PRIME MINISTER
TRANSCRIPT OF ADDRESS BY THE PRLIE MINISTER, THE HON P J
KEATING, M. P.
SYLVIA SMITH'S ELECTORATE OFFICE LAUNCESTON, TASMANIA
SATURDAY 26 FEBRUARY, 1994
It is a great pleasure to be here with Sylvia ( Smith) to open this, her electorate office,
in the city of Launceston because it was on that night, just slightly less than a year ago,
that we saw Tasmania lead the return of a Labor government. And, when I saw the
numbers in the Tasmanian seats, given the fact that we had a substantial lead anyway, I
knew then we were always going to be unbeatable. As it turned out, that's as it turned
out to be. But, the truth is that we now want to earn that faith and trust which you put
in Sylvia and the government, through the course of this parliament, to see again the
great things that Labor can do for Australia, and to see return to the fold all of the
Tasmanian seats at the next election.
Tasmania, of course, is playing its part in the recovery which we are now seeing in the
Australian economy. We are now growing faster than any other comparable economy
and we'll be doing well growing around four percent into next year. And, I'm very
pleased to see Tasmania taking a part in this, sharing in this, in fact in some places,
leading it. And, today, just coming from Hobart, as I did, through Richmond and then
Ross, up to Evandale, seeing the tourist industry of Tasmania obviously playing a role
selling Tasmania's heritage as it does because the preservation of this wonderful city
and the places I mentioned is, I think, second to none in Australia. But, what also
pleased me this morning, I went through a fish export factory and, not so many months
ago, one at Ulverstone exporting potato chips. And, when you look at the amount of
industry and innovation which is taking place with Tasmanian companies picking up
the competitiveness which this government has now induced in Australia... we're
seeing Tasmania not just hanging behind the recovery but being ight in there with it.
And that will mean, as we're already seeing, employment start to pick up and we're
starting to see, I think, 145,000 job growth over the course of the last six months or
so, so we're well on the way to the half million jobs in three years having kept the
nearly two million of extra jobs which were created in the 1980s. So, we've had the
recession, we're out of it, we're on our way again and weve kept the great social
programs of the Labor party intact while we've been doing it. That is, Medicare and
thie ed ucation ' sy stem -and support for aged people and for young people and for
families we've been able to hold that together, now, as we contemplate the nineties.
And the nineties hold such bounty for Australia, now, as a low inflation country locked
into the. Asia-Pacific, -able to export our products and, in fhatjor the first time in our
history being closer to fast growing world markets where, for most of our history, we
were a long way from the markets of Europe and North America. So, now we are
part of the fastest growing part of the world and we're right in there with it.
Now, of course, that couldn't be done, we couldn't realise the great ambitions we'ye
had through the eighties in setting Australia up as a modem society and economy,
without getting this period of office, this term of office, to give us a chance to ride the
growth cycle through the 1990s. And, you've helped give us this term of office by
sending Sylvia to Canberra as Member for Bass. Now, Sylvia said she is a woman of
the people. She gets around and she knows the electorate and she knows the
community. And this is what the Labor party always has, it has touch with the
community because it is from the community. And, that is why it has taken a Labor
government to give Australia a market economy, it's taken a Labor government to
enlarge the country and give it a greater future, it's taken a Labor government to see
the great opportunities in Asia and, at the same time, see our whole society grow
along... so that this recovery is not just for stockbrokers or people at the top end of
town, this recovery is a recovery for everybody and that includes the unemployed and
the long term unemployed and all Australians who ought to be able to participate in it.
Now, I said at the election, on election night, that we were not going to forget the
unemployed. That we were going to reach out our arms and bring them up with us so
we could go on to growth and prosperity in the 1990s. And, in this half year coming
up towards this Budget, I'll be introducing a statement dealing with the problems of
the long term unemployed and long term unemployment. And, let's, us, do something
new in the world7-fist in the world, again to say that in our society, in our
compassionate society, we will not leave three or four hundred thousand Australians
long term unemployed. That the rest of us won't move on and forget them, that we'll
go along as a society together. Because, only in that way will we keep this a nice
country which has got good values where we care about one another and where we
say, when we move along we all go along, not just those who are well off.
So, these are the great things we're fighting for, these are the great things we've been
elected for. And, we've now got a healthy, strong parliamentary majority and, for the
first time in a long time, the state of Tasmania playing a real role through the Labor
members in the Federal government of Australia. Now, it was 20 years ago when it
was thus, last like this. But, now Tasmania has rejoined the fold and as a consequence
Tasmania is getting the lift from the policies of the national government. And this has
got to help in general prosperity, in employment in this beautiful state. So, ladies and
gentlemen, Sylvia has already distinguished herself in the time she has been in the
parliamentary Labor party, she is a person of the people, she has that common touch,
she cares. And that input to the policies of the government, to the business of the
caucus of the party, is what makes all the difference in whether you've got a real
political party in office or just a business organisation which the Liberal Party is and
always has been a sort of semi-business organisation. Not a feeling, growing,
organic political organisation with touch to the community of this country.
So, I had a lot of pride on election night, none more so than seeing Tasmania return a
swag of Labor members. And, amongst them, Sylvia, whom I share this platform with
today with very great pride. So, could I thank each and every one of you for coming
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along, for supporting her, for believing in her, for having faith in the government and
faith in the great ideals of the Labor party. And let's hope, from the portals of this
office, that the great humanitarian policies of the party and its great sense of
enlargement can be accomplished here in Launceston. It gives me very great pleasure
to declare Sylvia's electorate office open.
Ends.