Book Launch of ‘The Land of Dreams’ by David Kemp
27 November 2018
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Well thank you for that address, David. It is a great privilege for the Speaker and I to be here with our friend, and mentor to so many of us in the Victorian Division of the Liberal Party, David Kemp.
This book, and the series that follow are not just important, they are critical. David, for the first time, tells our story: the liberal story that created the modern Australia that we know. He does it warts and all.
History, like mankind, and especially politics, can never achieve perfection. It can’t be blemish-free. But this is the story of the triumph of liberalism and liberal values in a new land.
Yes, it was tragically and wrongly assumed to be a blank slate, as David has just outlined, contrary to the wellbeing of the indigenous peoples. But it was a blank slate for the modern society that was built. This is the story of liberalism in Australia in all its strains, and all its battles and arguments, being applied to a society being built from the ground up like nowhere else in the world.
And this is why we should never disparage or abandon the liberal theme. It is our theme as a movement, as a Party, and most importantly as a nation.
Being a politician, it probably wouldn’t surprise anyone to note that my favourite chapter was Radical Democracy – I think it’s Chapter 14. The outline of how Eureka and its aftermath is a liberal story, not one we should allow to be claimed by militant fringes on either side. I can’t help but mention two elements as a Victorian, and I hasten to say it’s not an observation on recent events:
David writes that “Due to the rush of gold and mass immigration in such a short period in Victoria, if the dramatic spirit of the age were to be discovered, distilled and refined anywhere, it would be amongst the diggers on the goldfields of Victoria.”
He quotes William Stawell, then Attorney-General: “The very fact of emigrating has a tendency to render us all equal.” Those words are as appropriate in the 21st century as they were at that time.
David also goes on to say: “Victorian liberalism rapidly assumed a unique character”. This reflects that there were liberal characters across the country. We were products of historic events that came together to form the Australian story.
Recently, when the Speaker and I were considering re-naming some rooms in this parliament, I came across a statement from the original design plan that said we shouldn’t be naming rooms after people. Now I think that’s one reason this building can be a little soulless, but it also reflects how we lack public recognition of the liberal champions that David brings to life.
You can’t understand our success, you cannot understand Australia today, without understanding our foundations.
Because Australia’s history, as David has outlined, is a liberal history. Our opponents don’t talk much about the nineteenth century. We need to talk about it.
As David outlined, the first liberal party was in the 1830s. Liberalism dominated debate in every colony in the nineteenth century. And just as this book outlines, settlement and institution building in this country was a liberal project. Federation was a liberal project. Only one delegate at the conventions was labour, and he wasn’t even an enthusiast.
That is the story that we need to tell. This book and this series that I look forward to, and I’m sure we all do, are about telling a story that isn’t told often enough. And bringing to light this part of Australian history that is necessary to understand the national success that we are, and that David outlined so beautifully.
So my final job here is to urge you all to buy it. I urge all my colleagues to use their communications allowance to buy it and donate it to school libraries in your neighbourhoods, if indeed they still have books.
This book and this series are important. You can’t understand Australia without it and I urge you all to join me in congratulating David Kemp for this enormous intellectual contribution to our history.
[ENDS]