Thursday, August 18, 2005
Last of the First Speeches
The final three First Speeches of the new crop of Senators occurred today. First up was the NSW National Senator Fiona Nash. She is a farmer from Young, but has also been a Ministerial staffer for 5 years, which explains why she appears so comfortable in the Parliamentary environment. There was a heavy focus on rural and regional Australia and the divide between city and country, which is understandable, but still seemed somewhat fresher in her approach and ideas than the stereotypical National Party Senator. She called for intellectual as well as economic prosperity and noted the importance of adequate childcare and a better work and family balance. She also noted the terrible state of indigenous health and the lack of services and support for mental health and carers. She gave a big push for ethanol and made a reasonable fist of trying to justify the sale of Telstra. It was a solid speech without having any dramatic standouts. There was no overt interest at all from the press gallery, with only the ever faithful AAP watching on. There was a decent crowd of observers from the House of Reps included Warren Truss, Mark Vaile, John Cobb, Deanne Kelly, Paul Neville, Kay Hull and John Forrest. Second was South Australian Labor Senator Dana Wortley. She was third on the Labor Senate ticket and probably wasn't expecting to win a seat, but benefited from the collapse of the Democrat vote in that state, taking the Democrat seat held by Meg Lees. Dana has a background in education and the media, and has been an officer with the journos union (MEAA). Perhaps not surprisingly, she spoke about the importance of the media and of a stronger ABC and the lack of new Australian drama being broadcast. She also gave some emphasis to women, to indigenous disadvantage and to climate change, as well as a burst against the planned changes to industrial relations laws. I only saw one Labor MP from the House of Reps observing and only 2 journos in the gallery. Last was Tasmanian Liberal Senator Stephen Parry. He's from Burnie in the north-west and is best known as being a former funeral director, but he also worked for a decade as a policeman, and he drew on these experiences in the early part of his speech. He replaced long standing Independent, Brian Harradine, briefly acknowledging his contribution. This was one of the extra Senate seats the Libs picked up at the last election. The longest serving Senator is now another Tasmanian, Liberal John Watson, who is the only one here who has experience of a Government controlled Senate. Senator Parry spoke in support of greater funding for medical research (making some appropriate jokes about funeral directors along the way). Peter Costello came to watch, as did 3 other newer House of Reps people. The media observation dropped back to one again. All 14 newly sworn in Senators have now given their First Speeches in the last fortnight. However, we'll probably have another one in two weeks time when the Senate resumes, as the woman replacing Sue Mackay, the Tasmanian Labor Senator who resigned in July, will be sworn in then. |
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