PRIME MINISTER
EMAICOED UNTIL DELIVERY ( 8.30 PM, 19 MARCH 1992)
ADDRESS BY Tffl PRIME MINISTER, THE HON P J KEATING, MP
PRIME MINISTERIAL WOMEN AND SPORTS AWARDS
THE REGENT MELBOURNE
Thank you very much. It's my great pleasure to be here.
You will have probably heard me say on the odd occasion that
I want to see Australia become more competitive in the
world. It has been one of my ruling passions for the past decade.
More recently you may have heard me utter the words " One
Nation" this is -set to become a ruling passion for the
next decade.
Competitiveness is an essential part of the concept behind
One Nation.
Early in the statement you can read the following.
" The Keating government's goal is an internationally
competitive economy that continually strives for world best
performance and provides equal opportunities for all Its
citizens one nation, co-operating at home and winning
abroad". Read in one context, you might take this to mean that I am
about to give you another one of those boring economic
speeches. And shudder. Or yawn.
. aut I-ask you-to read those words in the context of this
gathering tonig.; ht.'
The values we are honouring tonight are those of
competition. rhey, are also the values of participation and
equity. Tonight we are paying tribute to people whose personal
ambition and personal effort lifts the national ambition and
the national efEfort.
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These awards are a measure of the value of the competitive
spirit. But the value of participation is equally reflected.
For the achievements we honour here tonight, it has to be
said, have bee~ n made against the odds.
Take the Olympics.
The Olympic hockey competition which the Australian women's
team won in Seoul was only the second to be held.
The women's marathon was not introduced until 1984. The
men's was first run in 490 BC1
Unfortunately we can't blame it all on the International
Olympic Committee.
Of the 76 national sporting organisations in Australia, only
14 have women in the top administrative position.
Of the 6.5 million members of sporting organisations in
Australia only a quarter are women.
It has to be said, therefore, that to some extent our women
athletes have -cone it against the odds.
Their achievements, of course, are outstanding.
For a very long time Australian women athletes have been at
the absolute pinnacle of international sport.
Their successes are measures of ourselves of our
confidence, of our' values. They are cultural measures.
Sport is one area where women can be numbered among the
Australian lege~ nds I mean the likes of MarJorie Jackson,
Heather McKay, Dawn Fraser, Betty Cuthbert, Evonne
Goolagong, Shane Gould. These names mean more than sporting
success: each of them stands for character for something
which we identify as Australian.
The list, of course, is much longer than that.
And it should be said that any list of Australian sporting
greats would have to include the hockey team, who recently
-beat . the Geirmans, the cricket -team who beat the English, and
the netball team wh~ o beat New Zealand in one of the great
sports highlights of last year.
Now a government cannot make people competitive we cannot
insist that our athletes become the best in the world, any
more than we can insist that Australian companies become the
best in the world.
But we can do a lot to create the conditions which will give
us the best chance.
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That's what wet're doing with the economy and the industrial
culture. That's what we want to do with sport.
We want to broaden the base of the pyramid.
That means giving every Australian, regardless of gender,
every opportunity to participate in sporting activities.
There is no better way to increase the numbers who reach the
top no better way to increase the chances for women to
realise their highest ambitions.
But it will be Just as important for those women and men
whose sporting ambitions are more modest.
I mean those who want to play sport at anW level of
expertise or exertion and I am not merely thinking of my
own tennis those who want to play sport for its social and
recreational value.
Beyond all this, of course, lie the physical, communal and
spiritual values which every nation needs and which sport is
uniquely capable of supplying.
We should remember that, when we exclude women in any way at
all from sport, we exclude them from sharing in the
expression of -those values and, what is more important,
from shaping them.
The idea of One Nation is the idea of inclusion.
The idea of closing gaps between places and people. Of
building partnerships. Of making the most of all our
resources and Australian women surely number among the
greatest of thom.
In sport, as in every other aspect of our national life, it
is our intention to lower the drawbridge and let all
Australians in.,
There is more 1to do there nearly always is but in a
number of ways, from broad social and economic reforms, to
specific programs like the Women's Sport in Media project,
the Gender Equity Guidelines and the Active Girls campaign,
mo~ nrore women are finding the! r -aif ntth e niaional
life, including the sporting life of Australia.
In this the efforts of my colleagues, Roe Kelly and Wendy
Fatin, should riot go unacknowledged. Both have been and will
continue to be great contributors, great encouragers great
at creating opportunities and openings.
By recognising those individuals and corporations who
encourage women in sport, and who create the opportunities,
these awards play their part in the goals of excellence and
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participation which is in essence the goal of national
growth. I said that we want to see partnerships: tonight we see them
between government and corporate sponsors, between
community, medlia and sporting organisations, between men and
women. I want to thanxk and congratulate all those who have played
such constructive parts in women's sport, and take this
opportunity to express the hope that these awards will
rapidly come to play their part in advancing the cause.
ENDS