Tiberius with a Telephone

by Patrick Mullins

  To those inside Parliament, McMahon’s objection stemmed from the implied reflection on his abilities and the sense of being pressured by his own ministers. He decided that the ministry should be consulted, but this was seen as his way of playing for time. Snedden called around to find out what other members thought. Bert Kelly remarked:

  Billy Snedden asked me what I thought and I told him I thought it was a good idea. The chief reason is that I am frightened of two things, first, that the more Billy McMahon exposes himself to Parliament, the more shallow and unprepossessing does he become. Secondly, if we have a policy speech in the proper sense of the word, following this budget we will probably have to have another auction sale which we can’t afford.91

  When it came to ministers, however, there was no unanimity. While Fraser, Forbes, and Nixon were supportive, Bowen — whom Snedden and Anthony believed was in favour — turned against the idea after talks with McMahon. Lynch and Chipp were in favour of an election later in the year. Fairbairn said he would accept McMahon’s judgement on the matter.92

  That ended it. McMahon guarded his prime-ministerial prerogative zealously. He wanted a later election. It was not an unreasonable decision; in fact, it might very well have been a correct one. The logistics of a snap election were daunting, with neither the Electoral Office nor the Liberal Party organisation in any state to take on the strain of an election.93 Moreover, as the subsequent publication of Gallup and ANOP polls suggested, the payoff for the budget measures was slight, with only a 1 per cent swing towards the government discernible.94 Holding out, and hoping, was the government’s best strategy.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  Tributes

  1984

  McMahon returned to the office on Wednesday, 11 April. He was pale, his hair lacked ‘its usual dark tints’, and there was a little blood on his shirt collar. But he seemed happy, Bowman thought, and noticeably less stressed.1

  But his memory was still failing, and his mind was playing tricks on him. That Friday, McMahon put a letter from a local pharmacy onto Cawthorn’s desk. ‘Get me James Clancy,’ he told her, pointing to a handwritten annotation on the letter. Cawthorn called the pharmacy, but they had never heard of a James Clancy. When Cawthorn told McMahon this, later, he grabbed at the letter again and pointed, this time to the letterhead, to the pharmacy’s address. ‘Get me George Street!’ Cawthorn was boggled. When McMahon asked, later, if she had contacted Street, she deflected the question: ‘He’s not available.’2

  Easter and the ANZAC Day holidays allowed for a much-needed break. McMahon went to his property at Orange and came back ‘a good deal quieter and saner’. Bowman made good headway on the book. By 27 April, he had finished chapters four and five, the latter on the economic problems in 1960–61 and McMahon’s letters to Menzies.3 But there were distractions over and over again. Three days later, Bowman had to set aside the manuscript to edit a letter that McMahon wanted sent to the Sydney Morning Herald. He had spent a week on it, and had sent George Campbell running around Sydney doing research for it. The letter was a gargantuan 1,500 words — too long to run in the newspaper — and in Bowman’s opinion it was terrible. ‘Hopeless,’ he remarked, and cut it down to 500 words.4

  And yet there were occasional glimpses of McMahon’s ability to pull himself together when the occasion warranted. The next day, he taped a video address for a Masonic charity that provided homes for the elderly and infirm. The remarks were clear, lucid, and characteristically immodest: ‘A tribute to those who first saw the need for proper care of the aged…’ McMahon said.

  In spite of himself, Bowman was impressed: ‘Voice like Gladstone!’5

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  ‘Where We Are Heading’

  1972

  McMahon had recognised early in his tenure that the government needed to refresh its agenda and policies. Whitlam had staked out ground in urban development and housing, had made forays into censorship policy and open government, and the government had allowed him to do so almost without contest. To have any chance of winning the election, McMahon decided, his government needed to demonstrate that it too had policy in these, and other, areas. To find this new agenda, McMahon turned to the Liberal Party organisatioin.

  ‘Party policy needs restatement in fresh terms and in a contemporary environment,’ he wrote, in a letter sent in August 1971. ‘We should be able to state where we stand and where we are heading.’1 In response to his request, the Liberal Party’s joint standing committee on federal policy established twelve sub-committees to report with policy recommendations for education, social welfare, urban development, health care, arbitration and industrial law, law and order, immigration, rural issues, defence, and foreign policy, and ‘national goals’. The remaining two sub-committees were to be purely oppositional: one was to study Labor’s ‘socialist objective’ and its implications for voters, with the aim of ‘destroy[ing] Labor’s known policies’2; the other was to look at the ALP’s power structure.3

  By the end of May 1972, federal president Robert Southey was lauding the work as ‘more far-reaching than any other undertaken since the formation of the Liberal Party’.4 Aware that the need to counter the advantages held by the ALP was pressing, the decision was made not to hoard the policy recommendations but to use them before the election. What followed, throughout 1972 but most particularly in the latter half of the year, was the fruition of that policy work. It surfaced in a flurry of ministerial statements, a bevy of white papers, and a litany of reports, all of them aiming to demonstrate the existence and superiority of government policy — or, as Snedden was to put it, ‘good reasons not to change [government]’.5

  Some were in areas where there was little chance of movement. Suggestions that the voting age be lowered from twenty-one to eighteen were heard but then ignored. Attempts to have it lowered through court action were struck out. McMahon, who, two years before had told the Liberal Party’s federal council that Liberal MPs in marginal seats would never agree to the idea, on grounds that ‘it would tip the balance against them’, would soon move to explore it, only for the Country Party to resist.6 Suggestions that the government do something on superannuation were similarly considered but eventually forgeone.

  Attempts to devise a policy on secrecy and transparency in government were similarly hampered. Catalysed by publication of Jim Spigelman’s Secrecy: political censorship in Australia, which argued that the McMahon government was secretive and McMahon himself deceitful, McMahon harried the public service and his ministers to come up with a response.7 By the time the response could be drafted, it was nearly too late. On 25 October, cabinet deferred the submission.8 There would be no other attempt to address the matter. An attack on Labor for its support of the thirty-five-hour workweek came under the guise of a ministerial statement and with pointed reference to the economic cost. Senator Thomas Drake-Brockman, the minister for air, told the Senate, on McMahon’s behalf, that, ‘The sum of it all would be a serious assault on our standard of living.’9

  Attempts to counter the Labor Party’s policies in health bore mixed results. Under the gentlemanly minister for health, senator Kenneth Anderson, a wrangle with the Pharmacy Guild in April had been resolved with little criticism from Labor. There was a similar result in a debate in the second half of the year over reforming the funding of aged-care homes. But the government did not win plaudits for these successes, Anderson would say. Because the matters had Labor’s support, they seemed uncontroversial, uninteresting, and thus media interest was limited. ‘We got about as much publicity as you’d get if a dog bit a man,’ Anderson said later.10

  But there was relentless criticism from Labor, and considerable publicity, for problems associated with the common fee. In March, in response to questioning from Whitlam about overcharging by GPs in New South Wales, McMahon announced that there would be an enquiry, with details to be announced by Anderson that day.11 The speed with which this moved was
too fast for Anderson. After a cursory survey of candidates to lead the enquiry, McMahon selected John Kerr, only for Kerr to pull out when he was named chief justice of the Supreme Court of New South Wales. McMahon had known of this possibility before Kerr’s appointment, Anderson said later, yet he had picked Kerr anyway. ‘The anguish and concern we had in relation to that was unbelievable,’ Anderson said.12 Never particularly healthy, Anderson also became very ill in August, and was away from the Senate until October. In combination with his unprovocative manner, Anderson’s absences in the vital second-half of 1972 meant that the government was unable to gain attention for its measures on health.

  In other areas, the government’s attempts to refresh and find new, appealing polices were more successful. Under Fraser, education received some of the most significant attention and action. In July 1971, the government had more than doubled — from 1,500 to 4,000 — the number of scholarships for students attending colleges of advanced education;13 in 1972, responding to increased demand and competition, Fraser gained cabinet’s approval to expand the number of scholarships, this time also including those available to students attending, and about to attend, university.14 After establishing the Commission on Advanced Education as a statutory body, cabinet accepted recommendations from both it and the Australian Universities Commission for a large expansion of funding for advanced-education providers and universities across the country.15

  Changes in secondary education were no less remarkable. In December 1971, the government had increased the rates of per capita assistance to independent schools and announced $20m worth of capital grants. In May 1972, it went further: McMahon announced that the Commonwealth would provide $167m in capital grants over the years 1973–78 for construction of libraries and science laboratories in secondary schools; would provide $48m over the same period for building classrooms and facilities in independent schools; and would, with the states, commit to making per capita grants to independent schools at a rate of 40 per cent of the cost of educating a child in a government school — an extra $14.3m per year.16 Two months after this, cabinet agreed that the Commonwealth should partner with the state governments and provide $1.5m over five years to ‘stimulate’ the teaching of Asian languages and cultures in schools.17 Cabinet also agreed to provide 25,000 scholarships for the final two years of secondary schooling.18

  By August, the government had committed to an extra $72m in Commonwealth spending on education — a 20 per cent increase on the previous year’s appropriation. It was an eye-catching sum, and belied suggestions that the government was doing nothing. But amid the continuing economic unrest, there were questions to be asked about the prudence of these increases. Was all of this affordable? one interviewer asked McMahon. Was there a risk in all the ‘larger social service Bills’ the government had committed to? ‘No risk whatsoever,’ said McMahon, ‘because the Commonwealth always has the power to be able to pay for the promises it makes and the legislation it introduces … I believe what we have done is just about right, and I think it will turn out to be right in the long run, too.’19 McMahon was quite aware of the importance of education in public opinion; it was another of the ways that he attempted to regain the government’s standing.20

  Another area where the government made a significant change was in childcare. In the 1972–73 budget, the government announced its intention to provide assistance to non-profit organisations to establish and operate childcare centres for children of working and sick parents. Building on a promise made by Gorton in the 1969 election campaign,21 the McMahon government passed the Child Care Act 1972, which offered money for the building and maintenance of childcare centres, the training of qualified staff, grants for centres to offer lowered fees to needy families, and funding for further research into childcare.22 Though the test providing for lowered fees was criticised for discouraging mothers from working, the Act’s significance lay in the changes that it augured.23 Childcare became a public responsibility, and the Act created a basis for Commonwealth governments to continue intervening. It was implicit acknowledgement of the need for Commonwealth involvement to ensure that high-quality childcare was available; it also opened the doors for professionalisation of the early-childhood education and care industry through training, qualifications, and continuing research.24 McMahon, who had pushed to take up the issue and for its inclusion in the budget, was aware of its significance and, crucially, that it was only a beginning. ‘I believe it is a very, very good start, but of course we would only regard it as the beginning of a process,’ he said.25

  The movement towards independence in Papua New Guinea had also been given fresh impetus by the McMahon government. Since taking over the external territories portfolio in January, Andrew Peacock had largely continued his predecessor’s policy for a self-governing territory that would, after a suitable interval, become independent. But Peacock’s conduct meant there was a key change. He was able to revitalise the process with his enthusiasm, charm, and willingness to engage; as one observer was to say, he ‘animated’ the government’s policy.26 Engendering goodwill over the course of seventeen visits, Peacock impressed upon Papua New Guinean officials the need to make their own decisions; back in Australia, he nudged the government’s policy closer to Labor’s by insisting on the reality of the move to self-government. He pressed colleagues to hasten their handover of vital infrastructure and civil responsibilities, such as control of civil aviation, and he was deeply involved in the considerable legislative and administrative changes that would need to be made in Australia and Papua New Guinea for self-government to work.

  ‘Creating a nation out of 500 tribes, 700 languages, trying to draw them together and setting up a representative government for this diverse country, was a huge challenge and I loved it,’ Peacock would say later.27 After elections in April saw Michael Somare become chief minister, Peacock won cabinet approval to urge Somare to lay the ‘sound groundwork’ for the steps towards self-government, a point quickly taken up in the decision to hold a constitutional conference in Port Moresby on 1 August. Peacock also managed to nudge his colleagues in cabinet to accept that a request for independence might be made before the next scheduled elections in Papua New Guinea.28 Peacock was not a McMahon supporter, but he offered his support to get the government moving. ‘I did my job,’ he said later.29

  At other times, however, the McMahon government’s moves to chart new policies was prompted less by purpose and more by accident and embarrassment. In a year characterised by pre-occupation with the economic downturn, poverty was an area where the government did itself no favours, yet managed to initiate worthwhile action.

  On ANZAC Day, the Anglican Archbishop of Sydney, Dr Marcus Loane, called for the government to deal with unemployment and price rises. The archbishop observed:

  The April mini-budget does not solve these problems nor does it adequately take into account the fact that pensioners have to make ends meet at a time when they face the same cost structures as every other Australian … Every winter in Australia welfare agencies, both Church and private, are inundated with pleas from those who have reached desperation point. It is a pity that this human need is not made obvious to those who hold the economic balance of power.30

  The next day, when Bert Kelly brought Loane’s statement to McMahon’s attention in Question Time, McMahon said, ‘It is obvious to me that the Archbishop does not have a very great knowledge of the problems associated with inflation and unemployment,’ he said. ‘… I shall make certain that His Grace the Archbishop is informed of what the government has done and that he has every opportunity to form a better view.’31 While a rebuttal of Loane’s statement was quite reasonable, the suggestion that Loane had little knowledge of the problem was not; if anything, it was gratuitous and insulting.

  Labor made moves to exploit the matter. Lionel Murphy, the ALP’s leader in the Senate, resurrected his long-running motion for an enquiry into poverty by the Senate’s Standing Commit
tee on Health and Welfare. The DLP joined the government to delay the motion, but it was clearly well disposed to the idea: it had acted only to allow the government to consider initiating its own. Billy Wentworth now made a suggestion that the government hold an enquiry, but cabinet was ‘not disposed’ to do so.32 Word of Wentworth’s support for an enquiry leaked, ensuring that the matter continued to bob up in press reports. When McMahon was asked about the prospect on 25 June, he scotched it entirely. ‘My own belief is that on social services and poverty it is up to the government to find out what is wrong and when it knows what is wrong, or when it even regards there are difficulties, to solve them itself. And that is my attitude and I believe it is the one we will take.’33 By July, McMahon was ‘pretty certain’ there would not be any such enquiry.

  Pressure continued to mount. Wentworth’s support — in another letter to McMahon — saw the possibility of an enquiry return to the cabinet agenda, where it was once again shrugged off.34 Religious and charitable groups called for the government to act; Gorton thrust himself back into debate with his opinion on the idea. ‘The time has passed when we can give $1 or $1.50 or, if it’s election year, $2 to pensioners,’ he told a Liberal Party meeting on 28 July. ‘The time has come for a proper public enquiry into these areas of poverty.’35

  Eventually, the pressure grew too much. On 15 August, the day of the budget, cabinet met again and decided that, after months of delay and ‘growing public concern about poverty and growing pressure’, the government should ‘take an initiative’ and institute an enquiry. Cabinet had been forced to the decision. As the resulting minute noted, Murphy’s motion for an enquiry would very likely have succeeded that week, and the government would have no control over its terms of reference. Thus a question was arranged in the House, so that McMahon could cut the pressure off immediately and announce the enquiry.36 The terms of reference were narrowly drawn: the enquiry would consider the extent of poverty in Australia and its levels, the demographics of poverty, the factors that caused it, and what government could do to alleviate it. There were restrictions: among them, a statement that the ‘poverty line’ that had been devised by Professor Ronald Henderson, the foremost expert on poverty in Australia, should not be introduced, nor should the government subscribe to it.37 Five days later, however, cabinet agreed that Henderson should be appointed to conduct the enquiry.38