February 2006 Newsletter

The summer holidays have come to an end and parliament resumes next week. Last week the Prime Minister reshuffled his ministry and appointed me his Parliamentary Secretary with special responsibility for water policy.

Also in this news letter:

- news on Australia Day in Wentworth,
- the debate about whether the Australian Flag should fly on the Bondi Pavilion,
- farewell to three good friends and great Australians,
- a new FAQ on the shared parenting amendments to the Family Law Act, and
- how to unsubscribe or change your details .

Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister

Last Friday I was sworn in, at Government House, as the Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister with special responsibility for water policy. 

The new Cabinet Ministers were Mal Brough as Minister for Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and Julie Bishop as the new Minister for Education, replacing Brendan Nelson who in turn was promoted to Minister for Defence replacing Senator Robert Hill who has retired from Parliament.  The Prime Minister's other changes to the Ministry are here.

I was delighted to be given this new responsibility. I have had a long interest in water policy and in water conservation in particular, although to date almost all of my speaking and writing has been about urban water. I have a great deal to learn about the wider water challenges, especially in the irrigation areas and I hope to be visiting a number of irrigation districts within a few weeks.

The Federal Government has already taken a leading role in Australia's water future through the National Water Initiative and the establishment of the National Water Commission and the Australian Government Water Fund and in my new role I will be  assisting the Prime Minister in developing and executing policies which will ensure a more secure and sustainable water future for all Australians. I have already met with the National Water Commission and their press release about our meetings is here.

Last year I launched a campaign to promote large scale water recycling and to reduce ocean pollution in Sydney. That is an important objective of the National Water Initiative. See my recycling website here.

Over the last year, I visited Israel and investigated their very sophisticated water practices and was a member of the House of Representatives Environment Committee whose report "Sustainable Cities"contains a very valuable chapter on Water. I have spoken on water issues on many occasions and my speeches on water and related sustainability issues are in the speeches section of my website here.

Australia Day in Wentworth

It was a particularly busy Australia Day. I represented the Australian Government at citizenship ceremonies at Randwick, Waverley and Woollahra Councils. The new citizens were excited to become Aussies on our national day, and as I said to them they honoured us by their decision to join our Australian family.

I also spoke at the Queen's Baton Relay ceremony at Centennial Park. The Park hosted the Relay on one of its few stops in Sydney on Australia Day.

The Melbourne 2006 Queen's Baton commenced its epic 366-day journey in London in March 2005, en route to the Melbourne Commonwealth Games in March 2006. The Baton travelled through all 71 Commonwealth nations and arrived in Australia on 25 January. It will travel for 50 days throughout Australia to all states and capital cities.

Why the Australian flag should fly from the Bondi Pavilion

In one of the more baffling political decisions I have ever observed, a few weeks before Christmas the Waverley Council's Green and ALP majority voted to block an initiative by Liberal Councillor Joy Clayton to fly the Australian and aboriginal flags from the roof of the Bondi Pavilion.

This is what I wrote in the Daily Telegraph.

The Australian flag belongs to all Australians, whether they are descendants of our first inhabitants or just became citizens last week. That is why the Federal Government encourages the flying of our national flag by all Australians. And that is why I, as a Federal MP, present a lot of flags to schools, clubs and other community organizations.

We don't fly our flag as often as the Americans do, but which Australian heart does not beat with a quiet patriotic pride when we see that big blue banner snapping in a brisk nor'easter or waving languidly in a gentle summer breeze?

Uluru may be more spiritual and the Opera House more cultural, but there is no place more recognizably Australian than Bondi Beach. And there is nowhere in Australia which better represents our easygoing acceptance of diversity.

Only the other day I was on the 380 bus and I heard two young Irishmen talking. "Where are you living, Pat?" one asked. "I got a flat in County Bondi." His friend replied.

Bondi welcomes and is home to the world. But that only makes it more Australian, not less.

And right in the centre of Bondi Beach is the Bondi Pavilion.

So what better place to fly our flag? Well that's what Bondi Ward's Liberal Councillor Joy Clayton thought and so for a year now she has been trying to persuade her colleagues at Waverley Council to fly the flag on the Pavilion.

She was knocked back in March. But they don't say you can take the girl out of Bondi, but you can't take the Bondi out of the girl for nothing. Joy needed more than the support of her Liberal colleagues to win the vote, so she enlisted the support of fellow Councillor Dominic Wy Kanak, an indigenous Australian. In December they proposed that Council fly two flags from the Pavilion: an Australian flag and an Aboriginal flag.

I was delighted to give Joy two flags. All Council had to do was put up the flagpoles.

However, the Labor Councillors and the rest of the Greens voted it down 5 votes to 4 on 13 December.

Now, I am sure that some of the Councillors were concerned about the events at Cronulla. But whether violent louts are waving the Australian flag or whether they are burning it should not diminish our pride in our flag.

The best answer to the misuse of our flag is to fly it with pride wherever and whenever we can and the best way we can show our flag belongs to all Australians is for all Australians to see it flown.

For a more pungent commentary Piers Akerman is hard to beat!

Farewells

Wentworth lost three of its most distinguished residents over the holidays.

Our friend Kerry Packer passed away on Boxing Day. Much has been written about him, and no doubt much more will be. Here is what I wrote on the morning I learned of his death.

Justice John Lockhart died a few weeks later. He was a great judge both in Australian and international courts and a very generous and charming friend. Only weeks before he fell ill he had completed a review of Australia's cloning laws. I "argued" my first case as a barrister before Lockhart J, and I can attest to his very considerable kindness and patience!

And only last week, we lost Gordon Douglass. Gordon was a gentle, elegant and witty man, successful in business, politically active and devoted to his family and horse racing (in that order).

All three of them, in different ways,  have given me great encouragement and support and Lucy and I will miss them each of them. 

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