PRIME~ MINISTR
CHECK AGAINST DE3LIVERY EMBARGOED UNTIL DELIVERY
SPEECH BY THE PRIME MINISTER
" OUR FOURTH ANNIVERSARY"
BATHURST 8 MARCH 1987
Fellow members and supporters of the Australian Labor Party,
Cabinet and Parliamentary colleagues, Friends:
Last Thursday we passed an historic milestone in the great
march of the Australian Labor Party and the Australian Labor
Movement the fourth anniversary of our government's
election on 5 march, 1983.
For four years now this Government has proudly represented
the par! ty, served the people, and built the nation.
We have shared those tasks with Labor Governments in four
Australian States.
Never L-efore in the long history of our party spanning
nearly a century have so many voters in so many parts of
the country elected and re-elected so many Labor Governments
to office.
So it is fitting that we should take a brief moment to
celebrate these historic achievements.
And especially, I want to pay my tribute to the thousands
upon thousands of our fellow Australians, the Labor men and
women, w'. ose work and support, whose faith and loyalty and
firmness of purpose have made it all possible.
And it is absolutely fitting that we should do so, here in.
Bathurst the place forever associated with the name of
Chifley and with all he stood for and fought for, all he
represented for Australia.
We are celebrating not just the victory of a party.
We are celebrating a victory for the people of Australia.
we are celebrating the successful fight we waged for the
very heart and soul of this nation, four years ago.
2.
But the note I wish to sound tonight is not one of
self-congratulation, and certainly not one Of com~ placency.
Rather, it is a note of urgency a deep sense of the urgent
demando the future of Australia makes upon us, as a party,
as a mcvement, a government, a nation.
Four years ago we brought to office a determination to buildi
reforms that would endure, create growth that could be
sustain~ ed, promote genuine equality of opportunity.
And I believe we have been, and are being, successful in
fulfilling those promises.
By any standards, those four years have been difficult ones
for a Fceral Government and we have never disguised those
difficulties from the Australian people.
The legjacy bequeathed to the nation by Malcolm Fraser and
his Treasurer John Howard was scarcely a rich one.
They bequeathed an almost tangible pall * of gloom over the
country, a gloom created by lengthening dole queues,
continuing business failures, racking confrontations in our
work places, economic mismanagement, double digit inflation
in sum, the worst recession this nation had endured in
years. our first task was to reverse that recession. This we did.
we restored growth and revived employment throughout the
nation. But we then had to face a new and even greater crisis. A
sudden collapse in commodity prices meant that our
tradition~ al primary exports our wool, our wheat, our meat,
our dairy products, our sugar, our minerals were no longer
bringing the prices on which we had confidently relied in
the past.
The fact * is, that collapse slashed $ 6 billion off our
nationa~ l income the equivalent of $ 1500 for every
Australian family.
our livin~ g standards have been pushed down.
only by restructuring the economy, by creating a more
competitive and productive attitude within the Australian
community, can we restore our nation to the prosperity we
seek for ourselves and our children.
That means breaking our cycle of dependence on those
agricu-. tural and mineral commodities whose prices have
fallen so sharply; reorienting our economy to look outwards;
exporting; competing; paying our way.
This is the only sure way towards lower unemployment and
higher living standards.
That hard fact sets the stage for the Government of
Australia for the remainder of the 1980s and beyond.
So this government has initiated the most sweeping reform of
Australi., s economy in the history of our nation.
in the L1ezms of the pledge we made to the people four years
ago, we have effected national reconciliation. We have
generatoc6 national recovery. We are now achieving national
reconstruction.
And we are doing it within the context of the great Labor
tradition the application of Labor principles and Labor
aspirations to the demands of present challenges.
It has been our task, and our achievement, to undertake the
task of reconstruction while also protecting the essential
welfare of the disadvantaged, the battlers, and the ordinary
men and viomen of Australia.
Let tha. z., he no doubt about the contrast. This Government
has sta-ted the long task of reconstruction and has
distributed the burden of hardship fairly and
compassionately. The opposition parties, with their
spurioui ; and reckless promises, have made it clear they not
only can.-iut provide the answers but cannot even comprehend
the prow ) em
So don't . et us have any of this nonsense that we are not a
real LabDor Government.
Don't jucw. e me or my government by whether we have blindly
adhered to the standards of the past or uncritically
observed the shibboleths of the past.
Judge u by our ability to take our inherited principles and
breathe nsew life into them, applying them anew to the task
we face today.
Let me show you in detail how we have done that.
Through the Accord, the industrial and political elements of
the Labo: movement have forged anew their traditional links
not just to protect the interests of working people but to
advance the task of cooperatively building a better future
for Australia.
The rewi-rd has been clear: we have created three quarters
of a mil. lion new jobs in our first four years the highest
rate of crployment growth in Australia's history and we
have halved the number of industrial disputes.
Like previous Labor governments, it has been our achievement
to fulfil to the maximum extent we could, our historic
responsibilities to the underprivileged.
We have wcrked to help the poor, protect the battler, and
ensure that the elderly and people with disabilities and the
sick are well cared for.
We have . iade the taxation system faitrr and more efficient
than it eve-r was under the Fraser-Howprd years.
income tEax rates have fallen and will fall further. Rorts
open to t. Ac privileged few the free lunches, the company
cars and the tax-free capital gains have been closed off.
Young people are staying at school longer, learning the
skills they need to play their role in the workplace of the
future. Whlen we came to office, only 36% of school kids
stayed on to year 12 by the end of this year more than
will. Health care is now available to nearly two million
AustralianG who were previously without insurance, thanks to
our restoration and improvement of Medicare.
In addition to our range of existing rural programs, we are
providin( I $ 150 million in assistance to farmers, who though
they are the most efficient in the world, have been hit
especially hard by the collapse in our commodity prices. In
every appropriate international forum we are pushing for an
end to the insanities of American and European protectionism
which are squeezing us in our traditional markets.
We have spent more on public housing than any other
Government a 42 per cent real increase.
We have introduced sex discrimination legislation and
affirmative action legislation which for the first time
guarantee a fair go for women in the workforce.
we have provided more child care places than any other
Government since Federation. By June next year we will be
funding 106,000 of them, compared with just 46,000 when we
came to office.
We have established new levels of care for the vast majority
of aged people who wish to stay in their homes rather than
entering an institution.
we have stopped millionaires from getting the pension. We
have lifted the pension by more than 6 per cent in real
terms; the conservatives managed a meagre 1 1/ 2 per cent
increase over their entire seven years in office.
We have acted decisively to protect the environment. we
stopped the Franklin Dam. We are protecting environmentally
valuable forests in Tasmania while exploring alternatives to
logging them. We are legislating against mining in the
existing frakadu national park. We have nominated Stage 2 of
the Park for the World Heritage List and are adding large
areas to the Park.
We have restored a proper sense of independence and
self-respect to the conduct of Australia's foreign policy.
Without seeking to exaggerate the importance of our
influence, we have sought where we can to ease tension,
encourage dialogue, promote disarmament, discourage
violence. We have involved ourselves constructively in the great
issues confronting the world and our region.
We havi do-voted unprecedented effort to the practical
pursuit o. l peace and disarmament, both in our dealing with
the superpowers, and in our own region, where we took the
lead in creating the South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Treaty.
Australia nias become one of the first independent sovereign
countries in the world to make a commitment by national
legislation never to acquire nuclear weapons.
We have taken the lead in the Commonwealth to fight for
democracy and justice in South Africa against the evil of
aparthei6.
We stand vith our South Pacific neighbours in favour of
decolonisation in New Caledonia.
in recoun~ ting this record of achievement, I do not seek to
deny therse have been hardships along the way.
Because ol' the acute economic problems we are going through,
some peop> a have had to do with less than they might have
expected. Aged pensioners have taken a delay in the
increase ol? their pensions; home buyers have had to endure
high inter2Gt rates; some groups legitimately seeking
government assistance have been given a ' no' or at least a
' not yet'.
But this has to be understood clearly: without wage
restraint, without a smaller budget deficit, without
temporarily higher interest rates, we could not have made
the progress we have-in reforming the Australian economy,
making it more resilient, and putting us back on the road to
prosperity. The need to make further spending cuts in a May Statement
demonstrates that we remain committed to achieving a still
lower deficit.
And let me make a further comment about interest rates.
No politician in his right mind wants interest rates a point
of a per cent higjher than absolutely necessary because
high interest rates do cause difficulties for farmers, small
business~' en, home buyers the whole community.
But, at present, interest rates have to be held at their
current level to support the dollar. They cannot be lowered
without the certainty of losing the exchange rate,
dramatically higher interest rates and higher inflation. I
assure you interest rates will begin to come down the moment
economic circumstances permit. No sane government could
have any other objective.
The simple fact is this: the sacrifices the community has
borne during these difficult economic times would have been
more onerous, indeed they would have crippled the long term
health of the nation, had our opponents been in charge.
Nor would they have endeavoured to share with fairness the
burdens of restraint, as we have ensured they are shared.
They claim to stand for the Australian family.
But in 18 out of the last 20 National wage Cases they have
urged a wage freeze.
How can they protect the family with a policy of pure and
simple wage freeze? How can they protect the family by
totally lifting the lid on prices with the abolition of the
Prices Su : veillance Authority?
How is the-welfare of the family advanced by their
commitment to renew for the exclusive use of the privileged
few all the tax lurks and perks which we have eliminated?
And the real consequences of their tax proposals could only
devastate the families of Australia.
If the conservatives again dismantled Medicare, they would
set the average Australian fanily back some $ 15 a week.
So their promise to help Australian families is empty. They
pretend to offer huge tax cuts, but those supposed cuts are
so spurious, they could only be paid for by bigger deficits
or drastic cuts in Government services.
As for the National Party, whether, I stress, led by Ian
Sinclair or Joh Bjelke-Petersen, what does it stand for?
Environmental vandalism. Cronyism. Perversion of one vote
one value elections. Racism at home. Friendship with the
racists in South Africa. Free enterprise rhetoric cloaking
massive intervention on behalf of greedy vested interests.
Now, my friends, I suppose we are entitled, as Labor men and
women, to take a passing pleasure in the disarray of our
political opponents in the way they have unleashed upon
themselves the forces of division they want to unleash upon
Australia. But looking deeper, we must take urgent warning from this
spectacle, as Australians, passionately concerned about the
future of Australia.
For there is more to this than their squalid brawling.
What is ha~ pening on the other side of politics today is an
attempt to revive the kind of Australian politics the people
of Australia rejected so decisively four years ago.
7.
In our election campaign in 1983, we asked the people of
Australia to set their face against the politics of division
and of confrontation.
They did so then, and equally clearly, they did so again in
1984. Yet what the conservatives now propose for Australia is
precisely a return to divisiveness and confrontation the
setting of Australian against Australian.
The factions which make up the non-Labor forces want to tear
Australia a-, art, hoping in the process to pick up some of
the pieces, from the wreckage to satisfy their pe-rsonal
ambition or their collective and individual greed.
And the strategy behind it all is very clear: to use the
individual and sectional discontents inseparable from times
as complex and difficult as these, to exploit the anxieties
of the groups which make up the fabric of this society, and
to stitch together a temporary coalition of fear and greed.
But I deeply believe the whole strategy is based on a
gigantic :-iiicalculation.
It is one 4-ing to hi-jack the National Party -and they
have done that.
it is one thing to hi-jack the Liberal Party -and they are
more than half way to doing that.
It is one thing to hi-jack the coalition and they have
certainly done that.
But nobody however rich and powerful their hidden backers
can hi-jack Australia.
Because Australia has an unbeatable weapon against what
Howard himself has called " this political terrorism"
It is the greatest weapon of all, in defence of democracy,
in defence of stability, in defence of sanity, in defence of
all the freadoms and decencies of the Australian way of
life. It is the matchless weapon of the commonsense, the
intelligenca and maturity of the Australian people.
And I will back this commonsense against all the armoury of
deceit and irrationality, that could ever be brought to bear
against us.
So much for the Liberal-National coalition. Not liberal,
never national, and no longer a coalition.
Contrast all that with the great Australian Labor Party.
8.
Where th(! y are desperately divided we are in fundamintal
unity ibove all, united on the correct course for
Australiii In the years ahead.
Where thoy squabble over who should lead them and what
directiou they should travel, we provide a strong, united,
competen'-. znd decisive team.
Where they are in barren opposition we shoulder the broad
national responsibilities of government.
They stane for the deliberate creation of conflict. We
stand fo:-the resolution of conflict.
They opt for the short cut. We run the whole race.
As the el~ ection draws closer, one thing will emerge with
stark claL-ity for the overwhelming majority of the
Australii. n people, day by day.
And it iG the most basic fact of Parliamentary democracy
itself simply, that the purpose of an election is to elect
a Governnernt that can govern.
But to makco that choice properly, the people have to know
exactly ' zhat the competing policies are and exactly who will
implement them after the election.
And whatover may emerge from all this turmoil, only one
thing is certain.
This Opposition, in whatever form it emerges, whatever
combinat:. ori of incompetencies is stitched together, will be
totally '. ncapable of offering the people a government.
Because, La~ dies and gentlemen, a government is not just a
gaggle oZ snake oil merchants, three or four of whom think
it's about time they had a go at being Prime Minister.
It involves the highest responsibilities that Australian men
and women can ever seek to undertake.
It demand-s discipline and a profound sense of responsibility
for the ael~ fare of all sections of the Australian community.
It demands clear, coherent and consistent policies. it
demands A high degree of party unity. And it demands at the
very least, a moderate degree of mutual goodwill and common
purpose amnong colleagues.
But not one of tfrese minimum requirements for government in
Australia can ever be met by this Opposition.
So ladies and gentlemen,
As we mark our Government's Fourth Anniversary, we are
entitled to take pride in our achievement.
7-9.
We offer stability, we offer unity, we offer competence, we
offer co-operation, we offer leadership.
In these times of enormous challenge we offer a strategy for,
the futuic~ and we offer a vision for the future.
There are four elements to that strategy.
The first of these is the continued effort to restructure
our econom-y to make it world-competitive and
outwa rd-look ing.
Certainly, the great agricultural and mining industries
which unkrpinned our prosperity in the past will remain as
engines of growth. But, they must be supplemented by new
exports. We must learn to develop a more competitive
attitude towards production. We must find new markets. We
must learn to pay our way again.
We are only part way along what will be a long road back to
prosperity. As we approach the 1990s we must ensure that
the start we have made along this road is-not wasted by an
opposition whose inability and irrelevance is so clearly
demonstrated both at the level of leadership and in the
generation of realistic policies.
Second, given the decline in our national income, we will
continue to ensure that where sacrifices are necessary,
their burden will be shared with fairness and where gains
can be made, their benefits will be passed on, with
fairness, to the whole community.
Where the false prophets of the conservative parties offer
Australian workers the immediate prospect of a wage freeze,
we will make an explicit promise.
Under this Government there will be no wage freeze.
under this government, workers will continue to receive wage
increases as large and as prompt as Australia's economic
circumstances can afford.
And where the conservatives offer the reversion to an unfair
taxation system, where taxes will rise for virtually every
item you buy, we will guarantee a continuation of fairness
and efficiency in taxation.
The third element of our strategy for the rest of the 1980s
is to continue to manage the economy and the nation with
strength and stability.
And the keystone of that task is our capacity to maintain
co-operation with business and unions, to work within the
estabished framework of our conciliation and arbitration
system, to provide leadership for the whole nation.
The fourth element of our strategy is to continue to ensure
that todiay's policies not only achieve goals for today but
are so geared as to protect the interests Of our children
and of our children's children.
This is why we must restructure our economy; it is why we
must protect the environment for the future.
it underlies why we must continue to encourage school
children stay at school so they can productively
contribute to society in a satisfying job; and it underlies
why we must ensure that adeq~ uate technical training exists
for those young people who need it; and it underlies our
commitment to ensuring the talent and potential of young
people is not destroyed by drugs.
Perhaps most fundamentally of all, it underlies the need to
secure pea. ce and effective disarmament in the world
without which all our hopes and plans can founder.
Friends, These aze our aspirations: reconstruction of the economy,
fairness in the protection of living standards, stability in
leadership, and care for the future of our nation.
They are the elements of a ntrategy which will guide
Australia's economic and social growth in the lead up to the
election and, after we have been re-elected, into the
1990' s.
So we go together into our fifth year with renewed
confidence confidence in our ability to lead Australia
through tV-hese times of high challenge to an even better and
fairer future.
And the real basis of that confidence is our confidence in
the people of Australia.
I am ab,, solutely confident about the judgement the Australian
people make, for they will have an absolutely stark
choice bcfore them: the firmness and fairness, stability
and security we offer, or the conflict and bitterness, the
weakness and instability offered by this shambles of an
opposition increasingly dictated to and directed by the
faceless men of greed.
Their old ramshackle coalition is dead.
Their parties are hopelessly split in at least five ways
that is, on the last count, anyway.
But let us not be diverted by their disarray.
This government will not be diverted nor will we relax in
our endeavours to provide the solutions to our nation's
problems.
11.
That will be the real basis for our victory at the next
elections, whenever they may have to come.
The question before the people of Australia will be clear.
It is the essential question of our Australian denocracy.
It is indeed the essence of our democracy.
It is this: which side of politics has the proven capacity
to make and take the best decisiops for our country and our
future? My friends, 4. n this election year can there be any doubt
what answei: the people of Australia will give?
Fellow members of the Australian Labor Party, colleagues,
friends:
Ben Chifleyo " light on the hill" still beckons us.
As far zo thiis Labor Goverment iq concerned, that light on
the hill it; otill our goal.
That light is what we march towards today proud of our
record, confident of our future, and determined to write
another grea. t chapter in the grand partnership botween the
Australian L bor Party and the Australian people.
g,