Page 1872 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 1 May 1991
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Mr Humphries: Maiden speech.
MR COLLAERY: Well, we do not use that term, I gather. I think Mr Connolly reminded us of that, but he used it himself in his address. That just proves that we all have our foibles. When he said that he was the only one elected in that manner and may go down in history, I could not but think of the 1935 election campaign when the Labor Party in New South Wales was not too sure of where it was going to go, so it put the following people on the ballot paper, trusting in the donkey vote - Amour, Armstrong, Arthur and Ashley.
Mr Stefaniak: Did they get in?
MR COLLAERY: And they got in. I am sure Mr Connolly will not have to rely on something like that.
With respect to the Labor Party, all of us who grew up in Wollongong were familiar with Spence's History of the AWU, the shearers and the maritime strikes and so on. Labor has travelled a long way. When it first got to Federal Parliament it was not that organised, and it has become progressively and cyclically organised and disorganised. I need not state what cycle it is in now; I think that is pretty obvious. It is a movement that had, and has, great aspirations. I just wish that they could see through those and, instead of trying to knock down alternative political parties, concentrate on cleaning up their own game first.
I say that because it has become particularly evident in recent times in this chamber, and elsewhere, that the Labor Party in this Territory is determined to attack the new movement, which I represent. That might be to the ultimate detriment of the Labor Party. I like to think that some of the values, the Chifley-type Labor values, that have been abandoned now reside in measure in the local new fledgling movement that exists in the Territory in the form of the Residents Rally.
I would say, on the centenary of Labor's growth, that if they are going to pass the baton to us, just for a little period, until they get their act together again, they should acknowledge that those of us in this chamber - I also look at my colleague Mr Duby - who make and press for strong social justice decisions in this Government should occasionally be given the credit for carrying the baton that was dropped in this Territory for a number of years. I do not say that it was dropped by those opposite, because they were not in power.
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