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from public office his energies were far from diminished as he embarked on a new community role of unofficial ambassador for Canberra. He has left the capital enriched by his memory. Fred Daly was, and will continue to be, a role model we can all aspire to in our political duties.

MR OSBORNE: Mr Speaker, I am pleased to support my colleagues here in the condolence motion for the Hon. Fred Daly. We have heard this morning a lot of talk about Fred Daly’s political career. I would like to dwell on a couple of personal matters between Fred and me. As has been well documented, Fred was patron of the Raiders. But, from my own point of view, he was also patron of Newtown, which was my team, my suffering side that was not very successful. I met Fred a long time ago when I played S.G. Ball for Newtown. He has always been a hero in my mind.

I was born in Fred's electorate. I attended the same church as Fred. My family all voted for him. He was a wonderful representative. I suppose my first real encounter with Fred was when I first joined the Raiders in 1992. I had not seen him for a number of years and I remember walking into our first home game. I think it was against Penrith. They had fought out the grand final with us the year before. Prior to the match, Tim Sheens, the coach, entered the dressing room and I remember seeing this old fellow waddling around the room. I thought, “Who is this?”. He walked up to me and he said, “Good luck. I hope you score a couple of tries today”. Anyone who knows my football career, Mr Speaker, knows that in 10 years I scored a total of about three tries. So I immediately thought, “This is a very optimistic fellow”. As has been well documented by other members of the Raiders side, after a loss - although I must say that we did not lose many games with the Raiders, Mr Speaker, but on the odd occasion we did - Fred would be first into the room, walking around telling everyone that they had had a blinder. I must say that when you have had a bad game you always look for people like that to bolster up your spirits a little bit.

He was a great man. I remember talking to him when I first toyed with the idea of coming into politics, and he said to me those same words that he said to my colleague Mr Moore, namely, “Learn the standing orders”. Although I have not quite mastered them to Mr Moore's level, I am working on it. Mr Speaker, in summing up, for me Fred Daly was a great friend. I was fortunate enough to spend a few hours with him at the Raiders auction a couple of weeks ago and I did by chance happen to pop in and say good day to him when the Raiders were playing Wests, just before he passed away. He seemed to be in pretty good spirits then, but I had noticed a deterioration in him. For me, as the Chief Minister said, the three biggest things in Fred's life were his God, his family and his party. All of us here should take a great lesson from that. I, for one, think Fred Daly served them all admirably.

MR DE DOMENICO (Minister for Urban Services): To me, the thing that was testimony to the great bloke that Fred Daly was was the number of people and the calibre of person who attended his funeral in Sydney. The thing that really stood out was the number of politicians in particular from all political parties who were there respecting the fact that Fred Daly was a good bloke. And is it any wonder? The other really satisfying thing was to see the number of Canberra people from business, the sporting arena and the political arena. As I said, people of all political persuasions were there paying their respects to Fred Daly.

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