprecedented increase in the living standards of Australian workers want to embark upon policies that would work in the opposite direction? I'm frequently asked by the Labor Party in relation to these changes, they say "will you guarantee that no single person out of the 10 million Australian workers will be worse off as a result of our changes?" And my reply to those sort of questions is to say that our guarantee is our record. And if you look at our record we have been a Government that has delivered for the workers of Australia infinitely better outcomes than the outcomes that were delivered for the workers of Australia by either the Hawke or the Keating Governments. It's the Coalition Government that has delivered the high real wage increases. It's a Coalition Government that's delivered lower interest rates. It's a Coalition Government that has delivered lower unemployment. It's a Coalition Government that has delivered lower taxation. By every measure the conditions for Australian workers at the present time are better than they have been at any time since the end of World War II. And the sole purpose of our changes is to introduce flexibilities and changes and alterations in our workplace relations culture so that as the economy continues to alter and the nature of work in this country continues to alter, we can have rules and systems in our workplace culture that accommodate those changes and result in businesses being able to operate more efficiently and their workers being employed more profitably and with higher levels of remuneration. And all of you in this audience who are employers know that your greatest asset is your workforce. No employer in his or her right mind will do anything to alienate or antagonise their best workers. When you get a good employee you hang on to him or her like grim death because they're very important to the profitability of your business. And the changes that we propose are really very straight forward. We're going to get rid of this absurd unfair dismissal law for firms employing fewer than 100 people. And in case you hear any trade union spokesman or Labor Party critics saying that this is some ancient protection that Australian workers have always had, let me remind you that the law we're going to get rid of was only introduced in 1994. It wasn't introduced in the Magna Carta way back in the 13th Century, it was 1994 it was introduced. That's the first thing we're going to do.
The second thing we're going to do is to make it easier to enter into workplace agreements. We're not going to make them compulsory, if people still want to be covered by an award, if they still want the opportunity of a collective agreement then the opportunities will be there. We're not going to prevent people belonging to unions, we're not going to prevent unions bargaining on behalf of workers. But we are going to make it easier, subject of course to minimum guaranteed conditions, we are going to make it easier for people to enter into workplace agreements because we believe that agreements fashioned to suit the circumstances of individual workplaces are agreements that are more likely to produce a more productive, profitable workplace and therefore a more highly paid workforce. And finally, and very importantly, we're going to create in this country a single national system of workplace relations. We are not six separate economies, we are one single economy. And the regional differences now are far less than they were 10 years ago and infinitely less than they were 30 years ago. I often recall the fact that when I first practiced law in Sydney in the early 1960s, it had only been two or three years since the introduction of the uniform companies legislation and under that legislation we finally escaped the absurdity that if you incorporated a company in New South Wales and you wanted to carry on business in Victoria you had to register it in Victoria, would you believe, as a foreign company? And that was actually what it was called and all of the law firms then were city-based firms, you had Melbourne firms and you had Sydney firms and you had Brisbane firms. And if you wanted to have business done on your behalf in Melbourne and you were a Sydney firm you had to appoint what was quaintly called a 'Melbourne agent'. Now it all sounds very quaint but it was only a little over a generation ago. And I recall that from my own personal experience as an illustration of this country has changed, and we therefore need to have a single national system. And we need to sweep away the barriers that still exist that penalise people who get a trade qualification and I had an example brought to my attention in connection with the speech this morning that somebody who gets a hairdressing qualification from a private training college here in Victoria can carry on as a hairdresser in London but can't do so in many of the other states of Australia without getting a further qualification, often involving a significant delay and further training. Now I could list you a half a dozen further examples of those sorts of ridiculous institutional barriers that still exist. Now to his great credit when Jeff Kennett was Premier of Victoria he decided that we should have a national system and he handed over the industrial relations powers to the Commonwealth. Now we're not interested in a power grab, we're not interested in centralisation of power, we're interested in ratifying and underpinning the fact that this country is a single, even economic unit. And we should remove the impedients for the doing of business across state borders to the extent that they continue to exist.
Now you may notice ladies and gentlemen that I haven't said anything about a certain publication. And I don't intend to recommend the book, I don't intend to give any kind of review or commentary. I simply want to make two very important points about all of this. And the first is that Mr Latham was not only a product of the Australian Labor Party, he was chosen by the Australian Labor Party in full knowledge of his beliefs and the person he was to become the Prime Minister of Australia. Now I think it's important that that be said because there's an attempt being made by our political opponents to separate themselves, and I don't get into commentary on individual allegations except to say that of course so many of them are plainly wrong and plainly absurd. But the point I make is that the character of this person was known to his colleagues when they chose him, they knew he was viscerally anti-American, they knew that his stock-in-trade was personal abuse, they knew of his desire to regenerate a class division of this country, his schools policy was a throwback to a level of class division that this country in a sense never really had and certainly never wanted to have. Now I simply make the observation that he was chosen by his colleagues in full knowledge of what he believed in and what kind of person he was.
And the second point I would like to make, and this is a point made in defence of all people who go into public life, you would imagine after the diatribes of the last few days that there was nothing honourable, there was nothing respectable, there was nothing decent about public life, political life. There is, there's a lot. The overwhelming majority of the men and women I have met in politics from both sides, from both sides, have been people who've gone into Parliament wanting to serve their country or serve their state and to make a contribution and to try and achieve change and to make a difference, it's beneficial. Now I think it's very important that something be said on behalf of the profession of politics because public service remains a decent calling and it remains something that I hope will continue to attract a wide range of people. Our Party, the Liberal Party, has been far more successful than the Labor Party in attracting a range of people with different talents. More and more the Labor Party is sending into Federal Parliament now people whose sole background has been in the trade union movement or working on a political staff - nothing wrong with that but you need a mix of people, you need people that have got a range of all of the talents and that is one of the great strengths that the Liberal Party has. I look at the people who came in at the last election - you've got defence scientists, you've got policemen, you've got funeral directors, you've got lawyers, you've got academics, you've got doctors. Now that's to name seven or eight by profession of the people who joined us at the last election. You go through the Labor Party list and you've a trade union official, you've got an official from another trade union, you've got somebody else from Gough Whitlam's staff, you've got this, that and the other. And so the list goes on. And it's a very, very limited gene pool and it's one of the greatest strengths that we have.
But I simply wanted to conclude my remarks by saying that public life in this country is overwhelmingly honourable, it's made up of people on both sides who care about the future of Australia, they don't always get it right, we don't always get it right any more than our opponents do. But I think it is totally wrong to embrace as the former alternative Prime Minster of Australia embraced this utterly and despicably cynical view of public life and political practice in this country. I think he's done not only an enormous disservice to his own party but an enormous disservice to all people who care about quality of life, public life in this country.
My friends, can I again thank you very warmly for the help and the loyalty and the support that you've given to Chris and to Tony and to all the other members, to Jason Wood who wonderfully took over the seat of La Trobe from Bob Charles, to Mitch Fifield, and to everybody else. And to all of the candidates at a State level I wish you all, I don't like eight State Labor governments around the country, I'd like to get rid of all of them if we could. But you've got to start somewhere and I'll do everything I can to assist the Liberal Party here in Victoria at the next State election. But my friends, thank you for your support. Chris, magnificent job over the last four years, magnificent job over the last year as Parliamentary Secretary to Peter Costello. Keep it up and thanks everybody for coming.
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