Albanese, Anthony, MP

Mr ALBANESE (Grayndler—Leader of the Opposition) (14:09): Australian politics has featured a few giants, but only one has run the country from a caravan—Doug Anthony. Doug Anthony had to be a giant, given that the shoes he was filling were Black Jack McEwen's. And a giant is what he became, both as the nation's longest serving Deputy Prime Minister and as the leader of a relatively small party that, thanks to his efforts, consistently punched above its weight. Whether it was the Country Party or the National Party into which it morphed, Doug saw to it that his party stood resolutely at the centre of power. As he said of his partnership with Ian Sinclair and Peter Nixon, 'We tried to be reasonable, but we weren't going to take any nonsense from anybody either.' Doug was, of course, steeped in political life from an early age, often travelling to Canberra with his father, Larry Anthony Senior. Until the discovery of a cache of letters much later in life, Doug new little of his father's time fighting in Gallipoli. His father's time as a Menzies's government MP and then minister, on the other hand, was part and parcel of his childhood. They would stay at the Kurrajong, where the young Doug met many of the hotel's revolving cast of political residents. He told the ABC several years ago that his favourite was John Curtin—not what you would expect necessarily. Doug recounted this: Curtin was very kind to me and every evening after dinner we would come out into the lounge room and we'd have a seat that we would sit in, he and I, and he would tell me bedtime stories. —a great statement. As the second of the Anthony trinity to enter politics, Doug's style was summarised in his speech at the official change of the Country Party's name to the National Party: 'There is one thing that I would like to make clear: it is that what we are doing today is much more than political flim-flam.' It is doubtful that anyone ever mistook Doug Anthony for the flim-flam type. He was a man of drive and efficiency. His energy was guided by an innate understanding of the fact that power is for exercising and that advantage of incumbency is not to be wasted. While it's true he wasn't above playing politics hard, he was also a man of positivity and humility. He also seemed to recognise the value of at least occasionally being an enigma to his coalition colleagues. Michelle Grattan wrote after one particular event, way back in 1979, 'On occasions he simply leaves colleagues perplexed.' One Liberal remarked, 'You never know with Doug whether he's fallen into something or he's thought about it.' But his record speaks for itself, not the least his many achievements in agriculture, resources and trade. It is fair to say that I knew people who served with Doug and that he was respected across the parliament. His renowned generosity of spirit abandoned him though when it came to Britain turning its back on Australian agriculture as it entered the common market. Doug's feelings left little need for guesswork. This is what he said: It was the contempt that I couldn't put up with. It's always been the attitude of the colonial powers. After the loyalty that we'd shown, the wars that we'd fought—I thought it was a pretty shabby way to treat us. Perhaps it shouldn't come as a surprise then that Doug was so firmly in favour of an Australian republic. One person who saw him in action during the 1999 republic campaign was Richard Fidler. He was then a member of the Doug Anthony All Stars, the comedy troop that had lovingly re-purposed Doug's name. Richard crammed into Sydney Town Hall with an audience that was there—along with myself—to be wowed by the likes of Gough Whitlam. Doug took to the stage. The republicans who were there that day in the centre of Sydney weren't probably your natural National Party branch membership crowd, it's fair to say. So I actually remember the speech, and as Richard says: 'The mainly leftie crowd was suspicious, but he stormed it. He gave a stunningly good speech in support of a republic.' And I think he got a shout-out as big as the great Gough Whitlam that day from that crowd, to his great credit. Doug's political career was bookended by a common spirit. In his first speech to parliament in 1957 he expressed the bold hope: We may disagree with a member's political views, but that need not prevent us from being his friends and I certainly hope that I shall be friendly with political allies as well as political foes. As he bowed out in 1983, he said: I have never tried to build any deliberate enemies, although I will play politics with anybody, as I hope all honourable members will. But I hope that we can all maintain healthy personal relationships because if we do not, this institution will not work as it should. He was a gentleman. Of all the commitments Doug entered into in life, surely none was as powerful or long-lived as his marriage to Margot. As Larry, who is here with us today in the gallery, put it, 'It was a romance that never died.' Our thoughts today are with Margot; with Larry; his sister, Jane; his brother, Dugald, and all Doug's loving grandchildren. May he rest in peace, somewhere where perhaps there is a caravan and where the fish are always biting.