Mr President, Opposition Leader Bill Shorten, parliamentary colleagues, ladies and gentlemen.
It is, for me, a deep honour to be the first Australian Prime Minister to welcome to this country a President of France.
A few moments ago the President and I were at the Australian War Memorial; a fitting place to be with the French President given that our friendship was first forged one hundred years ago in the crucible of war.
The friendship between Australia and France has stood the test of time and I should observe Mr President that the Great War touched your own family – it touched, of course, all the families of France with both your grandfathers serving their country in uniform.
Your grandfather, Gustav, might have imagined that his regimental commander, Charles de Gaulle, would one day be President of the Fifth Republic, but I suspect he would not have imagined that one day his own grandson would be the President of the Fifth Republic.
I mention this because Australia does feel a deep connection to France.
We have defended freedom in France not once, but twice, as I'm sure the Australians here all know. We lost 46,000 on the Western Front and some of them still lie in the cemetery of St Sever in your own hometown, Mr President, of Rouen.
I hope one of the consequences of the centenary of the Great War now coming up is that we Australians will be as familiar with the story of the Western Front in the years to come as we have long been with that of Gallipoli. We will be as familiar, in part, because of the John Monash commemorative centre that our two countries are resolved to build at the village of Villers-Bretonneux which Australia did so much to defend in 1918.
This is France’s story and it is Australia’s story too.
Of course, in the Rouen Municipal Library, Mr President, there is a document that might have changed both our stories – the plan and the itinerary co-drafted by King Louis XIV of Lapérouse voyage, a journey which would eventually bring the French explorer to Botany Bay just a few days after Governor Arthur Phillip.
The suburb of La Perouse in Sydney reminds us that but for this near miss of history, Australia might have been a French colony rather than a British one.
Still, France has been an important presence in our culture. From the days of wool buyers setting up businesses in Sydney to the impact of French viticulturalists on our wine industry, there has been a French dimension to the Australian story.
Here today, in the National Gallery of Australia, we are surrounded by the works of the greatest French artists – Rodan, Monet and so many others – because to Australians, France is the epitome of culture, of beauty, of elegance.
Traditionally, the numbers of French people migrating to this country have been small, but recently there has been an increase of French travellers to our shores, many of them young people taking advantage of our working holiday arrangements and this has added a new vitality to our relationship.
During your stay, Mr President, you have spoken with French students, researchers and business people who have told you of the potential for great links between our countries.
One of the French people here in Australia who you will meet later today is Mr Jacques Adler, who joined the Resistance at 15, became the youngest sergeant in the French army, then came to this country and his daughter Louise manages and runs our most distinguished academic publisher, The Melbourne University Press.
I’m pleased that today the President and I have been able to discuss building on our strong $6 billion a year trading relationship, including through an Australia-EU free trade agreement. Because we do need to boost the $78 billion two-way trade between Australia and what is still the world’s largest economic bloc.
But our friendship, Mr President, is based on values as well as on interests. We are partners in the Pacific; indeed we are neighbours with New Caledonia. Australia deeply respects France for its work in Africa, particularly against the threat of instability and extremism. And I was proud to work with you and with France in the UN Security Council Chamber as we voted recently to take action on the threat of foreign fighters. Today, our Air Forces are working together against the ISIL death cult in the skies over Iraq.
Thank you, Sir, for being the first French President to visit Australia. Ours is a true friendship and I look forward to building on it. It is founded on the memories on the past but it flourishes on our hopes for the future.
Merci beaucoup.
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