ADDRESS BY THE PRIME MINISTER, MR E. G. WHITLAM, M. P.,
TO THE FEDERAL CONFERENCE OF THE AUSTRALIAN LABOR PARTY,
TERRIGAL, 5-FEBRUARY 1975
It is only 18 months since we last met in Conference
at Surfers' Paradise. We set this time for the Conference in
the belilef that given the normal operation of our system,
given the normal rules of the game, we would-here be
preparing the program for our first election after the
victory of 1972. The fact that it hasn't worked out that way
is just one example of the extraordinary task imposed upon
the Party and upon the Australian Labor Government. We now
know that our opponents will tear up the rule-book and write
new rules whenever they think it suits them. Fortunately,
in May last year, they seriously misjudged the temper of the
people and the spirit of the Party. We can always look back
with great pride at the campaign of 1972. But the victory of
1974, in circumstances of enormous difficulty, was no less
a splendid achievement. The Party was aroused; its
determination, its purposeful anger about the-fraud being
attempted by our opponents3 carried us through and carried us
back into Government to continue to carry out the programa
three-' year program for which we have now twice been
elected. It's too easily said that 1974 was a bad year
for Labor. True, it was an extraordinarily difficult year,
but the fact remains that in circumstances of world-wide
difficulty, we won an election against great odds. For only
the second time in our history, we won a second consecutive
election. The war of nerves waged by our opponents continues
unrelenting. They no more accept the verdict of 1974 than
they did the verdict of 1972. So the pressures on the Partyon
our nerve, our resources, our organisation, our loyalty
remain tremendous. We need the crusading spirit of ' 72 and
the deep determination of ' 74 to carry us through 1975 and
far beyond. We've seen over the last two years how very rapidly
circumstances can change. In every sense they have been two
years of great change. Most of all, and best of all, there
have been the positive changes which we as a Labor Government
have made in the Australian ' society and in Australia's position
in the world. There have been rapid and unpredictable changes
in economic and political realities. In going about its
business Conference must bear this in mind. Our task here
is to draw up the conti-nuing program a program for the next
election and beyond. Our task is to revise the existing
platform and to make the platform even more relevant to the
future of Australia as we see it. We cannot be preoccupied
with one issue or one problem, and certainly not just this
week's or this month's most topical issue. We can't write
the platform in terms laid down by today's headlines. 9./ 2
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Of course, each conference reflects the mood
and need of the times. Throughout the period covered by
the three great conferences of 1967, 1969 and 1971 we were
always deeply concerned about Vietnam. Yet, crucial as
that issue was, if we had allowed ourselves as a Conference,
as a Party, to be completely preoccupied with it, if we
had not used those Conferences to transform the whole of
the platform, to revise and modernise it, we would not be
in Government today. Now, as always, Conference must build
for the-future. That is what makes great and memorable
Conferences. Conference and the whole Party should also bear
. this in mind when assessing the work of the Government and
judging our actions. There has been a great deal of talk
in recent weeks about reversing policy. Don't fall for
the line. We are not going into reverse; we are not
abandoning the program; we are not going back on the mandate.*
It's true we are going through times of great economic
change and economic uncertainty. All the mixed economies,
all the democracies, all our trading partners, all the
industrialised countries, are sharing the same experience.
From the time we cime in we've made economic decisions
relevant to the needs of the time and the problems of the
time.. It would of course be grossly irresponsible to refuse
to budge from a decision, correct enough in one set of
circumstances, when a completely different set of circumstances
* arose. Of course, we are adjusting; of course we are prepared
to adjust. But the underlying direction, the overriding
objective remains constant, unchanged, unchangeable to carry
out the program, to fulfil the mandate.
Jim Cairns has spoken here, and around Australia,
about the difficulties of economic management in a mixed
economy. It raises special difficulties for a democratic
socialist party. As Jim Cairns has said, we find ourselves
now in a position of seeking ways of restoring profitability.
We have to do that if we are to restore full employment.
I will have something more to say about this in
detail in relation to our particular economic problems and
unemployment and inflation. But don't let's forget that
we have always recognised the relationship between the prosperity
of the private sector and our ability to carry out the program.
We should not think there is something shameful or demeaning
about it. There is no sell-out involved. Indeed, in the
1972 Policy Speech, I laid particular stress on this the
relation between our ability to carry out the proqram and
the strength of . all sectors of the economy including the
private sector. I said: " Our program particularly in education,
welfare, hospitals and cities, can only work successfully
within the framework of strong uninterrupted growth." / 3
We have to ensure those conditions of else abandon
the program. The fight against unemployment and the fight
for the program go hand-in-hand. Behind any temporary measures
and changes we have made and may make lies the great continuity
and the great consistency our determination to carry out
the program, the program based on the decisions of Conference,
the program twice put to the Australian people and twice
endorsed by them.
And what a mighty work it has been, and yet there
is still so much to do. Delegates will now have a copy of
the document called " Report 74" which sets out the achievements
in a single year. There's been only one year to rival it
for achievement 1973.'
I find there a re frequent complaints on two scores.
One is that we have done too much too soon. The-other is
that we have failed to communicate. As to the first, we have
to ask: which of our achievements all of them in pursuit
of the platform and in fulfillment of our pledges should we
have abandoned or deferred? We have, in fact, deferred some,
such as our schedule for the abolition of the means test, but
in everything we've done there has been a clear priority
the priority of greatest need. We have acted, urgently because
the need has been urgent. We couldn't have delayed in
rebuilding the ramshackle structures and systems we inherited.
We had to act urgently to clear away the accumulated deadwood
of 23 years, and we are doing so. Of course this upset the
vested interests, those who had it so good for so long.
And this gets to the second question communication.
The people whom our program is designed first and most to
benefit are not in general the most articulate, or the best
organised sections of the community. The interests and-. groups
who may feel disadvantaged or feel that their privileged
position is in some way threatened are of course, the most
articulate, influential and powerful sections of the community.
We can't really expect the press to take up the cudgels on
our behalf. The cudgels are thoroughly employed in bashing
us. And it is a myth that the Government has built up its
own vast propaganda machine this is just not true.
In the final analysis we will have to rely on
ourselves to get our message across. We do have in our ranks,
as members, as supporters, some of the most articulate people
in Australia. * We must not allow the media to, dictate the
terms of debate. We cannot sit back supinely. I It is time
to go on the offensive as we did in 1972. Of course it is
easier to attack from the advantage of opposition, particularly
an opposition as irresponsible as this present contemptible
rabble. / 4
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But the record of the achievement of our Government
is there. If we ourselves are apologetic about it or silent
about it, or if we fight just on the terms and issues laid
down by others then we have no chance of getting the essential
messg across. That's the real problem about communication.
The Labor program the program of this Government
is to ensure that the services and opportunities which the
community must provide are made more abuhdant and more equal
for all Australians wherever they live, wherever they choose
to live or wherever they are obliged to live.
I. don't expect to see in my time a total transformation
of the political and economic systems. I don't expect it to
occur in the lifetime of delegates here. But we can achieve
in our time the situation where anybody who has the will can
get a proper education to the limit of his ability, where
anybody who has the need can have the best medical attention
and hospital treatment, where anybody who has to live or
work in a city can have decent transport, a decent environment
and decent means df recreation.
Wages and salaries are becoming less and less the
dominant factor in determining a family's real welfare. No
longer is a person' s income the sole measure of the quality of
his life or the opportunities he can provide for his family.
They depend on things which the community acting as a whole
provides for its individual members, and which the community
alone can now adequately provide. Increasingly, a family's
standard of living is determined not so much by their income
but by where they live and by the community services provided
by the community in which they live. Their health, children's
education, opportunities and leisure, sense of security and
real security increasingly depend on the community's ability
or will to provide for them to provide for the needs 6f
individuals by collective decision and collective action.
Thes6 general thoughts are very relevant to any
consideration of unemployment and inflation. There is a
link between wages and inflation and there is a link between
inflation and unemployment. There are certain facts which
I'm bound . to state, not just as Prime Minister but as Leader
of the Labor Party, because they go to the heart of our
present problems. Don't let's have this childish accusation,
any time one of my colleagues or I state the facts, that we
are union-bashing. I will not mis-state the facts, over-state
them or under-! itate them. And the fact is that we cannot beat
inflation or unemploymfent if there are wage increases this
year on the scale of last year' s increases. I certainly
expect union officials and advocates to try their hardest
for their members. But the over-all task is to ensure
that gains are real and lasting.
There must be a l * imit . to the increases of wages
which the economy can stand in any one year. Only so much
extra can be provided from the growth of the economy or
re-distribution from profits. Wage increases beyond such
limits must inevitably cause price increases and thus attempts
to improve the living standards by wage claims are frustrated.
I believe there is evidence that in recent times wage
increases have gone beyond the present limits of the capacity
of the economy to pay. We have a very rapid increase in the
share of GNP going to wages and salaries. Wage and salary
increases have been much greater than the rate of price increases.
I will give some examples. In our first: two years
of office, the Consumer Price Index increased by 31 percent.
Average weekly earnings increased by 40 per cent. Minimiumn
award rates for men increased by 47 per cent. Minim~ um award
rates for women increased by 70 per cent. With the taxc cuts
we brought into operation on the 1st January, real average
weekly earnings after tax have gone up by 7.5 per cent.
But its support for indexation, the Government
has indicated clearly its determination to protect the
real level of wages.
Australians should-be clear what the opposition's
attack on indexation means every wage earner would have
his living stan~ dard reduced.
And here again, let's be clear about the alternative.
Take Malcolm Fraser. He makes no secret either of his
ambitions or his intentions. You Might take notice of him
as Mr Snedden's rival and challenger. You might take notice
of him as Mr Snedden's appointee as Shadow Minister for Labour.
He has tried to sack Snedden but Snedden has not dared to
sack him, nor has he repudiated the industrial policy which
Mr Fraser unveiled in his speech to the ANZAAS Congress two
weeks ago. And there it is in all its horrendous detail
a promise of a return to the penal clauses, goal sentences
not just for officials but for erring members, a complete
wage freeze, an entire apparatus of union intimindation. There
is one great difference between Mr Snedden and Mr Fraser.
Mr Fraser is at least his own man. You will remember when
Mr Snedden was Minister for Labour he supported the idea of a
Prices Notification Tribunal. When he became Treasurer-he
opposed it. When he changed his advisers he changed his policies
and since he has been Leader of the Opposition the same
process continue! s different advisers, different policies.
Mr Fraser has at least come clean; employees now know exactly
what is in store for them, under any Government in which he
might have any say. ./ 6
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I do hope the Party and the Trade Unions will make
the connection between real living standards and the Government's
programs. Inflationary wage settlements this year would
threaten both real living standards and the program. And, of
course, we have to bear in mind the alternative. It has been
highly instructive to see the reaction of our opponents to
our curz'ent difficulties. They have shown themselves in
their true colours. Trendyism has had its little day. The
forces of the right have reasserted themselves with a vengeance
even Mr Hamer has dropped his trendy image so carefully and
expensively cultivated and hopped on the Petersen Bandwaggon.
For an example of sheer bloody-mindedness, what could excel
the Victorian challenge to the High Court on the validity of
the Australian Assistance Plan a pioneer experiment in
community involvement. If anything disposes of the idea that
the Liberals are concerned about so-called centralism, about
community involvement, it's that. The list of benefits
imperilled by this challenge is terrifying and goes far beyond
the Australian Assistance Plan.
It includes such matters as assistance for isolated
children, pre-school teacher education allowances,
Commonwealth Technical Scholarships, grants under the new
program for child care and pre-school education, national
apprenticeship schemes, grants to community agencies inolved
in migrant welfare, local aid for aboriqinas, grants fox
aborigine community development, protection of aboriginal
sacred site%, aborigiftal community enterprises, aged pc. 0z'
homes and hostels, sheltered employment assistance, handicapped
children's assistance, homeless persons' assistance, meals
on wheels, home nursing subsidies, nursing homes' ass' t nze
and many, many more. I am advised that in all, soMe 56
separate programs of assistance from the Australian Govw nment
not all of them the creation of our Governraent (. ould he
affected if the challenge were to succeed.
What on earth have these matters to do with t1
question of State rights or centralism? The degree of
misrepresentation on this question is astonishing. We oughtn't
to allow ourselves to succumb to it. We have had uhis
extraordinary spectacle of Mr Bjelke-Petersen and Sir Charles
Court descending on poor, beleagurered London breathing
fire against the Australian Govenment in general, and me in
particular. It is amazing how these super patriots, Mr Snedden
included, feel free to'denigrate and downgrade Adstralia abroad,
to foul the nest. Mr Bjelke-Petersen alleges that I set out
in London to abolish the Agents-General. Whatever I might
think about the anachronism and pretension of Agents-General,
I have never raised the issue. / 7
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The only time I have been asked to raise any matter
concerning the Agents-General was by themselves in 1969. They
had a terrible problem and petitioned me in London to help
them. They were terribly upset by their low rating at official
functions. Under the order of precedence they lay somewhere
under the Mayor of Manchester and just on top of the Dame of Sark.
So you see the weighty problems that the Agents-General have
to deal-with. But I have not raised the issue. The only matter
I have raised with the British Government is the question of
Appeals to the Privy Council that the Australian High Court
would be the final Court of Appeal. This does not involve any
question of State rights, because in matters between the States
and the national Government, the High Court is the final
court of Appeal. It should be so for all matters. It is what
I believe I am sure it is what most Australians believe and
in particular it is what the platform says.
In London I did, however, say in a public speech
in very general terms something about the responsibilities of
the national Government and the State Governmen * ts. I pointed
out that in the two Australian States with the largest
populations it was obvious that only through the involvement
of the national Govenment could the people be provided with
essential public services like health, public transport and
education. In the States with-the largest areas, only the
national Government could safeguard a control of the vast
new natural resources discovered in the last 10 years.
Later this year we will be concluding a new
five year financial agreement with the States. I should stress
this: no reimbursement formula would solve the financial
difficulties of the States as permanently and successfully
as acceptance by the National Government of responsibility
for hospitals and railways. It is not enough to say thdt
because these are traditionally fields for the States, nothing
can be done. Where would our universities be if we had
accepted the traditional argument?
And of course, over the whole range of policy,
the traditionalist argument is one that should not wash with
our Party the Party of change, the Party of reform. It
has been by-breaking with tradition, by seeking new methods
that we have been able to achieve so much in so short a time.
We shall go from this Conference with our program
refreshed and I believe, with our determination refreshed.
I don't disguise the difficulties. The real difficulty is
purely political this notion that an election may be held
every 6 months at the whim of half the Senate. The opposition
is characterised by an extraordinary combination of irresponsibility
and arrogance. Mr Snedden talks as though it were his
prerogative to decide when the next election may be. That is
a fantastic assumption for any Leader of the opposition, but
doubly fantastic for this one a man with the shakiest hold
on the leadership of his own party, a man who cannot commit
his own Senators, on this issue or any other.
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He cannot commit them to bad conduct or compel
them to good conduct. The Parliamentarv system everywhere
is being challenged as never before. The irresponsibility
of the Opposition injects a new poison, a further uncertainty
into the Australian system. For our part, we are determined
to' work on the basic assumption of elections that in 1974
the people elected us for a further three years and we have
a mandate to carry out our program during the full term for
which we were elected.
Any other approach would. be to succumb to the
tactics and the propaganda of our opponents. We should not
get unnerved about difficulties. Politics is by its nature
a difficult business. None know it better than we in
this room. We did not get an armchair ride into office
and we could not have expected an armchair ride once we were
in office. Government is about solving problems. Because
these are always human problems, they'don't lend themselves
to perfect, complete solutions. Difficulty is the name of
the game. Don't be fazed; don't be panicked. The people
of Australia placef a high privilege upon us. It is a great
honour to have been twice entrusted with the conduct of
their affairs. I am confident we shall emerge from this Conference
further strengthened in our ability to carry out that trust.