W. A. CONVENTION OF THE LIBERAL PARTY
AT SOUTH PERTH CIVIC CENTRE
JOTH JULY,-1962
Speech by the Prime Minister, Rt. Hon. R. G. Menzies
Mr. Chairman, Mr. Premier and Ladies and Gentlemen
I have really had quite a good day here. I
first of all went to have a talk with Mr. Brand one of
the great Premiers in the history of Australia ? Applause),
then I recorded a television appearance, and those of you
who haven't been through that misery, won't understand what
a misery it is ( Laughter) and that, ltm told will be on at
otclock tonight. Enough, no doubt, to undo whatever good
I may do tonight ( Laughter).
This afternoon, I went to the opening of a new
building; I went on strict conditions that this was my
afternoon off no speechmaking, but after I had arrived
there, I began to detect in the mind and the voice of the
Chairman a sort of hint that, with a little encouragement,
he would ask me to speak and I was resolutely determined not
to speak. Even a chattering fello.-w like myself needs t-Ime
off occasionally ( hear, hear), and just as we were reaching
the danger point His Excellency the Governor had spoken,
the Chairman of the Company had spoken, the Premier was in
midstream a note came into me that I was wanted on the
telephone, At first I thought this was the effort of a
zealous officer of mine ( because I have one or two who might
be so described), but when I went out it turned out that it
was the Prime Minister of New Zealand who wanted to have a
little natter to mel and I said " My dear Keith, I can't tell
you how glad I am to hear you. Laughter) When we have
discussed our business letts keep it going for a little
while" and we did. And so I was saved. ( Laughter)
Now, I said just then something about your Premier.
I'd like to say this. I know that there is a by-election.
There are always by-elections. There will be one for Kooyong
one of these days. ( Laughter) By-elections are terrible
things but on this by-election at Bunbury much will turn for
this State because to lose this by-election, would involve
the Premier of Western Australia in the most tremendous
political problem and I repeat what I said to you, we are all
very much inclined, and particularly in our own country, to
disregard the local product. " Oh, yes, he's quite good."
" Oh yes, he's not bad." " Oh yes I knew him at school." It
is a pity that Australians go outside their own bailiwick so
frequently to be recognised. Every time your Premier comes
to Canberra to a Loan Council Meeting, to a Premiers'
Conference I find myself saying to my colleagues " Isn't this
man absolutely first-class." I have never in my long experience
of office the longest outside South Australia ( Laughter) of
any man in Australia known a man to establish, time by time,
year by year, such repute and authority among the Premiers as
your Premier has. ( App), ause)
And, therefore Mr. Chairman, whatever comes or
goes'on the great issues that we discuss otherwise, I hope
that everybody in the Liberal Party in this State will do
whatever he can, directly or indirectly, sparing no effort to
see that the Brand Government continues to exist and to serve
this State, And, indeed, why shouldn't it? I almost give
up guessing, I've been a long time now too long -in this
c e* & e a/ 2
busiessand I never cease to marvel at how disposed people
are to say 11Oh yes, whatever is good we must take for
granted. Let us concentrate our minds on what we want, not
on what we have or what we have achieved."' This is a very
human falling. It is just as much as to say, " W1ell, Father
Christmas hasn't been here this year. He came along last
year rather handsomely." But when I look back over even the
last ' twelve months, and remember what has been done by Dave
Brand's Government and by my own in utter collaboration for
the development of this State, I marvel that anybody could
vote against him,
In fact, I will tell you a story about that. I
have a couple of sons who treat me with reasonable respect,
and I have a daughter who treats me with more than respect,
and before she was married, she travelled. around Ausuralia
with me on one of tl'ese grr'at campaigns, you know my wife,
my daughter and myself. We got back to Melbourne the night
before the poll and my daughter leaned against the mantelpiece
in the hotel sittingroom. and looked at me and said, " You know,
Dad, I don't understa. id how anybody could vote against you."
( laughter) I said, " Well, of course, darling, it's very nice
of you to put it that h. ay, but I'll. settle for fifty percent,,
plus one." ( Laughter) I want rather better than that for Mr. Brand,
14oulC. you all think about it, would you all work on it?
Because, really, it would be one of the ironies of political
history to have a Government that has done and is doing more
for this State than any other Government in its history, to
be put in any position of embarrassment over a by-election,
So it's your job. Everyone of you, directly or indirectly,
Now, Sir, I thought I would like to talk to you
as the Fede ral leader, about national policy, particularly
internal national policy. There are quite a few people to be
found who will say to you you know you have met a few of them;
have perhaps said it yourselves " Oh yes. The Liberal Party
stood for something. it has done great work, but what does it
stand for now. It can't live on the past." Now, this is
something that every political party that has had success must
face up to " What do you stand for now. Are you living on
the past?" It is just wlhen you have been in office for long
enoutog hve a reat record of positive results that your
opponents will be heard to say, " Yes, well., that's all right,
but what are they doing next year or the year after or the
year after," Then, with great gaiety, they begin to let
their imaginations loose on what they would do,
I notice that my friend and opponent, the Leader
of the Opposition, has been in the Northern Territory. Dear
me, what he's going to do ' or the Northern Territory after the
next election exceeds all the expectations of his prospective
Treasurer0 ( Laughter) But hevs announcing it0He doesn't
realise, of course, that in my own Cabinet, we have a Minister
who represents or administers the Northern Territory. That's
Paul Hasluck, And iJ. f I were to give you a ball to ball
description of how Paul Hasluck tr* ies to get the extra
œ C100 000, the extra half million, the extra million out of us
for he Northern Territory, you would be Jfascinated as listeners,
and shocked as taxpayers. ( Laughter) And Paul knows all
about it. Nobody has ever understood better the problems of
the Territories than hoe does, but it's so easy, when a Government
has been in office for a long time, for its opponents to say,
" Oh, well, thais is what we'tll do, and so on,," 0904066OS / 3
And, therefore, I thought I'd like to say something
to you tonight about Liberalism as a living force.
After all, as everybody knows, I had romething to do with
the establishment of the Liberal Party in Australia and
something to do with writing its first platform, and writing
its constitution, and something, I hope, to do with subsequent
achievements in the political world, I dontt regard
Liberalism as a fading force, I think we've run our trial
courses and that we are now at the beginning of the next
great chapter of achievement. But if we are, then we must
know, positively, what we stand for, Don't suppose that I
am going to make you a policy speech about half crowns, oi
five shillings or things, I want to know what it is we stand
for, what we believe in, what makes you come here, what makes
me come here, what makes the whole movement of Liberalism n
Australia a powerful force6 So let's ask ourselv-es what our
objectives are not yet achieved; far from it.
i think that above althings we want to build in
Australia a balanced and strong and progressive and civilised
nation in which advances are shared by all sections of the
people, Now you may say that's platitudinous, Perhaps it is.
There are many great passages in English that are platitudinous
and that, if you like, is a platitudeo But let's look at it.
A balanced nation. That is, a nation in which primary industry
and secondary industry and tertiary industry live side by side
and achieve a common, national purpose, And the moment you
say that you stand for a balanced nation, you are saying that
whatever is done there must be progress, productivity,
advancement for the man on the land, for the man in the factory,
for the man on the truck or the railway train. This is a
balanced community strong, progressive. I'll say something
more about that in a moments
And civilisedo There is a tremendous amount of
talk engaged in about economic problems; there is a great
amount of discussion about how much more money A gets or B
gets or C gets, 4We could easily become man fr many woman
for woman, the richest country in the Southern Hemisphere,
cut it won't matter very much unless we can say that we are
the most civilised country in the Southern Hemisphere,
Civilised because we understand the unselfish duties of
citizenship; civilised because we have come to understand
the importance of tho human being, the dignity of the human
being, the dignity of labour, the responsibility of riches,
These are the tests of civilisation, and our great task is
to produce a civilised nationo
The only supplement I would like to make to that
is that in our time, certainly in mirn there have been many
furious attempts made to build up class warfare in Australia.
We hear a lot about class distinctions. All the reactionary
forces in the country, and I refer particularly to the
socialists and the communists who are, of all people, the
most reactionary, always like to talk about class distinction,
the class war, in the classical phrases of the Communist Party
that you so well remember.
But I have, all my political life, believed that
there is one single, very g: reat, class distinction in Australia.
I insist on it. It's the distinction between people who work
and people who donet; between people who contribute to human
society and people who merely want to benefit from human
society, This is an enormous distinction; and if in the
language of the old Communist Manifesto, the phrase is,
" Workers of the world unite you have nothing to lose but
your chains," I say, " Yes. Worhkers of the world uniteo
That's what the Liberal Party believes ino" ( Applause) e0 0 0 a3 0 9 t
Iow Sir, the next thing that L want to say to
you is this. Here we are, we are a young nation, not
unknown around the world, sometimes credited with being
aggressive, sometimes accused of being noisy, but not unknown
around the world, and I am happy to say, in all material
quarters, respected around the world,, What we are engaged
in doing, what we must continue to be engaged in doing is t
build this young nation into a strong ans splendid heritage
and that cantt be achieved by people who acquire habits of
dependence. A Slight yawn " Wlhy doesn~ t the Government
( whatever that ieans) do something about it." You can't
build up an independent nation on a foundation of dependent
people. The spirit of independence, this fire that burns
in the veins of an independent nation must burn in the veins
of the individual, We cannot succumb to the ideas of our
opponents which, roughly, are that whatever good is to be
done must be done by the L-ystical being the Government.
This is, a matter for the individual; this is a matter which
calls for a spirit of adventure, a desire to contribute.
You know, it is a cant phrase, Sir, a cant phrase to talk
about private enterprise and every now and then, I will hear
people say, " Oh, of course, your Government is not as much
in favour of private enterprise as it ought to Not
infrequently when I hear somebody .3ay that, I come to discover
what he means, What he means is that his particular private
enterprise ought to be the nursling of the Government. He
doesn't want private enterprise really; he doesn't want
competition really; he wants to be protected from all the
winds that blow, In other words, that particular private
enterpriser has lost the spirit of adventure.
Have we? This is the crucial question for the
people of Australia, because our whole history has been a
history of adveonture sailing wherever ships could sail.
This island continent came out of the mists it was
developed by people who had the spirit of aiventure. it
has been found by people who had the spirit of adventure,
Wherever you go in Australia, you see all the memorials
not cairns of store, but the memorials in farms and stahions
and factories to the people who had the spirit of adventure.
And without that spirit of adventure, Australia can't become
by the turn of the century the great and powerful and respected
country to whose noises I would hope to listen from the grave.
It's the spirit of adventure and it is our task as
Liberals to foster it, not to foster the spirit of leaning
on governments but to say thiat if private enterprise means
what we think it means, it must be prepared to accept risks,
take chances, go forward.
Now, Sir, all that is by way of preliminary. I
just want to elaborate that a little tonight by saying something
t'Vo you about what, in material terms, might be regarded as
our problems. And the first of them is to increase the population
of this country, I think that when at the and of 19&+ 9 we
came back into office, full of adventure, full of hope? full
of' thought, the population of Australia was about 7_ 2 million
and, 9 today it's 1bJ million. There are three million more
people in kustralia than when I went and took my oath of
office at Government House only a few years ago. And we
must do this. We know, do~ t we, what a pressure there is
co 00000
in the world great populations in Asia, China itself, which
may very well have by the turn of the ' entury, a thousand
million people " suckled in a creed outworn", if you like,
still perhaps under the authority of Communism a thousand
millions. If we, in Australia are to enjoy and defend our
heritage, we can't afford to have 10i or 11 million people
at the turn of the century. We must have our 25 or 30 or
whatever it may be,, And this means that we must do whatever
we can in this country to maintain the flow of immigrarts
and that's not as easy as it looks, because you have fluctuations
in the economy from time to time and there will always
be people to be heard to say, " Well, you must cut down on
Immigration or you must abolish immigra-t'ion,." We irust have
people coming into Australia or we will oerish,
I know about the proble.-. is of ipmigratior, not all
about themi but I know a good deal about them and the
pressures they make on resources and the impact that they
make on the general problems of inflation in the country,
but I am a convinced believer in imnmigration, because I
believe that unless we can go on as we have been going on
in Australia, increasing our population by importation and.
by natural increase inside our own country by about 2 a
year, thun we are going to be in a position in ten years'
time, in fifteen years' time in which thie onlooking world
will not tolerate our ownership of our trusts.
That means, you know, that-. occasionally we ought to
think about our grandchildren; not as rather nice little
creatures, or naughty little creatures or dampening little
creatures you know, all grandparents will understand what
I mean ( Laughter), We musn't think of them entirely in
that sense; we must think of them as those who, as the men
and women of their -ace, will be standing responsible for
Australia in their day, and there can't be too many of them.
Therefore, to build up the population is a great and primary
task. But you canft build up the population, Sir, in that
handsome fashion and, at the same time, ignore the responsibility
of providing proper employmaent for the people who live
hero. Not only proper employment of human beings, though
that is of supreme importance, but proper employment of the
material resources of the nation. And, therefore, our
second great task is to maintain full employment of manpower
and material resources.
Now so far, I suppose everybod~ y would say to me,
" Yes, that~ s quite right. No difficulty in agreeing -to
those things. Why labour them? They are two riat-ters;
they are commonplace." Yes, I suppose they are I hope
they are. But side by side with these matters we have, and
particularly as a Government a profound responsibility to
restrain the destruction of the currency, -to restrain inflation,
to maintain economic stability. Now, the moment I come to
that point because all the pressures of the first two
propositions tend in the direction of inflation the moment
i say, " But, at the same time, we must restrain inflation,"
and I mention the word " stability" somaebody is bound to say,
" Oh, IYes, there you are, you see. That's what's wrong with
this Govirnment. It believes in stagnation." There is not
much evidence, is there, in the last eleven years of the
stagnation that we have produced? Not much. But today, they
say, " Stability? Wel'l, that means Stagnation." oe, ./ 6
Now, I'll come back to that because this is crucial
to my argument, We have had for the last eighteen months,
pursuant to policies for which we have, or some of us,
been roundly abused, we have had, in Australia, for eighteen
months, complete stability in the consumer price level.
How many people really worry about inflation? I do,
There must be a lot of people here tonight who do, who
know that if their incomes are fixed by any method. at alJ.,
then to have the value running out of their fixed income
is a cruel, heartless tax on them. Of course, people of
responsibility don't w" nt inflation. Gamblers do, becauce
they can chase the market, But do you? Do you want
inflation? It isn't stagnation o The fact is that for the last eightEen
months we have had a steady level of prices-for the lasu
eighteen months in consequence, we have had the most marvellous
flow of capital into Australia for investment. " Here is a
country that is stable, here is a country that is not afraid
to take the measures designed to check inflation." I have
had these things said to me abroad by some of the shrewdest
financial people in the world who inspire their clients to
put their money into Australia,, They say, " You've got a
government there that isn't afriad to take steps to restrain
inflation, to produce stability in the currency. And when
somebody says to me stability means stagnation, all I want
to say is that this is an utter abuse of language, I was
thinking of it this afternoon when I went to the opening of
this big building in the city, If somebody had said, " Oh,
this building is no good because the foundations are stable,"
everybody would have laughed. They would have said, " Well,
that's today's funny story." It might have got into a gossip
column, for all I know. ( Laughter)
These are equally important a building in the city
of Perth and the building of this nation, the building of the
mansions in which we want our grandchildren to live,
Stability and strength, In case somebody wants to tell
you once more that your Government in the Commonwealth has
confused stability with stagnation, I would like to remind
you that in this very period in which we are accused of this
negative, stagnant attitude towards public affairs, we have,
in conjunction with State Governments, accepted a share of
responsibility, and a very large share for probably the
greatest developmental programme in the history of Australia,
( Applause) Speaking in Perth, I wontt take you on a tour of
the horizon to all the other States, though I very well
could. I will just talk about your own, here. In this
period of stagnancy, what has happened.? We have agreed,
and put in hand, ana it is now being pursued with great
vigour, a standard gauge railway line from Kalgoorlie to
Kwianna; we have agreed upon the development, organised
by your own Government, of a great iron and stool industry,
We look around us and we see bauxite, alumina; we look
further up, and we see the most remarkable developments of
iron ore, with pert development, with roads in the Northe
Look, Dave Brand could give you a much fuller account of it
than I could, but he would be the first to say that my own
stagnant Government has played along on these matters with
immense vigour and the result is that whatever comes or goes,
the State of West Australia is at the very beginning of its
greatest period of development in its historyo ( Hear, hear)
( Applause) o 0ooo . oo / 7
I wonder if I might without wearying you tell you
a little private recollection of mine, When I was first
Prime Minister, which is beyond the memory, I hope, of some
of you who are here tonight, one of my Ministers was Herbert
Collett a West Australian Senator and a great man, a
splendid person, and I was chatting with him one night and
I said, " Herbert, were you born in the West?" He was then
fairly venerable, about the same age as I am now. ( Laughter)
This is a long time ago, I said, " Were you born in che West?"
and he said, " No my family went there when I was about seven
or eight." And I said " What was the population of the ! Jest
then?" He said, ' 36,000 people."
Somebody said this afternoon, no doubt with that
truthfulness that characterises West Australians, tbat the
population now is about three-quarters of a millioi. Think
of it, At the very time that he and I were speaking, the
population was over half a million from 36,000 to over
half a million and this seemed to me to be the most phenomenal
development that you could imagine in a community, I want to
say to you, it's nothing to what is going to happen in the
next fifteen or twenty years. You may say to me, " Well,
fifteen or twenty years, old boy, you won't be here." Neither
I will be, that's quite true, I am happy to say ( Laughter) but
it is going to be true, it is going to be true, and I do hope
that all Liberals throughout this period will keep on emphasising
that it is because we want this kind of thing to be true
that we believe that we serve the best interests of the people
of Australia. The people who talk about stagnation in a period of
the greatest fertility in development in Australian history
are preferring a slogan to the truth and I beg of you to
answer them,
Now there is one other matter that I want to mention
to you. If we are to have a large migration programme, if
we are to build up our population, if we are to have the
fullest employment of our resources, of men and materials,
if we are to have the greatest outlook on the development of
the resources of the nation, then there are one cr two other
things that we must have, and one of them is a growing
manufacture because, with all the good will in the world,
any man on the land will agree that the rural industries are
not going to atcract migrants. As they become more and
more mechanised, as they become more and more improved
scientifically in productivity, the chances are all against
them being able to absorb thousands of new citizens. I
understand that. That is true. Therefore, if we are to
bring into Australia large numbers of imrmigrants we must
look at the manufacturing industries and at the tertiary
industries to help us to fulfil the condition of full employment.
Now that is a very simple conception. It is true,
we believe in it, We stand for ito But it contains onn
great danger. We must guard against ito If we are going to
develop our manufacturing industries as we must, and as we
should, if we are going to encourage them as we must and we
should, to export some of their products to the rest of the
world, we must never lose sight of the fact that today and
for many years to come, the primary industries of Australia
provide the backbone of our export income and therefore
provide a good deal of those imports upon which manufacturing
in Australia will depend, ( Applause) 000o..../ 8
8.
Therefore, Sir, every time I think about this matter,
every time I speak about this matter as a Liberal and a
leader of the Liberal Party, I keep reminding myself and
those who are good enough to listen to me, that whatever
we do we must do a great deal to develop these other
industries, vastly important for full employment, and
therefore to population growth and therefore to national
strength and national security, The argument is unanswerable.
Whatever we do about that, we must remember that the costs
of production in the rural industries are more important
than perhaps they are in any others. Because if you have
a local industry and its costs go up well, it has its
local list of customers and if their wages go up they can
pay the increased price. It's rather a sort of homely
affair, But the woolgrower gets what the world will pay
him. The wheatgrower, subject to certain limitations, will
get what the world vill -ay him. The grower of meat also
you can run the whole gamut of primary industry. The
essential thing from their point of view is that they should
not be costed out of their market.
And how are we to achieve that? This is where the
Liberal Party has a great task, a great task. How are we
to achieve that? We are not going to achieve it by crying
down manufacturing because I think without an increase in
manufacture in Australia, steadily growing, year by year,
our population will not grow year by year. We are not going
to do it by fine words, we are not going to do it by taking
the world by the throat and telling the world that it ought
to pay more for what we grow. We have to do it by attacking
the problem of rural costs, and in order to do that, we
encounter not just some simple problem of subsidy but a
basic problem of bringing to the service of the man on the
land, whether he is a grazier, a sheep man, a cattle man
or a wheatfarmer or a dairyfarmer or whatever it may be, the
latest results of scientific researcho We must have more
scientific research, we must build up the activities of
people like C. S. I. R. O and so on and above all things, we
must get a common understanding between Commonwealth and
States that the results of research must go in the quickest
possible time to the man on the land. They must travel
from the laboratory to the farm much more rapidly than
they ever have before. And if they do, we will find the
most remarkable results.
I am not one of those statistical fellows who come
around with reams of figures because, although they are
fascinating, I've often found that nobody listens to them,
and therefore I am not imposing them on you. But I will
safely say this, in the broad, that one of the great features
of the last few years in Australia has been the increased
productivity of rural industries, not arising from increased
employment because, on the whole there may have been a
fall in employment but increased productivity, increased
efficiency. And here is a point of time at which governmonts
and private enterprise can meet together.
I still have a few friends and I like to see them
who are on the land ( Laughter) who are sheep men or whatever
it may be. I am always fascinated to find that at a time
when our opponents like to represent the sheep man, for
example, as a rather idle fellow who goes down to the
Melbourne Cup you know and buys a bottle of indifferent
champagne and all that kind of nonsense, I an fascinated
to find that I never encounter one of then on his own
property who isn't at some pains to tell me how much he has
0o0e o / 9
9.
been able to build up the weight of fleece in his flocks,
how delighted he is to know how he his been able to increase
the carrying capacity of his land by the improvement of
pastures these are men who believe in enterprise, They're
men who know that while they don't mind earning some money;
of course, who does they know that their own country in
which they have a considerable stake will depend on The
skill, the scientific effort that they put into the problems
of production, Now, Si, this is not merely a matter for tLemo
This is where we come in, Tonight, standing here I can
see an old friend of mine the distinguished Minister for
Agric-iu. tw. e in the State of Victoria,, He has been over
here on a conference. He knows, I donst need to persuade
him, and all his colleagues around Auscralia know, that this
is one of the great proLlems to have more and more
scientific efforto ( Between you and me, and I wouldn't like
to have it quoted against me, I grudge all. this stuff vp in
the air). I want more and more scientific effort in
increasing the productivity of the land, the capacity of
Australia to sustain a cost level by making it spread over
a far greater area of production,,
This is our great hope. This is the great tasko
I dontthink our opponents have ever thought of ito To
them, costs are nothing, There is nothing in costs to
them that can't be made up by an extra tariff or by an
extra subsidy or something, or an extra tax, But for
Liberalism, which believes in Australia, for Liberalism
which knows that it is on the productivity of our o. n
country and our capacity to sell what we produce to the
rest of the world that tie whole of our economic future
depends, this is a different problemo Keep down the
costs of rural industries, increase the efficiency,
increase extension services, do all these things, so that
we may extend our secondary industries increase our
population and come, in twenty years' time, to a state
of affairs in which somebody will look around and say,
" This is wonderful, the population of this country is
twenty odd million, the position in this country is that
we still maintain our position as remarkable exporters to
the rest of the world, we still retain our position of
being a country in which the man on the land can survive
and grow and prosper and maintain our position as being,
perhaps, the greatest manufacturing and export manufacturing
country in the Southern Hemisphere" This is a good dream,
isn't it? And it is not merely a dream, it can be made to
come true, It can be made to come true if we, as Liberals,
do not allow ourselves to be beguiled by silly people who
tell us that Liberalism has Pecome stagnant, that it's all
over, that it is about time to give the other boys a go,
These pseudo-Liberals who whistle in your ear some of them
from very well-appointed offices, forget about them. You
don't suppose do you, for a moment, that we would be
exercising such miserable talents as we have in the service
of this country as Liberals unless we had something to
believe in? Not to make too fine a point of it, I have
been Prime Minister, in my second manifestation now, for
twelve and a half years, You don't suppose, do you that
I had some fascinated interest in creating a record? I
would like, very much, to have a little private life, Most
of you have I have none. But I am here, I hope you're
here, because I believe in things, on behalf of my country
and am determined to do every last thing that I have in
me to achieve themo