VISIT TO SOUTH EAST ASIA 1968
KUALA LUMPUR
Speech by the Prime Minister, Mr. John Gorton
at State Dinner given by Tunku Abdul Rahman 12 JUNE 1968
Prime Minister, Mr. Holyoake, Your Excellencies, Distinguished Guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen:
The first thing that I must do, Prime Minister, is to express to you my
thanks, very sincere thanks, for your having extended to my wife and I the
invitation to visit your country. And to say that, during the course of that visit,
you have extended to me many kindnesses which I shall remember as long as
I have breath, You did this morning an honour to my country, through me, by allowing
me to enter your House of Parliament, and by the things you said about my
country, remarks which were seconded by the Leader of the Opposition in that
House. The fact that I was the first Australian Prime Minister to enter your
House of Parliarent, and be so treated is perhaps an indication of how much
closer together wV-e have been getting, and perhaps an indication of how much
closer yet we may get in the future.
The ties betw., een Malaysia and Australia, and particularly that part of
Malaysia which I shall call Malaya, and Australia, go backIC a long while, but
they were in the beginning quite tenuous. The people of my country knew little
of the people of yours and I expect that the people of your country knew little of
mine. But a little more than a quarter of a century ago, those ties began to mean
something rather more real when together, you and we, and New Zealand, Great
Britain and other nations attempted to stem the tide of conquest then sweeping
down the Malayan Peninsular. That, I think, gave to thousands of Australians a
clearer knowledge of this country and of those who live in it. And, since that
time, the inter-flow of the thousands of visitors of -which you spoke, the great
enrichment of our own country by the students who have come in such large numbers
from Malaya, the closer economic co-operation between Malaya and ourselves,
the requirements to use force in order to resist at first an emergency and then a
confrontation, have all strengthened those ties of which you spok e.
Prime Minister, they are not now just ties between Prime Ministers;
now, are they ties between governments or the policies of governments. I
believe that they are now ties between the peoples of my country and of yours
and, I think, that they will grow still more in strength as the years go by. I
don't know, Sir, what the future holds, for none of us have a crystal ball. Vie
have for some time been engaged in joint attempts to safeguard the stability, the
security and the progress of this area but now a change has come and some of
those who are engaged in these attempts may or may not be engaged in them in
the future, or at least not in the same way. And this, of course, has been the
theme of the initial Five Power talks just concluded.
3ut I would hope, Sir, one m~ uld not put one's trust for security in such
things as the w, alls to which you referred which the Romans built ; when they
quitted Britain because, if I remember subsequent events correctly, they were
of no use whatever in preventing the Scots from completely subjugating Britain
and indeed I think New Zealand. But one doesn't of course put one's trust in
such things: rather does one put it in that common pur pose which you have
expressed a common purpose to seek by such means as each of us are able
to spare, the security of an area which is necessary if the peoples of that area
are to progress and get a better standard of living. Rather does one put one' s
trust in a common outlook recognising that security, and progress, are best
secured by those kind of democratic processes, which you put into practice
here and we put into practice in Australia. These are the ties that bind, these
are the objectives in common.
And until that time comes when the motto of the United Nations is
translated into that motto being " They shall beat their swords into ploughshares"-
until that time comes, and it has not come yet, then there will need to be
co-operation for security, and, under that shield, co-operation for progress.
And because I think, as I said, that the people of my country are interested in
the people of yours, and of neighbouring countries, I have high hopes that both
our nations will be able to progress, behind the shield of security, to a future
of even greater security, because the future rests on the will of the peoples and
the standards of living which we will be able to achieve for them.
Ladies and gentlemen, would you join me in a toast to the Prime
Minister of Mal ay sia.