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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 3 Hansard (8 April) . . Page.. 711 ..
MR MOORE (continuing):
beyond the sorts of attitudes that resulted in the problems that we and so many others had in World War II. When I say "we", I am speaking generally. I think it is important to recognise that probably most Australians do have these views, but there still exists within Australia a clear attitude that peace is not the most important thing; there are issues of pride and other issues that are much more important.
We come up with this issue that people have begun to talk about - the need for an apology. These demands for apologies are something that I have heard only recently, I must say - maybe in the last half decade or so. It seems to me that, as a nation, we sat down with another nation after a war and signed a peace treaty. That is an agreement to look forward, not a dwelling on the past. That peace treaty is the very thing that we should dwell on and is the very issue that comes up with regard to this park and our ties to Nara. When I was in Japan, I visited a number of peace parks. For us to be able to reciprocate in this way means that we are saying that it is not just an Australian peace but a peace at a much lower level - preferably person to person, individual to individual.
We want a peaceful world; certainly, city to city, we would like to have a peaceful world. It seems to me that is one of the reasons why all over the world we see the twinning of cities. We see the twinning of cities so that people know that the people in those other cities are ordinary citizens like themselves, with very similar aspirations. Certainly, when it comes to dealing with their children and their children's children and dealing with issues of kindness and peace as well as with economic issues, they are concerned in the same sorts of ways. A Canberra/Nara Peace Park would achieve that. I suppose, with the wisdom of hindsight, it may have been appropriate to seek a name like "peace and friendship park", or something to that effect. To my way of thinking, looking at this issue now, we may have actually enhanced our park by calling it a peace and friendship park. However, peace is very important.
I would just like to deal with the stand of John Howard and Digger James and with this whole notion of apologies. If it is appropriate for apologies to be made, then perhaps the Prime Minister would like to apologise for Australia's part in the Boer War. As my understanding goes, Australia has not apologised for its role in the Boer War. Yet one could put very good reasons why an island continent, Australia, as part of an empire, would need to apologise now for its part in a war in South Africa. In fact, more recently, we may have been inclined to be apologetic for the war that we were involved in in Vietnam. Why would we not do that? Why would we not have a Prime Minister who was likely to apologise for our role in Vietnam? There are a huge number of Vietnam veterans who are my age - indeed, I was called up as part of that process - who would be particularly upset by such an apology. One has to ask, "Is an apology necessary?". I would have said, "No, it is not necessary. It is not necessary for us to apologise for our part in the Boer War. It is not necessary for us to apologise for our part in the Vietnam War". What we needed and what we have is peace treaties and actions that take us forward and that look forward to peace.
I know that most members, if not all members, are members of Amnesty International. Why are we members of that organisation? We are members of that organisation because we believe in the importance of human rights and human freedoms; because we want to work internationally to try to achieve these things. Why do we not have the same sort of process here? We have a wonderful opportunity to say, "Here is a situation where we
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