1993 True Believers speech
From Wikisource
| ←Wikisource:Speeches | Keating Claims Victory in 1993 Election by |
| Paul Keating's "true believers" speech. Delivered on 13 March 1993. |
Thank you ladies and gentlemen. Well, this is the sweetest victory of all. This is a victory for the true believers: the people who, in difficult times, have kept the faith. And to the Australian people, through hard times, it makes their act of faith all that much greater. It’ll be a long time before an opposition party tries to divide this country again. It’ll be a long time before somebody tries to put one group of Australians over here and another group over there. The public, the public of Australia, are too decent, too conscientious and they’re too interested in their country to wear those sorts of things. This, I think, has very much been a victory of Australian values, because it was Australian values on the line and the Liberal party wanted to change Australia from the country it’s become: a cooperative, decent, nice place to live where people have regard for one another. And can I just say that this has been a hard campaign and I can assure every member of the public out there when they think we don’t know in the political system how tough it is, I can assure you, I can tell you how it tough it was in those last few weeks.
But, can I say to you I wanted to win again; to be there in the 1990s to see Australia prosper as it will. The thing is, I said to the Australian people: “We’ve turned the corner.” Can I say now after the election, let me repeat it, we have turned the corner. The growth is coming through, we will see ourselves as a sophisticated trading partner in Asia and we’ve got to do it in a way where everyone has a part of it. There’s always cause for concern but never pessimism and, Australia, we are for the first time in our history located in the area of the fastest growth in the world and we’ve been set up now as we’ve never been set up before to be in it, to be part of it, to exploit it.
It offers tremendous opportunities for Australia and now we have to do it, but we have to do it compassionately. I give an assurance to the people that this victory won’t go to the heads of the government, of the Labor party. We’ll take it seriously, we’ll take it thankfully and we’ll do a great deal with it. The people of Australia have taken us on trust and we’ll return that trust and we’ll care about those people out there. Particularly the unemployed. We want to get them back to work, and if we can’t get them back to work immediately as sure as hell we’re going look after them. We’re not going to leave them in the lurch, we’re going to put our hand out and pull them up behind us. This country is going to move along together. We have such enormous opportunities. This world recession is starting to dissipate, we’ve made the break out of it, America’s starting to turn, it won’t be that long before the Japanese economy starts to turn and hopefully we’ll be away and running in the 90’s in a low inflationary period of prosperity. Yes, and NO GST!
I can assure you the government will now be redoubling its efforts to be as good as government as you hope and expect we can be, to be as conscientious with this mandate as we possibly can be. To give it our every effort, our every shot, to see that we recover quickly and we get going and we put this recessionary period behind us and we get this country of opportunity off and running, but keeping the opportunity there for everyone. Keeping those great nostrums of access and equity. Getting people into the game. The policies of inclusion. The policies of one nation. And that’s what its got to be about. So, can I say again, this is a tremendous victory. It’s a tremendous victory for all those with imagination and faith. The people who believe in things who are not going to let good beliefs be put asunder for essentially miserable ideas to divide the place up. And I think the Australian people have always had such remarkable sense to spot the value and to cut their way through it. Now, part of this victory is ours, part of it is spotting the danger in the Liberal party’s policies. What I hope is that at the next election the victory is 100% due to the Labor government.
I’d like to start thanking some people, and the first person I’d like to thank is my wife Annita. Can I also say, can I give an extra special note of thanks for the women of Australia, who voted for us believing in the policies. I want to pay a particular thanks to the architects of this victory my personal staff.
But most particularly to those people in the Labor party who never lose faith, never lose heart and are there at the polling booths to work and to fight for good things. Thank you.
The people who never give up, who always keep on believing who are always there no matter how heavy the travails may be. To you I say thank you very much indeed, thank you again. Thank you for believing.
But could I most particularly and again finally, thank the Australian people.
