Senator Andrew Bartlett
Tuesday, May 10, 2005
 
Senate Condolences precede and follow the Budget

In what may be symbolic of wider things, the Senate spent most of today speaking to condolence motions prior to the tabling of the Budget and will resume tomorrow with more of the same.

After starting with an hour or so debating a Workplace Relations Bill seeking to curtail the right of entry by union officials in to workplaces, we moved into Question Time, where the Immigration Minister, Senator Vanstone, quite rightly received a lot of questions over major failings of her Department.

Following that, there were a lot of speeches to a motion acknowledging the 60th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day. I spoke to this isse, and quoted some parts from a piece on Jellyfish's blog which I thought gave a good insight into the suffering and damage to lives in just one family that is caused by war. Pulling things back to the individual impact can sometimes give the enormity of war's horrors more impact than quoting numbers of millions dead and injured.

This was followed by a long condolence debate on Pope John Paul II. Whilst the Senate has an existing practice of moving condolence motions for Popes, having a long debate is a bit unusual. However, seeing there were a lot of speakers, I thought it appropriate to speak as well. I've written my thoughts on the Pope before, some of which I repeated in the Chamber. Whilst my view is that his global contribution was overwhelmingly positive, I felt it necessary to emphasise a few key failings – namely the ignoring of sexual and other abuse perpetrated by Catholic priests, and the human damage caused by continuing to denigrate the basic humanness of gays and lesbians.

Tomorrow morning, we have condolence motions on Al Grassby and Joh Bjelke-Petersen. I've already written pieces on this site about both men - Al Grassby here, and Joh here and here. However, whilst it is totally appropriate for people to speak in the Senate about Joh, I am not happy that a formal condolence motion has been moved. From all the information I could find, this will be the first time that a formal condolence motion will be moved by the Government in the Senate for a former State Premier, unless they had also served as a Senator or Governor-General. I could maybe live with the motion if it was existing standard practice, but I am concerned that this precedent is being set with someone as flawed as Joh. I've stated my views before, but I think it is dangerous for the future if we too easily airbrush the major errors of the past. However, the same motion has already been moved and passed in the House of Representatives (with a supporting speech by the ALP), which I am informed is also without precedent for a former Premier. I feel uncomfortable picking on a condolence motion, but I am even more uncomfortable with giving support to a motion which "records its appreciation of his long public service", given it is an unprecedented level of acknowledgement by the Senate for a former state Premier. Anyway, I'll deal with that little dilemma in the morning. No doubt it will occur unnoticed by the mainstream media, given the understandable focus on the Budget.

posted by Andrew Bartlett @ Tuesday, May 10, 2005 Permalink
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