PRIME MINISTER'S RADIO BROADCAST IN PORT AUGUSTA, S. AUST.
SUNDAY 2 NOVEMBER 1975
It is a very great pleasure to be in Port Augusta
again in the centre of South Australia's iron triangle
and to have this opportunity to talk to you. I was last in
Port Augusta in April, before going on to Tarcoola for the
inauguration of the new railway line to Alice Springs. That
railway will be one of the many achievements of my Government
of benefit to the people of South Australia and the Northern
Territory. Since then South Australia has had a State election.
It was an election on the very issue of railways, and I was
delighted that Don Dunstan won that election and was able to
put through his lesiglation to transfer financial responsibility
for the State railways to the Australian Government. It was
an excellent financial deal for South Australia, and it will
make possible a very great improvement in South Australia's
railway services.-Of course the other issue, the basic issue in your
election, was the power of an Upper House to frustrate a
Government's policies. Don Dunstan won that battle too,
and now in Canberra the national Government is facing an even
more serious challenge from a reactionary Upper House and
we are fa: ing it for the second time in the life of my
Goverrent. We have to win that battle for the sake of democracy,
for t e sake of our Budget with all the benefits it will bring
to thee Australian = eople and for the sake of the economic
health and stabili-y of the nation. The Senate is threatening
Australia with total chaos and disruption in its attempt to
ovet_ r_ n the Gover-nent, in its determination to follow in
the wcrds of Senator Steele Hall, a great South Australian
the " sleazy road to power."
In the pas-t few days the opinion polls have shown
clearly what the Aus_-alian People think of Mr Fraser's tactics.
Seventy percent of the people believe the Budget should be
passed. Yet Mr Fraser persists with his disastrous policy.
Already the Liberal-Country Party tactics are damaging the
business community and threatening the nation's economic recovery.
The Opposition is threatening the country with chaos in a grab
for political power. They are telling the Australian people
that a democratically elected Government, a Government with a
secure majority in the House of Representatives, a Government
elected for a three year term, should hand over power half
way through its term simply because it suits the Opposition.
Could any self-respecting Prime Minister yield to such tactics?
What leader worth salt would give in to this sort of
blackmail? I certaily will not. The Government will not.
It's not Government which is blocking the use of
. your taxes. It's = ot -he Government which is threatening the
life and stability cf the nation. It's the Opposition in the
Senate. The House of Representatives has passed the Budget
Bills. Every Labcr Senator has voted for the Budget Bills.
Every Labor member of Parliament and every Labor Senator will
go on voting for these Money Bills until they are passed.
The Opposition Senators alone are holding them up. / 2
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We have to remember that at the Senate elections
in May last year Labor candidates polled 165,000 more votes
than the candidates of all other parties represented in the
Senate. We Were returned with 29 Senators the same number
as the Liberals and the Country Party. And there were two
Independents. No party has a Senate majority. Since then,
the Labor Senators have been reduced to 27, because two State
Premiers have flouted another great constitutional convention
that Senators should be replaced by a man or woman of the same
Party as the one elected by the people. The Senate motion to
block Supply would never have been carried but for the death
of Senator Milliner of Queensland. As Steele Hall put it in
another vivid phrase: " Let it be remembered that the Opposition
succeeded only because a Labor Senator died. They did it
over a dead man's corpse."
I ask the people of South Australia a State that
has consistently demonstrated its concern for democratic
principles and for the rights of elected Governments to
stand firm with me in resisting Mr Fraser's threat to democracy
and his threat to the nation's economy. The Budget must pass.
The Government must be allowed to govern. The nation and the
economy must go forward.