ADDRESS TO THE YOUNG LIBERAL MOVEMENT NATIONAL CONVENTION

_{22 January, 2006}

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Thanks very much, Daniel and Alex, and to all of your executive, and Grant Chapman, and other parliamentary colleagues and Young Liberals.

As a former Young Liberal myself many, many years ago, and as a relatively recent past Federal Patron of the Young Liberal Movement, I'm always delighted to be with Young Liberals.

I am pleased this morning that I showed a lot of sense in not turning up at the function last night because I probably am a little healthier than most of you in the room. But it is great to be with you and thank you for having me.

The last six months have been a period of achievement for the Liberal Party with the passage of the Workplace Relations Program, the Welfare to Work Reforms, the Telstra Sale Bill and, of particular importance to young Australians and many in this particular room today, the long-term policy goal of Voluntary Student Unionism was finally adopted to start on the 1st of July this year.

So well done and congratulations, particularly to the Young Liberal Movement and the Liberal Students Federation for their work over many generations of Liberal activities in achieving that particular goal. My sincere congratulations.

Can I also congratulate those couple of student unions around Australia who have been successful in getting Young Liberals first of all elected to those student unions and then having those student unions actually support the Voluntary Student Unionism. I refer of course very proudly to the James Cook University Student Union in Townsville and Cairns, and of course the University of New England whose officials have actively supported the passage of that legislation in the media.

I reflect today on how this policy achievement occurred in a Parliament that rarely is able to effectively achieve policy goals. Our success with those landmark pieces of legislation did not result from debate in the Senate, nor even from some of the background dealings that had to occur. Our success is emphatically due to one thing and that is numbers - we had the numbers in the Senate.

How could this be with our Senate system of voting which has the Senators from the left of the political spectrum of about 50% or religiously 50% at every election, and Senators from the right of the political spectrum, the other 50%.

I'm very proud to say, Young Liberals, that it is my state, Queensland, and the culmination of a lifelong goal of mine that has put a third Liberal Senator into the Senate and into the Parliament, and that Liberal Senator gives the government its majority in the Senate.

The achievement of getting a third Liberal and one National Senator into the Parliament at the last election is nothing short of remarkable. And it's an effort that I think that will be hard to emulate anywhere around this country, but it did happen and it happened in Queensland.

You know back in the 1950s when the Liberal Party was in its infancy, the Party in Queensland was a broadly based Party - both support wise and also geographically. Indeed, where I live in the Ayr - Home Hill district of north Queensland, way up there in the tropics, the sugar growing area which back in the 1950s was four days travelling by road from Brisbane, there was in those days a very strong Liberal Party Branch consisting of farmers, of businessmen and women, and other people in the town. And it was led by a sugar mill employee, a man by the name of Bob Sherrington, later a Liberal Senator and a distinguished President of the Queensland Division of the Liberal Party who the Queensland Young Liberals honour each year with the Bob Sherrington Memorial Dinner.

A short time after Bob Sherrington moved to Brisbane and that was in the late 1950s, and the Liberal Organisation in my town went into slumber, one might say, but in 1965 it was reformed by Young Liberals. The public meeting to launch the Branch attracted one eager and I might say quite naïve articled law clerk who even in a community that was overly represented by cane farmers believed that the Liberal Party with its non-sectional, it's broad base, it's free enterprise principles and it's the concentration on the individual was the right Party for me and the right Party for Australia.

I hadn't heard at that time of Menzies 'forgotten people' speech but I certainly experienced its sentiments.

And after a couple of unsuccessful state campaigns in the 1960s and one successful federal campaign in the seat of Herbert, which in those days did encompass Ayr and Home Hill, the Organisation again went to sleep for about a decade until 1983 when a revitalised Liberal Party took on the entrenched National Party and the Bjelke Peterson regime for the state contest for the Parliament in Queensland. In that election in 1983, I was beaten by the might of the then all-conquering National Party regime and the Police State which existed in Queensland in those days. But I did at that time form a determination to make the Liberal Party the Party of choice everywhere in Queensland.

At the time that I was first elected to Parliament in 1990, the Liberal Party did not have one single seat, State or Federal, outside the Brisbane metropolitan area. Outside Brisbane, in 1990, you were either Labor or National, no one knew of, or more importantly cared about, the Liberal Party.

And since that time a lot of people have done a lot of work to change that and from my Liberal outpost in north Queensland we have achieved much.

I and many others have for 15 years travelled the length and breadth of country Queensland changing perceptions, displaying our credentials and garnering the country vote. That work over a period of time, the very clever campaign strategy developed by Senator Brandis and Senator Mason and John Howard's popularity in rural Australia were critical to the election of that third Liberal Senator in Queensland at the last election giving us the control of the Senate.

Now Young Liberals, I didn't plan to come here today planning to give you a discourse on the Party history of the Liberal Party in country Queensland but I did want to make the point that our acceptance in all parts of the country, our broad appeal has allowed our government to achieve its policy goals.

Alex and Young Liberals when I accepted your very kind invitation to speak at your National Convention it was certainly not my intention to finish my speech with what I say next.

Last Thursday evening, the Prime Minister advised me that I would not be reappointed to the Ministry.

It's been for me an honour and a privilege to have served Australia for seven years as a Minister, three years as a Parliamentary Secretary and about four years as the Opposition Shadow Minister.

And I thank John Howard and Alexander Downer and John Hewson for giving me that opportunity.

John Howard has my respect and admiration for his ability and the way that he has led Australia in the past ten years. He has indeed been an exceptional Prime Minister.

My loyalty to the Liberal Party, particularly in North Queensland, to my staff, to the many friends who have supported me over the years, and indeed to the north broadly has meant that I have no interest in serving Australia in another non-parliamentary capacity.

In September last year I was endorsed by the Queensland Liberals by a vote of 245 to 25 to represent Queensland as a Liberal Senator for a further six year term, and at the time of my preselection I did indicate that I would serve out my next term.

I intend to remain a committed part of the Liberal team in Parliament. There is still much to be done in Australia. I will now concentrate on my passion for improving a lot of those living and working in regional and rural Australia, and for highlighting the wealth and importance and opportunities in northern Australia.

I commit myself to the return of the Liberal Coalition Government in Queensland.

In the time that I've had the privilege to be a Minister, I hope that I have made a difference.

The work done against illegal fishing in Australia's southern and northern waters will pay dividends for Australia in the very near future. And the $220 million fishing package and the Torres Strait Fisheries Readjustment will set the framework for a profitable and sustainable fishing industry in Australia.

I believe Aquaculture is well on its way to becoming one of the sustainable and profitable sources of seafood in this country contributing further to the regional workforce.

My part in saving the Tasmanian forestry industry and its consequent impact on the outcome of the last Federal Election are highlights of my ministerial career. As well, I'm proud of my contribution to rural Australia with the Rural Transaction Centres, the Roads to Recovery Program and support for Local Government. And I look back fondly on the initiatives that I started in our external territories which will eventually lead to better administration there.

Being a Minister is a great privilege but to do the job properly does require the support and commitment of others. And I particularly want to thank my wife, Lesley, for her generous and never failing support and encouragement, my staff present and past whose talents and loyalties have been exceptional, my friends and supporters and the staff of the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, the Department of Transport and Regional Services and the Environment Department all of whom have always given me very professional support.

I want to thank Robert Hill for his continuous loyalty and support. He has been my leader in the Senate and in other ways in all of my time in the Senate and I wish him all the best for the future.

As one door closes others open and I look forward to working for Australia in a different capacity in the years ahead.

From my very first meeting of the Liberal Party some 40 years ago now, I've been a firm and tangible supporter of the Young Liberal Movement and what it has done and will continue to do for Australia. I intend to use my next eight years in the Parliament to continue that support. My immediate goal is to ensure the election in the state seat of Townsville of one Jessica Weber, the Townsville Young Liberal President and the retiring President of the James Cook University Student Union, an excellent candidate and an excellent and very capable person. Those of you who know Jess realise how achievable that goal is.

My thanks to the Young Liberal Movement for their support during my term in Parliament.

In me you have the strongest supporter. If there is ever anything that I can do to help please don't hesitate to call on me.

Thanks very much for having me with you today and good luck for the future.

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