CONDOLENCES
Mr HAWKE (Mitchell) (11:14): I share my great sadness at the passing of the Hon. Bruce Baird and extend my and Amelia's and my family's deepest sympathies to Mike, Julia, Stephen, his grandchildren and great grandchild, to the entire Baird family—Liberal royalty in the great state of New South Wales. Bruce Baird was one of those politicians that you can remember.
From when I was a young man in high school, I can remember Nick Greiner. I can remember his dismissal because I was kicked out of class because my teachers were celebrating. I found that very difficult at public school.
I remember Bruce Baird because he was such an exceptional transport minister. There are very few politicians from your childhood that you could name or think about, on television or elsewhere. Not only was he an Olympics minister; he was the most effective transport minister of my generation growing up.
That's no small thing—inherent competence in a man who really believed in the preparation required for the Public Service. He had prepared himself like no other: a deep Christian, an ideological liberal, a person who understood good policy, good politics, how to administer a government department and how to deal with people. He had real charisma, real X factor—a man to admire to be sure.
Think of the contribution that he made to Australia. There is no doubt that anybody who lived in Sydney in that era would tell you this: at that Sydney Olympics, we had never before seen that kind of spirit wash over an entire city. It washed over the entire place.
Crime was non-existent. Prejudice had vanished. We celebrated a joint humanity.
We celebrated a great, functional, fantastic Olympic Games. For a period of time, all quarrels were forgotten. Bruce Baird can forever be proud of that legacy, and his name will be synonymous with what was one of the greatest ever Olympic Games in world history and no doubt something that all Australians have a shared pride in.
Bruce was a strong Christian man, and his Christianity, I think, did dominate his political decision-making for the better. Liberalism has two great traditions. He was architect of and advocate for the liberal tradition.
Certainly, I come from the conservative tradition. We never saw quite eye to eye on many of these policies, but I could never disrespect Bruce for having that giant intellect. He would argue and argue powerfully.
I've never seen, in this place, more fear than in the policy committee in government, the Liberal backbench policy committee for immigration. The preparation that used to go into those meetings! Any immigration minister will tell you; any of their staff will tell you.
To go to a meeting with Bruce Baird and his compatriots at that time and be challenged in that way was exactly how the parliament should function. He challenged the government. He challenged them with intellectual prowess, with moral principle, with a deep and abiding understanding of compassion.
And it produced the best in government. By the time I arrived in the immigration portfolio, there was not a child in detention. And we can thank Bruce Baird for that.
No child will, I believe, ever be detained again, even in our asylum system when parents make terrible choices or things happen or go wrong. What an achievement for a human being, to have brought through government policy to ensure that no child will ever sit in a detention centre again under government policy—real impact and real power in the federal parliament as in the state parliament.
In fact, Bruce Baird gave us that lived authentic vision of life that comes through in the Christian spirit, most notably adopted by C. S. Lewis in Mere Christianity when he said: Do not waste time bothering whether you 'love' your neighbour; act as if you did.
Bruce was a man who acted as if he loved his neighbour at all times, and everyone who met him would say so. He was a liberal. I was a conservative.
He would make me laugh about the conservative tradition every time we had an argument. I would laugh at myself, laugh at my own tradition. He was that kind of man.
They say it is quite difficult for a son to have a great man for a father. Sometimes they fall into their shadow. Sometimes they're unable to live up to their tradition.
But the greatness of Bruce Baird is borne out, in my opinion, in the bringing forward of his son Mike Baird, who was one of our state's best and strongest premiers. That is an intensely difficult thing to do with a great man as a father. But you can see the humanity in Mike.
You can see the Christian tradition and the economic liberalism. While Mike brings his own particular inherent competence and conservatism to his role, his father shone through in Mike's premiership, which is still impacting New South Wales in a positive way. New South Wales's books are balanced.
We have the world-class metro. We have the best infrastructure in Australia because of Mike Baird's deliberate premiership, sponsored and authored by his father, Bruce. We thank God for Bruce and his life, and the Baird family.
We thank them for their contribution to Australian liberalism—authentic, powerful intellectual giants of the Liberal Party who had a real impact in the biggest state in our country but also on the national stage. I thank them for what they have done for New South Wales and in providing our city with a vision of its best self, of how it can be its best, in the Sydney Olympics, which will never be forgotten, and, in the federal parliament, in the removal of children from detention.
They were great achievements for a great man. Our condolences to all his family on the passing of this great figure.