It's
time for the ALP to ask itself serious questions about the situation in
Israel and move to new policy platform, writes Stuart Rees
Earlier
this week a meeting in was held in western Sydney to discuss whether
the Federal Labor Party should support Palestinians’ rights to
self-determination.
In response to the unspeakable suffering of all Palestinians -
Gazans, West Bankers, Arab citizens of Israel, and the 5 million
refugees still served by the UN Refugee Works Association (UNRWA) - why
would the ALP not take a stand for Palestine?
But change from adherence to the Israeli narrative to fearless
support for the Palestinian cause may not be easy. Questions to ALP
members, which relate to the identity of a party which claims to promote
social justice, might do the trick. Here are the questions.
Key Questions
How can you retain self-respect if you appear to collude with Israeli
Government’s occupation of Palestinian lands? Do you have any sense of
disbelief at the displacement and replacement polices which have been
occurring since 1948, or at the blood bath of Operation Cast Lead which
began on December 27, 2008?
Surely the disproportionate use of force in the 2014 Operation
Protective Edge in Gaza would affect your attitude?In that operation,
over 2000 Palestinians were killed and 11,000 wounded. The non-combatant
ratio of Palestinians to Israelis who lost their lives was
approximately 600:1.
Eighteen thousand housing units were destroyed, 24 medical facilities
damaged and at least 16 health workers killed. Twenty-six schools were
destroyed, 228 were damaged and another 31 schools left to serve as
shelters for displaced people.
Will you acknowledge the unnecessary Israeli deaths but also the
massive imbalance in Israeli/Palestinian casualties, property destroyed
and the means of livelihood lost?
Since 2007, within Israel, at least 402 civilians and 58 security
forces have died as a result of suicide bombing. UN figures also
indicate that in Operation Protective Edge, the number of Palestinian
children killed – approximately 500 – exceeds the total number of
Israelis, civilians and soldiers, killed by Palestinians in rocket
attacks and all other attacks over the past decade.
UN figures indicate that Israeli citizens receive 300 cubic meters of
water per year, Palestinians 35-85 cubic metres. Israeli settlers on
the West Bank are allotted 1,500 cubic metres and enjoy green lawns and
swimming pools while Palestinians often get no water at all. Haaretz
journalist Amira Hass warns there’s little point in arguing whether
Israelis’ water consumption is four or only three times that of
Palestinians. Instead she requests, “Open your eyes: the thick pipes of
the Mekorot (Israel’s national water provider) are heading to the Jordan
valley settlements, and a Palestinian tractor next to them transports a
rusty tank of water from afar.”
“In the summer, the faucets run dry in Hebron and never stop flowing in (settlements) Kiryat Arba and Beit Hadassah.”
On 9 February 2014, B’Tselem, the Israeli Information Center for
Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, reported that “over 90 per
cent of water in the Gaza Strip is unfit for drinking. Wastewater
treatment facilities have been damaged, sewage seeps into ground water
and fills the sea.”
Following massive floods across the Gaza Strip in early November
2014, the head of Gaza’s water authority admitted, “The recent war
destroyed everything in Gaza. Many sewage pipes and water networks are
still buried under the rubble.”
East Jerusalem Violence
The record of suffering grows. How would ALP members respond if they
observed the hopelessness which Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem
feel when faced with attacks from armed settlers?
Admittedly there have been awful tit for tat killings, as in the
recent fatal stabbings in a synagogue. This violence occurs in the
context of incitement from settlement leaders, Jerusalem being cut off
from the West Bank, more evictions, more house demolitions and excessive
police brutality.
Israeli author and human rights activist Jeff Halper calls the
collective punishment involved in the demolition of people’s homes,
‘atavistic revenge.’ He emphasizes that the targeting and punishing of
family members innocent of any crime constitutes a violation of Article
33 of the Geneva Convention relative to the ‘Protection Of Civilian
Persons In Time Of War.’
What do party members know of the civil rights of Palestinians living
on the West Bank and in an East Jerusalem almost completely surrounded
by large Israeli settlements?
Israeli leaders encourage Jews to attempt to worship in Moslem holy
places and have given a green light to settlers to attack Palestinians
and their property. Gershon Baskin writes,
“The only real services that Palestinian neighbourhoods of East
Jerusalem receive are those of Border Police arresting suspects, closing
neighbourhoods as well as house demolitions and taxation.”
He reminds us that 80 per cent of East Jerusalem Palestinians live under the poverty line.
Hate speech in Israel and from leading members of the Knesset is an
almost daily occurrence. A right wing settlers’ slogan reads, “A Jew is
a blessed soul, an Arab is a son of a whore.”
In response to the current discrimination, hate speech and violence
in East Jerusalem, distinguished Palestinian lawyer Dianna Buttu
comments, “This has been the most dehumanizing ordeal in my experience.
All you hear about is the idea that Palestinians don’t value human life,
‘They have a culture of martyrdom’.”
To add to these cruelties a Jewish Nation State Bill is in legal
preparation as the right wing’s one-state solution which would include
the annexation of the territories and the establishment of a Jewish
apartheid State. Israeli journalist Gideon Levy writes that in the
proposed new law, Palestinians will become formally, legally second
class citizens. The architects of this new Israeli state must make sure
at any price that it will not be democratic and egalitarian.
Not Standing Alone
In recognising Palestine as a state, Australian Labor is not being
asked to go it alone, though there would be every reason for taking a
leadership role irrespective of the attitude of other nations.
Several European countries have already taken this stand. The Swedish
Government proposes to extend full diplomatic recognition to the State
of Palestine. By large majorities the Irish Parliament, the British
House of Commons, the Spanish Parliament and the French National
Assembly have voted to recognise the state of Parliament. The motion in
the French Assembly invited “the French Government to recognise the
state of Palestine in order to obtain a definitive settlement of the
conflict.”
Australian state Labor parties have also moved on this issue. A South
Australian Labor resolution mirrors similar statements passed in
Tasmania, NSW and Queensland. The South Australian resolution recognises
peace in the Middle East will only be assured by the foundation of a
Palestinian State based on 1967 borders with agreed land swaps and
security guarantees for itself and Israel.
“SA Labor welcomes the decision of the Palestinian Authority to
commit to a demilitarised Palestine with the presence of international
Peace keepers including US forces,” it says.
Will the Labor Party leadership also heed the cues being given by significant Israeli citizens?
In September 2014, 660 Israeli public figures called on the Danish
Parliament to recognise the State of Palestine. “This would be no
anti-Israel act,” they wrote, “it would help Israel’s future.”
In November 2014, 106 ex-Israeli generals, senior police, and former
heads of Mossad urged Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu to negotiate with
“moderate Arab states and with Palestinians in the West Bank and the
Gaza Strip”.
Their letter refers to the Saudi backed peace proposal that was
adopted unanimously by the Arab league in 2002. It offered full peace,
diplomatic recognition, and “normal relations” between Arab states and
Israel in return for Israel’s withdrawal to borders based on the
pre-1967 armistice lines, with negotiated land swaps and a ‘just’ and
mutually ‘agreed’ compromise solution to the Palestinian refugee
problem.
If Labor supports Palestine, will political leaders be sufficiently
resilient to not bend in the face of the torrent of derision which
always follows anyone who dares to criticise Israeli government
policies?
In response to an article of mine explaining why the world wide
Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS) movement was neither racist nor
anti-Semitic, one threatening letter read, “Go hide in a tunnel… or
stick a grenade up your arse like ur crocodile buddies”.
One of those crocodile buddies was presumably Bob Carr who had
identified and condemned the small group of largely Melbourne
businessmen who supported Israel’s fundamentalist position on illegal
colonies and who sought to veto any change in an Australian government’s
attitude towards Israeli policies.
Carr’s criticism prompted the usual howls of derision from the Israel
right or wrong lobby. Melissa Parke MP received similar vitriol when she spoke in the House of Representatives about the merits of the BDS campaign.
Labor politicians who have spoken in support of the rights of
Palestinians know that the criticism they receive is nothing compared to
the violence and humiliation meted out to Palestinians. They should
know that some Israeli leaders are also dismayed by reactions to any
criticism of the policies of their government.
Quoted in The New Yorker,
the current President of Israel Reuven Rivlin said, “It is time to
honestly admit that Israel is sick, and it is our duty to treat this
illness.”
He also commented, “I must say that I’ve been horrified by this
thuggishness that has permeated the national dialogue…I’m not asking if
we’ve forgotten how to be Jewish but if we’ve forgotten how to be
human.”
From Change of Attitude to Policy?
Beyond the symbolic importance of Labor recognising the state of Palestine, how might such a gesture be converted into a policy?
Although one state already exists in Israel/Palestine, and is about
to be consolidated in the Jewish Nation State Bill, the ALP policy still
envisages a two state solution. In which case a diplomatically sound
elaboration of ‘Labor for Palestine’ could be to return to UN Resolution
242 adopted unanimously in 1967.
Commitment to the terms of that resolution would require all the
parties to cease military activities and return to borders existing
before the 1967 war.
The ALP needs to recognise that if they want to remain a friend of a
democratic Israel, let alone find enough vestiges of humanity to support
the Palestinians, they should be urging negotiations under UN auspices
regarding the goals of Resolution 242. Those goals have much in common
with the Arab Peace Plan and with ALP state branch resolutions.
In the process of moving from a change of attitude to the crafting of
a new policy, emotions will come into play. But it should not take much
courage for Federal Labor to at last say, ‘We’ve had enough of cruelty
as a government’s policy. We’ve had enough of indifference to
international law. We object to violence from all sides but we have not
forgotten about justice; and we will not be intimidated by the Israel
lobby.’
In relation to a change of policy towards all Palestinians we want to
re-craft Gough Whitlam’s unforgettable slogan: ‘It’s about time!’’
I’m going to go out on a limb here amongst left wing bloggers and will say to Dunlop, and those that agree with him, what are you
talking about? What if Dunlop and people who share his views are so
obsessed with their idea that our democratic system is ‘broken’ that
they’re purposely looking the other way, rather than seeing all the good
that has come out of our democratic system in the past, and how much
good could still be done?
When Gough Whitlam died this year, there was an outpouring of grief
combined with a celebration for what this leader had achieved in the
very short time he led a Labor government. Correct me if I’m wrong, but
this success happened in a two party system. And what about Prime
Minister Julia Gillard who led a minority government successfully, in a
two party system, so successfully that she was the most productive Prime Minister this country has ever seen.
So this broken system that Dunlop is writing about, this system that no
longer represents the wider community’s values, how was it able to
produce a minority government of such amazing, but admittedly unsung and
largely unappreciated, success?
I’m currently researching political narratives and framing, and I’ve
learned that once a frame is secure in someone’s mind – once it’s a
‘thing’, people find it very hard to see a situation through this frame
in the same way that someone else with a different frame sees it. So I
would argue that Dunlop and I both think we’re equally right and perhaps
we are. But let me at least argue my case as to why Dunlop’s frame
clashes with mine.
Dunlop’s frame is that the previous Labor government, and clearly the
current Liberal government are not interested in representing the wider
community and are only interested in ‘the echo chamber of the concerns
of the broader political class’. Dunlop therefore, having made this
decision, lets this perception of Labor and Liberal politicians run
through every judgement he makes about politics. Major parties are
apparently out of touch. Minors and independents the only true
representative leaders. Apparently minor billionaire Clive Palmer and
his PUP Senators, Motoring Enthusiasts, Family First’s Bob Day and the
now independent Jacqui Lambie amongst them.
My frame, however, is that politics is about good policies and,
equally as important, implementing good policies. My values align with
Labor’s values and a Labor government is therefore the best chance I
have of seeing policies implemented that align with my values. I don’t
just want good ideas from politicians, I want the opportunity to see
these ideas become reality and therefore I will fight for Labor’s
opportunity to do this. This doesn’t mean I agree with everything the
Labor government does. But broadly, I do see their values aligning with
mainstream Australia – at their very heart they aim for sustainable
economic growth, healthcare, education, employment and opportunity for
all Australians no matter what background. I see these values at the
heart of Labor’s policies and for the most part, I am happy to
passionately fight to see Labor achieve policy success with these values
that I know align to mine. So I clearly come at this from a different
view point from Dunlop. Where I see Labor government success, he sees a
problem akin to Tony Abbott.
Dunlop mentions that he sees the two party system as being only
interested in ‘allegiance to the economic system of market liberalism’.
Yet he doesn’t mention what system he would prefer they had allegiance
to. Perhaps this is where Dunlop’s disappointment comes from (and I
would argue that this is not a mainstream malaise). The Liberal Party is
the party of economic rationalists. The Labor Party promises to
civilise capitalism – to try to reduce the inequitable power between
labour and capital. But Labor has never promised to get rid of ‘market
liberalism’ altogether and perhaps anyone who expects that they should
is bound to be disappointed that they won’t. Again, I wonder what Dunlop
would prefer from a government? A denial of globalised capitalism and a
protectionist communist democracy instead? Or maybe he wants a
coalition government of random small and individual factions, who have
to fight out every policy to get a backroom deal done for themselves, at
the expense of the wider community, and at the expense of long term
planning and vision for the country? Maybe he wants a system of
self-interested pork-barrelling, as outlined by Kay Rollison here.
That’s the thing about Dunlop’s anti-the-system commentary; he’s very
good at saying what’s wrong with the way things are now, but never quite
gets to a point where he has a sensible suggestion of what could work
better. And no, I don’t count a ‘lottery’ as a sensible suggestion.
And speaking of a lottery, then we have Dunlop’s preference for minor
parties and independents, who apparently are another symptom of the
problem with the two party system (although this is where I’m confused
as to whether Dunlop sees them as a symptom or part of a solution). I’m
sorry to say this about a blogger I respect, but again Dunlop, what are you
talking about? The most uninformed voters I know choose the most random
of independents and minor parties because it’s trendy. Because it’s hip
to be ‘against the established parties’, to be an ‘anti-politician’.
Not because it’s smart. Not because it’s going to be ultimately
productive for their values into policies agenda. Not because they
actually have any idea what on earth these independents and minors stand
for. How many Family First voters realised Bob Day is on a mission to
destroy the minimum wage? Seriously – poll them and see how few took any
notice of Day’s very well-known values. Or what about another South
Australian Senator, Nick Xenophon, who has just announced that he is
starting a political party. A party based on what values? Xenophon got
elected to the Senate in 2008 on the values of getting his face on TV
through stunts and promising to axe pokies. I have no idea what happened
to his passion for pokies policies because it’s not been mentioned in a
long time. But I wonder how many people who mindlessly voted for him
were aware of the lottery of votes their elected representative would
contribute to in order to help the Liberals get their Direct Action
joke-of-a-policy through the Senate, and more recently to reinstate
Temporary Protection Visas. But that’s the thing about independents and
minor parties – they escape any sort of criticism from people like
Dunlop. Apparently they win the day they get elected, and after that
they have a blank slate to do and say whatever they like – and no one
who votes for them, or publically supports them, ever calls them out.
What about when the Greens blocked Rudd’s ETS. Sorry, I haven’t
forgotten because this is one policy I am extremely passionate about and
I hate the idea of minor parties playing politics with it for their own
electoral purposes, when the fate of our future is at stake. But no,
there’s no criticism from anyone who voted for the people outside of
major parties. No, it’s the major parties that are the problem
apparently. The hardworking, values driven Labor MPs are heaped in with
the conniving Liberals as if they’re all from the same stock. They’re
just as bad as each other.
If Dunlop was clearer about what is was actually advocating in place
of the two party system, I might be able to more clearly define why I
disagree with him. But ultimately, it’s his prerogative to keep writing
on this topic if that’s what he wants to do. And I’ll keep pointing out
that I disagree with him. I believe Tony Abbott is the problem with Tony
Abbott and I’m not interested in people trying to make excuses for this
problem by blaming the two party political system. And I’ll be
fighting, in our two party system, to get rid of him in 2016. Whether
the minors and the independents are interested in supporting this
campaign is also clearly, a lottery.
The
current wave of anti-politics is a dead end. Tim Dunlop’s article on
The Drum, ‘A 'lottery' electoral system could break our malaise,’ is
just one example. Dunlop often has…
It's a rare political obituary in which
the words "honour", "integrity" and "service" make such regular
appearances. Annabel Crabb pays tribute to retiring senator John
Faulkner.
For Labor leaders over the years, Senator John Faulkner has been a mixed blessing.
On
one hand, he is a tremendous asset: principled, punctilious,
hard-working and circumspect, with the memory of an elephant, and a
clean-living elephant at that.
On the other, he is a frank and unswerving harbinger of doom.
If
- as a Labor leader - you peep out into the office waiting area and
spot John Faulkner looming there in the company of your leadership
rival, it's roughly 98 per cent certain you're about to be whacked.
At
the messiest existential junctures of a Labor leader's life (their
violent births, ignominious deaths, and the grinding election campaigns
that so often serve to contract the period of time elapsing between the
two first-mentioned events) solemn-faced Faulkner has a priestly
ubiquity.
He is not the author of political violence; rather, its
umpire. The guy that everyone wants in the room, for insurance. And yet,
his sudden appearance has something of the maritime albatross about it.
This
is also true for public servants, who at Senate estimates sessions have
faced thousands of hours of patient Faulkner invigilation, his long and
fluent periods of courtesy terrifyingly punctuated by the odd burst of
cogent annoyance.
Senator Faulkner gets the hard jobs. The
intricate unravelling of portfolio expenditure, the telling of difficult
truths to difficult people, the tidying-up of epic political messes.
He
was the party's messenger to Simon Crean, when Crean's leadership was
at an end. The night-watchman over its trickier recruits; he accompanied
Mark Latham on the 2004 campaign, and looked after Cheryl Kernot in
2001. (Later, after the shedding of many tears, he was the only member
of Labor's leadership to show up to the launch of Kernot's infamous
biography).
It is one thing to be the person to whom hard jobs are
assigned. It is entirely another to keep doing them well after one
might quite reasonably have begged off.
When Labor took office in
2007, John Faulkner was one of only two members of the Rudd frontbench
who had ever been a minister before.
As cabinet secretary, he
dealt uncomplainingly with increasing behind-the-scenes disarray in the
Rudd office, as well as sundry public humiliations like being called
"Faulks" by the nickname-mad prime minister.
As defence minister after the resignation of predecessor Joel Fitzgibbon, he brought calm authority to an always-difficult job.
It
was a job he left after Julia Gillard challenged successfully for the
Labor leadership, an act of political violence with which Faulkner
seemed unable to reconcile himself even over time, despite having - as
usual - been in the room at the relevant moment.
One would think
that a man whose career has been so steeped in difficulty might develop a
rather grim view of life, and certainly there is much in the Faulkner
countenance that would tend to confirm that suspicion.
But one of
his subtle legacies is his rich, dark sense of humour, much apparent in
this reminiscence about the 1993 election, which he fought as Paul
Keating's environment minister.
The anecdote, about Labor's
infamous candidate Peter Knott, was told by Faulkner at former Labor
national secretary Tim Gartrell's farewell dinner, and reported by Alan
Ramsey:
I am still recovering from a grand
announcement I made in Kiama to save a threatened species of frog, which
had the misfortune of living in Gilmore in an open drain, two metres
wide and two metres deep, that ran through a public park. I made the
announcement and turned to Peter for a comment. But he'd gone. He'd
pissed off, across the park, to where he yelled back to the cameras,
'I've found one!' It seemed unlikely but Peter yelled, 'There it is!'
And as the TV cameras swung round for his David Attenborough moment,
Peter fell arse-over-head into the drain.
Among
colleagues, Senator Faulkner was viewed with admiration, trepidation,
fondness and a readily-discernible streak of the annoyance people of
rigid principle tend to inflame in others.
It's a rare political obituary in which the words "honour", "integrity" and "service" make such regular appearances.
Thank you, Senator. Long may you live to annoy.
Annabel Crabb is the ABC's chief online political writer. She tweets at @annabelcrabb. View her full profile here.
If
you like passionate politics and zinging one-liners, then Anthony
Albanese's speech in parliament today won’t disappoint. Chris Graham
reports.
Labor
heavyweight Anthony Albanese has delivered a stinging rebuke of the
Abbott Government in parliament today, describing the Prime Minister as
‘one-trick Tony’, courtesy of his incessant negativity in opposition and
government.
Speaking to an almost empty parliamentary committee room, the
Opposition spokesman on Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism delivered a
speech that was clearly pitched at the party faithful. Although this is
one of those occasions where you can actually pick your party – both
Labor and Liberal appear to be heartily sick of Abbott.
As all good ageing hippies should, Albanese began his speech with a reference to the Rolling Stones.
“Those great philosophers Jagger and Richards wrote and sang in 1965
‘I can’t get no satisfaction’. Australian voters might be reminding
themselves of this today as they consider the disappointment known as
the Abbott Government,” Albanese said.
And then he got nasty.
“This is a government defined by disappointment, deceit and
incompetence. The opposition leader who promised so much has morphed
into a confused Prime Minister, a man rapidly sinking into the quicksand
of his own negativity.
“Not only can he not lead the nation, he cannot even lead his own
government, which is desperately split on policy and political direction
and crippled by internal power struggles.
“The source of this government’s dysfunction is the cynical opportunism of its period in opposition.
“Most parties in opposition focus on holding governments to account
and rebuilding their credibility by developing new ideas. That’s what
Dan Andrews did in Victoria in the past few years. He made himself a
participant in the battle of ideas and now he is Premier of Victoria.
“When the Abbott Government was in opposition its only focus was attacking the former Labor government.
“As Opposition Leader the Prime Minister transformed the Coalition
into the Noalition, building his entire case for power on anti-Labor
hatred and three word slogans.
“Everything about politics, and nothing about policy.
“That’s why the Tories have retreated to their comfort zone today.
Without positive ideas, they’ve been forced to lean heavily on Tony
Abbott’s regressive and punitive personal ideology, one that values
individualism ahead of equity and opportunity.
“The Prime Minister’s negativity did make him a formidable opposition leader, but they make him a pretty bad Prime Minister.
“We now see that negativity is all he ever had. It is his only weapon. He is a one trick Tony.”
And you’ll note Albanese hasn’t even got to the part about Abbott’s broken promises yet. Or the budget.
“You can’t win the battle of ideas if you have no ideas. You can’t
run an economy on three word slogans. You don’t create jobs by saying no
to everything. And you don’t inspire people by misleading them.
“Before the election, the Prime Minister promised no cuts to health,
education, pensions, the ABC or SBS. He promised no new taxes.
“In government he has cut $80 billion from health and education,
slashed funding for the ABC and SBS and created new taxes, whenever
people visit a GP or fill up their car at the petrol bowser.
“Rubbing salt into the wounds, he has since insulted the electorates’
intelligence with Monty Python-esque claims that he hasn’t broken any
promises.”
And at this point, Albanese really got started, zeroing in on the
Coalition’s real weak spot – virtually everything it’s done since it got
in office.
“The Prime Minister is on the wrong side of history, his place
defined not by leadership and forward thinking but by a sad yearning for
a less equal and less progressive past. A place where average
Australians pay a Medicare levy every week, only to be told they have to
pay again to visit a doctor. A place where education is about
entrenching privilege not spreading opportunity. Where climate science
is derided and where a visiting US president’s praise for the splendor
of the Great Barrier Reef is attacked by those opposite as an affront to
our national sovereignty.
“It’s a place where our renewal energy target has been so successful
that it has to be scrapped, where we have only one woman in the cabinet,
where radio shock jocks and partisan newspaper columnists set the
government’s political agenda, where bigotry is a right, where people
communicate over ageing copper wire rather than 21st century fibre, a
place where the long-faded trappings of our colonial past are revived
through the re-introduction of the British honours system.
“The Abbott Government has misread the egalitarian nature of
Australian culture. Australians care about the fair go. Part of what
defines us is a generosity of spirit, one that embraces a sense of
community and common interest.”
Which is all, of course, true.
But you might equally argue that the parliamentary wing of the
Australian Labor Party has misread the electorate too, by installing
Bill Shorten to the leadership position, rather than Albanese.
You might also wonder why this sort of parliamentary theatre is delivered to an empty committee room.
Either way, Albanese’s stirring speech suggests that Labor senses
there’s more than a few drops of Prime Ministerial blood in the water,
and they intend to finally start turning up the heat.
It’s the final sitting week of parliament for 2014… expect things to descend from here.
You can watch the full 10 minute speech on Albanese’s Facebook page here. Albanese moves onto transport and infrastructure, and a brief tirade on the G20.
* New Matilda is an independent Australian media outlet that relies almost entirely on reader subscriptions for its survival. You can help fund New Matilda here.
Australian Labor Party Today Bill Shorten MP announced Labor's
position on the ABC. SHARE the news and sign our petition to support the
ABC at www.alp.org.au/saveourabc
Friday, 7 November 2014
IT'S TIME IT'S TIME TO DITCH BILL SHORTEN AND HAVE ANTHONY ALBANESE AS THE LEADER OF THE LABOR PARTY
(Gallery by Sydney bureau chief Ross Jones) Prime Minister Gough Whitlam’s memorial service in Sydney
yesterday was an occasion memorable for its reticence, proud good taste
and meaningful contributions, writes Bob Ellis.
For a time it seemed Rudd must sit beside Gillard, but it was soon
sorted, and they sat, eyes averted, two apart. Keating, entering, with Annita, got huge applause; Hawke with Blanche, less so, Penny Wong and her ‘spouse’ a great deal, Garrett a little more.
Silence greeted Howard and Jannette. Abbott, unaccompanied,
materialised in the front row, from, it seemed, a secret entrance,
having been booed out on the street.
Jill Wran was there. Albo and Carmel, Deputy Premier and Deputy
Premier, man and wife. John Brown. Smith and Swan. Menadue. Spiegelman.
Two Fergusons. Les Johnson and Doug McClelland. Barry Jones,
famous now since 1948, irrepressible, buoyant, grizzled. Phillip Adams,
looking as he did since he was twenty-five. Latham was not there, of
course; of course. Like Hemingway, he never forgave a favour.
Huge pipe organ music as the tall family entered; a ‘flotilla of Whitlams’, I used to call them, fewer now.
From the upper level, near the front, I could see all the faces, like
a perfect stained glass window of a gathering of sainted worthies, in a
sacred site, the Town Hall, where, six months ago, Nifty’s coffin had lain, and his daughter, now on a charge of murder, had spoken over him, quoting Shakespeare.
There was the national anthem and Kerry O’Brien came forward, tawny
and mild-mannered, Steve McQueen-like, as always, and I remembered how,
on the day of the sacking, he, beside me in the press gallery, had said:
“Let slip the dogs of war.”
He told of working on Gough’s last campaign — the energy, the detail, the generosity, the fury, the joy.
And then there was a welcome to country, and a potent didgeridoo, and then ... Freudenberg.
The years melted away and I remembered Freudy in 1977 after Gough resigned, saying:
“I’m, what, forty-two, and my life is over. It ended tonight.”
I remembered ten years ago, after a lunch with Jeff Shaw, Gough saying: “Lend me a shoulder, comrade” and, leaning on Freudy, walked from the building, linked forever to his collaborator and chronicler.
Freudy’s speech ‒ and his delivery of it ‒ showed the great orator
the Legislative Assembly lost when the Labor Party, in its wisdom, nominated Eddie Obeid instead. Like his speech on getting life lembership, in the same Town Hall, it was among the best ten of our nation. But there was more, and better, to come.
Across the world, with perfect symmetry, America’s Whitlam, Obama, was being ended by ebola and Fox News, the toy of Murdoch, who had ended Gough also, and the choir and the orchestra performed the St Matthew Passion final chorus by J.F. Bach.
Cate Blanchett came forward and spoke of
how she, as a woman, was better able to explore what she could do in
the world because of Whitlam’s free universities and Abbott, the minister for women, cringed in the front row. The choir sang the chorus of the Chorus of the Hebrew Slavesby Verdi and things notched up a bit.
Fifteen years ago, I called Noel Pearson ‘Australia’s best orator’, after sharing a stage with him in Mosman.
He proved it again before a vaster audience in Town Hall with an oration rich in wile and fury,
almost Elizabethan in its intimacy, clarity and beauty, in which, being
now himself a man of no party, he extolled the ‘old man’ he, his
people, and Australia, owed so much.
Quickly hailed as the ‘best Australian speech, ever’, it became, like Lincoln’s second inaugural, a new benchmark of the language well used in a great cause on a high occasion.
Faulkner’s tribute and Tony Whitlam’s thanks then swiftly followed and the first chords of Jerusalem, as always, had me in tears.
I remembered Gough at Margaret’s funeral theatrically steering his wheelchair out of the church as the choir sang ‘I shall not cease from mental fight, Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand’
and knowing, I think, precisely knowing, that this was the last that
most of us would see of him, heroically engulfed in this great Labour
anthem, tragically leaving, making his exit, the job unfinished. And
here was the song again.
It was swiftly sung, and that was it. No coffin was carried out. There was silence.
The orchestra conductor stood undecided. Would there be more? No. An inconclusive, shuffling silence.
And that was it.
It was an occasion memorable for its reticence, proud good taste and
almost Anglican harmony of soul. No humorous montage of wacky television
moments was projected. Gough’s own voice did not occur, though the
imitations of others, on stage and at the party afterwards, were many
and usually good — Mike Carlton’s, as always, the best.
There was a feeling not so much of sadness, or even happiness at a
great life well concluded, as of an enormous, high-vaulting life
interrupted, diverted, dislocated and of thirty-eight years then
somewhat, although not altogether, diminished in a sort of grand
nightclub act, of a stand-up elder statesman for a nation’s posterity.
Language honours and forgives / Everyone by whom it lives, as Auden said of Yeats.
Lincoln, Churchill, the Kennedys, Obama, had varying successes and
great failures in war and peace, but their gift of language, of the
smooth self-mocking utterance, of bringing the house down with gales
laughter, made up for their failings while millions died.
Whitlam’s record was better than theirs. He embarked on no new war.
He ended one. He uplifted three generals to a possibility of personal
excellence like none before him, or after. He fought the good fight, he
finished, or almost finished, the course. He kept the faith. Now there
is laid up for him a crown of righteousness.
Gough Whitlam talks to Kerry O'Brien about his leadership style,
political donations and the virtues of television interviews in a
classic 1976 exchange.
Extraordinary could only describe the atmosphere
inside Sydney Town Hall, with its grand organ piping heart-wrenching
tunes, as people arrived to take a much coveted seat at the memorial
service for former prime minister Gough Whitlam.
The service for
such a gigantic presence in the landscape of Australian politics, and a
revered hero among the Labor Party and its true believers, was
extraordinary from beginning to end.
An unusual thing happened as
smartly dressed people filed in - a surprise standing ovation and
raucous applause erupted out of nowhere as people craned their necks to
see who, out of all the who's who at this grand memorial, had arrived.
It
was for Paul Keating and a surprise companion - his ex wife Anita - as
they walked down the red carpet aisle towards the front of the service
to take their seats.
There was this overwhelming, palpable feeling
of adoration and warmth, and a sense of belonging that erupted among
the crowd inside.
Former and current MPs, members of Mr Whitlam's
cabinet, dignitaries and ordinary mortals erupted in such joy and pride
- like fans of a beloved AFL football team cheering a captain and team
after a grand final win - like I had not seen at a memorial before.
It continued for Bob Hawke and Blanche d'Alpuget,
for Julia Gillard, Kevin Rudd and even for current Labor politicians,
beginning with Penny Wong and her partner as they walked down the aisle
of adoration.
John Howard was booed by the gigantic crowd watching on outside, but Mr Whitlam's comradeship was alive and well inside.
The
Howards sat side-by-side with his former political foe Bob Hawke and
Blanche and they chatted like any other normal old friends or family who
only catch up at funerals or weddings and are genuinely pleased to see
each other.
The last ovation was for Mr Whitlam's family, who
arrived to the sounds of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and Sydney
Philharmonia Choir.
And then to the national anthem - it was an
incredible experience knowing that seven prime ministers were in the
same room singing Advance Australia Fair with everyone.
Speakers
like Graham Freudenberg recounted numerous anecdotes, like Mr Whitlam
referring to his wife Margaret as "the other member for Werriwa".
It aroused warm laughter among the distinguished throng for a great man who reached a position most will only ever dream about.
At times it felt so much bigger than a memorial.
When
Noel Pearson spoke of "this old man's legacy with no partisan brief"
and counted off Mr Whitlam's achievements, there was great applause
inside and a great "Yes" could be heard from the masses outside.
It felt like a US presidential inauguration rather
than a farewell. It was a reminder of Mr Whitlam's value of equality and
his lasting impact still, alive in people's minds.
Many were
reduced to tears and some sang along when - as Kerry O'Brien called it -
Australia's other anthem, From Little Things Big Things Grow, was
performed by Paul Kelly and Kev Carmody.
After hearing of his
supporters talk of the greatness of his achievements and his place in
history, it was then to his son Antony, where the reminder of being a
memorial service of someone's dad started to sink in.
All leaned in to listen with respect as the greatness of his father was spoken of again.
He then introduced the closing hymn Jerusalem, as a farewell to his father and his legacy.
The
ovations began again as Mr Whitlam's family, seven former prime
ministers, his cabinet and hundreds of politicians past and present
filed out of a town hall that felt luminous with heartfelt admiration
poured into one space to remember a man of conviction, who arguably
changed the landscape of Australian politics forever.
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And at this point, Albanese really got started, zeroing in on the 
