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LAWS:
We have the Prime Minister on the line. Good morning, Prime Minister.
PRIME MINISTER:
Good morning, John.
LAWS:
I think your preamble is terrific.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, thank you very much. I think it's Australian.
LAWS:
I do too, very, very Australian. You might have heard me mention part
of that fax from a woman listening to us: people may expect
some pompous piece of rubbish just because this is supposed to be
part of some official thing but I don't think we're a pompous
people.' Obviously you don't think we are either.
PRIME MINISTER:
We're not. And there's no point in loading up an Australian
preamble with a whole lot of whereas's' and we
the peoples' and humbly relyings.' They are the words
and that is the language of another country, countries, another age,
another generation. What I did try to do with this, with Les Murray's
help, is to write it in contemporary Australian English and to embrace
concepts that were common to Australians, to embrace ideas that all
Australians would not object to, although some would like to go further.
But in this business, if you go too far on one subject you'll
start losing people in order to try to placate the passions of a minority,
and preambles are not like that. And as for the word mateship',
well, I'm not surprised that that's attracted a lot of attention.
It is the most unambiguously, passionate, unmistakable Australian
word and it conjures up whole lots of things about our way of life
and I can't imagine a contemporary Australian preamble without
the notion being in it.
LAWS:
Yeah, well I'm with you totally on that. I also had another fax
from Helen Deloraine in Tassie saying as far as I'm concerned
mateship is an Australian institution, part of our history since convict
times and the thread that has kept us all going through the tough
times. People feel very strongly about the word.
PRIME MINISTER:
Oh, they do. And whatever its male origins might be, it has acquired
a generic meaning and it evokes a sense which is distinctively Australian
and it speaks of helping each other in adversity. It reminds you of
bush fires. It reminds you of people dragging bodies out of the rubble
under a ski lodge, of train smashes, all of those sorts of things
when Australians pull together and forget our differences. And one
of the reasons why Australian soldiers survived better in prisoner
of war camps than those of many of our allies was mateship, they worked
together. And there's so much of our history bound up with that
notion. I can't conceive that you could write something like
this and try and make it contemporary without bringing that notion
into it. And that's why I wanted it included. And, frankly, I
don't care what some of the critics say. I feel very passionately
that you've got to have that concept in it.
LAWS:
I agree with you. I talked to Natasha Stott-Despoja earlier. I think
she might have changed her line a little bit on the mateship thing.
But what I suggested I also talked to Christopher Pearson and
I know that he and Les Murray were fairly close in discussions on
this whole thing about that paragraph: "we value excellence
as well as fairness, independence as dearly as mateship". I put
to both of them, and both liked the idea, if we added two very simple
words. I'm sure we'd keep everybody happy if we had: we
value excellence as well as decency and fairness, independence as
dearly as love and mateship.
PRIME MINISTER:
Mmm, that's an interesting thought.
LAWS:
Yes, because decency, I mean, we all should be, in Australia, striving
for decency and fairness. And, love, placates those who think that
mateship might be in any way sexist.
PRIME MINISTER:
That's an interesting thought. I'll think about that. I'm
not, I mean, I'm not so fanatically egotistical about this that
there's no one word I would agree to change. I've said it's
a draft but it's a draft that received a lot of thought and I'm
obviously not going to tear it up and start again. And I'm obviously
not going to sit down with a committee of people with each, sort of,
having 10 words - you end up with a complete camel. But I am interested
in people's views and I have sent a copy of it to the Leader
of the Democrats, to Mr Beazley, to the State Premiers, and I'll
be interested to hear what some of them have got to say. I mean, I've
heard what Mr Beazley had to say. Meg Lees, the Leader of the Democrats,
hasn't said anything yet. She just wrote me back a very polite
letter saying thank you for sending me a copy and we'll certainly
respond. So, I want debate on it. I expected debate. I didn't
expect everybody to like every word of it. This is the first time
in 100 years an attempt has been made to write what people say is
the new preamble. In reality the existing preamble is part of the
British Enabling Act and it's not really part of our Constitution
but it is colloquially seen as a new preamble and, therefore, we do
need a period of debate. But you can't have something like this
that doesn't express what the country is about. And this sort
of knee-jerk reaction of always racing off to the American Constitution
and saying, well, where's we the people'. Well, that
may have been all right for Jefferson, and that's fine, but surely
we can be original enough to devise a preamble that is quite different
from the preamble in any other constitution.
LAWS:
Yeah, I think that's absolutely right. Are you prepared to look
at that word, cultures'?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, the only reason we put cultures in is that there is sensitivity
between you mean the fact that it's plural?
LAWS:
No, the fact that it's there instead of the word stewardship'
that I think was mooted as being more acceptable.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, Les Murray originally said that he wanted to say stewardship
of their lands'. Now, some people might regard that as having
been a little too cute in that their lands' might sound
very expansive. Yet some people might say, well, what are their lands,
they don't have all the lands they want to have. Look, once again,
I'm not saying this is the perfect formulation. But what I tried
to do with the indigenous section was to use words that nobody could
object to, although they may fall short of the expectations of those
who wanted more.
LAWS:
Yeah, well I doubt anybody could object to culture. And as I said
earlier when I was talking to Christopher that I think the word stewardship
is a nothing word because it's sort of one short of a, it sounds
like somebody who's frightened to say ownership.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, that's the problem, you see. I mean, you have to understand
that if there is, within this document, words that in a sense get
into the native title debate, it will have a lot of opposition.
LAWS:
Absolutely.
PRIME MINISTER:
And you'll lose people. And what I say to the Aboriginal leadership
and I say it very respectfully is, what is there now is an advance
on the present situation because there's no reference to the
indigenous people in the original preamble, no reference at all. And
what I've put in my draft acknowledges the historical truth that
they were there from the beginning of time and that we honour their
cultures and that they're ancient and continuing. Now, that is
a huge advance on the present situation. I know that they would like
us to go further but in the process of our going further other Australians
are going to say, that's too far.
LAWS:
It's a very difficult thing to do.
PRIME MINISTER:
You'll lose the whole...[tape break]
LAWS:
....feel the same way about it.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, that's very encouraging.
LAWS:
Could I ask you, just before we go, what's happening with the
Telstra bill?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, it's off for the debate's not going on at the
present time. Look, my best guess on Telstra is this, John, that I
hope that although the Democrats and Brian Harradine and the Labor
Party have said no to the sale of 100% that we can get the further
16% through and we'll keep trying to get the sale of the rest
of it through. But, I mean, I believe that the whole of Telstra should
be privatised. I believe in the end it will be privatised. I think
we'll all be better off and if we can get the whole lot of it
sold we can totally eliminate the Federal Government's debt.
That's its debt, not the foreign debt of a country but the Federal
Government debt could be just about totally obliterated in one hit
if we can get the whole of Telstra sold and we're going to keep
trying. But at the moment we can't get the numbers in the Senate
for the sale of the lot of it but I'm hopeful that we can at
least get the numbers in the Senate at some stage for the sale of
another 16%.
LAWS:
So it's adjourned indefinitely.
PRIME MINISTER:
No, I don't think it's adjourned indefinitely, I think it's
just adjourned for the time being.
LAWS:
Okay, and could I just ask you again to consider decency and love
in that...
PRIME MINISTER:
I will consider decency and love.
LAWS:
In that paragraph because I'm sure that would placate most of
it and it doesn't add much to it.
PRIME MINISTER:
Okay.
LAWS:
Anyway, I think it's great and congratulations on creating it
and Les Murray too.
PRIME MINISTER:
Thank you.
LAWS:
Nice to talk to you, Prime Minister.
PRIME MINISTER:
Thanks.
[ends]