Kirsten Livermore (Capricornia, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the honourable member for Chisholm do take the chair of this House as Speaker.

The member for Chisholm has done me the great honour of asking me to move a nomination for her to be the Speaker of this place. It is a great pleasure and indeed a great honour to do that for her and to do it on behalf of my colleagues here in the Labor Party and, I am sure, across the chamber as well. Together, the member for Chisholm and I were elected to this parliament in 1998. In that time she has been a very loyal friend and a greatly respected colleague. All of us who have been on this journey together since 1998, including the Prime Minister, have come to appreciate and to know Anna's great qualities—those qualities that we have seen in action as both the Deputy Speaker and, in effect, standing in as the Speaker of this parliament for the last few months.

There are no doubts in anyone's mind about the member for Chisholm's ability to do this job. Indeed, there are no doubts in anyone's mind about her claim to this job. It is a terrific thing to see this come about this evening. In saying that, it is correct to acknowledge that this is probably not the way that she might have chosen for it to come about. There is no argument from any of us that this has been a difficult and unusual day in what has been a very difficult and unusual term of this parliament. But that is not to take anything away from the member for Chisholm as she steps up to accept this the highest role in the Parliament of Australia.

As I said, we came into this place together in 1998, and one of the things that really gives the member for Chisholm such great standing to take on the position of Speaker is her experience as the member for Chisholm. There is no better local member in this place than the member for Chisholm. She is hardworking. She is one of her electorate. She is there for issues and events in her electorate big and small. The people of Chisholm have recognised that and, I believe, consider themselves very fortunate to have her as their member of parliament. As a parliament we are now very fortunate to have her as the Speaker.

As we honour the member for Chisholm and celebrate her elevation to the very high office of Speaker, when I say that this is not exactly the way that might have wanted or imagined that she would come into this position I think it is right to also acknowledge that there are some people sitting in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne sharing that feeling very strongly as well. I am sure the member for Chisholm's loving family—her husband Steve and two beautiful children, Madeleine and John—would be wishing very much that they were here in the chamber with her. But they will be very, very proud of you, Anna, as we all are, as you take on this position.

In closing, I really do applaud the way that you have conducted yourself in the last few years. Being the Deputy Speaker was something that you took on and applied yourself to in the same way that you did being the member for Chisholm. You got stuck in. You were such a team player. You were really there looking out for all of us in this parliament and really fulfilling your role exceptionally well to make sure the parliament functioned to the highest possible standards. We have seen you do that in the most difficult circumstances in the last few months. Member for Chisholm, I wish you all the best in your new role as the Speaker and we look forward to serving under you and to serving the people of Australia as you bring the parliament to even higher standards in the way that we know you can do so well.

The Clerk : Is the motion seconded?

Kelvin Thomson (Wills, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion. Anna Burke became the member for Chisholm upon the retirement of Michael Wooldridge. She has proven to be a very diligent and conscientious local representative who is well liked by her electorate and who has steered Chisholm quite some distance away from its former status as a swinging or marginal seat.

She became Deputy Speaker after the 2007 election and served as deputy to Harry Jenkins during the life of the previous parliament, a task that she performed with considerable flair and distinction. The 2010 election and the unusual circumstances of the hung parliament led to her taking a break from Deputy Speaker duties. She sat next to me in the chamber during question time and would occasionally offer her observations about question time and the characters who inhabit it, but to the best of my knowledge she never sent any text messages or emails containing her thoughts, which was both prudent and prescient of her.

Late last year she was restored to the Deputy Speaker position and earlier this year she found herself in the very unusual position of being asked to carry out the duties of the Speaker, particularly at question time, while remaining Deputy Speaker. For some of us who believe in the concept of higher duties, this was a little bit unusual, but Anna carried out this role with good humour and with great dignity.

Given this background of service to the parliament, she is the obvious person to succeed the member for Fisher as Speaker and I think that no-one in the House, having heard the member for Chisholm or seen the member for Chisholm in action, will be surprised that government members are nominating her for this position. I hope that she will have the support of the opposition and of the whole House, both in the election process and in carrying out her duties as Speaker for the remainder of this parliament. She has demonstrated beyond all doubt that she has the knowledge, the experience, the sense of fairness and even-handedness and the temperament to carry out this important role.

Like the member for Capricornia, I note the role that her husband, Steve, and her children have played in her life. I know this will be a very proud moment for them and that, like other families in this place, they have experienced considerable sacrifices in supporting Anna's political career. I wish her family all the best in regard to this as well. Finally, after what we have been through in the last few months this House could use a little healing and I think we all have an obligation to make that happen and that Anna is just the right person to lead us in accomplishing that.

The Clerk: Does the member accept the nomination?

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I accept the nomination.

The Clerk: Is there any further proposal? There being no further proposal, the time for proposals has expired. I declare that the honourable member proposed, the member for Chisholm, has been elected as Speaker.

Honourable members: Hear, hear!

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I wish to express my grateful thanks for the high honour the House has pleased to confer upon me. I am truly speechless at this time, and those of you who know me well will find that passing strange. I am deeply honoured and moved by this incredible honour that the House has bestowed upon me. At the outset, can I thank the members for Capricornia and Wills for their gracious and kind words. They almost moved me to tears. It is difficult to hear yourself praised. We do not accept it easily or lightly, so I accept those absolutely delightful remarks.

I do look forward to this great honour and indeed this difficult challenge. I hope I will serve the House with distinction and pride as only the second female Speaker in this chamber. I will draw upon the great legacy of Joan Child, who was the first female Speaker in this House. Joan is, as many would suspect, getting on in years and not in great health. I am looking to her for the inspiration she showed in the way she led this House, also in some difficult circumstances.

I also have the legacy of Harry Jenkins, the member for Scullin, to follow and to live up to. Harry taught me many, many things and I am incredibly grateful and appreciative for his kindness and his guidance—sometimes not his wit or his dancing ability. But I do express to him my gratitude for his assistance in this role.

To the member for Fisher, I also want to extend my thanks for his delightful remarks about me today but also for the gracious way he stood aside this afternoon in very difficult circumstances. The member for Fisher has done the role of speakership a great honour. He undertook the role in a very dignified, effective and impartial manner, as many in this House have commented on. I praise and thank him for the role he undertook in that light. I want to record my many thanks to him for how he conducted himself in this chamber and for how he always treated me and my staff with the utmost respect.

I am a bit saddened that my delightful husband and children and my mum are not here tonight to. share this, but I know they are glued to channel 24. So I hope you are broadcasting or they will be greatly disappointed! None of us can do these roles without our family support. None of us are here on our own. Without our staff, without our electorates and without our families we do not do this job. It has been 14 years for me in this parliament. I have had both my children since being here, so obviously my husband has been an enormous support over those many years and I really do need to thank him for that. Also, he is in the middle of his studies and all the rest that is going on in his life, so I apologise now for the further impost I am about to place on it.

So I do need to thank Steve at the outset, but also my mum and my brothers and sisters. Many of you on the government side of the House know my extended family, who have also been an enormous support to me over the many years. Sadly, Dad is no longer here to see this. I know, in his inimitable fashion, he would have been very proud but would have rung me up afterwards to tell me what I had done wrong.

Often your greatest fans are your greatest critics. I know he will be somewhere looking down upon me, delighted at how I am doing, as he is delighted with how all his children are doing.

Thank you very much for this honour. I look forward to serving the House well and with distinction. I ask you all to remember that we serve this parliament and the people of Australia, and to uphold the dignity they deserve.

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to congratulate you, Madam Speaker, on your election. You and I know each other well—we have known each other for if not a whole lifetime at least half a lifetime, coming into this parliament after the same election and knowing each other for a large number of years before that. You have always been a very hardworking, very focused and very diligent member of this parliament—someone who could teach a large number of others about what it means to be a servant of your constituency. You have always been a very feisty advocate of your part of the world, and I have had the pleasure of visiting your electorate with you on a number of occasions and seeing how appreciated your efforts there are.

You are also someone who made a deliberate decision to specialise in the work of this parliament. Some come to this parliament with their eye set on the executive; some come to this parliament fully appreciating the roles and opportunities that parliament can give. You came to this parliament with capacities to address many of the opportunities that being in parliament, being in opposition and being in government can bring, but you did make a deliberate decision during your career to focus on what it is to be a parliamentarian and what it is to be a servant of this parliament. So, with some twists and turns along the way, that has led you to tonight and to your election. I congratulate you on your election. I know your family, glued to ABC News 24, will be absolutely delighted. I have had the opportunity to meet with your family on more than one occasion and their pride in you is palpable. I am sure that pride is absolutely running over tonight.

As recently as this morning I spoke at a women's breakfast about women's roles in parliament and women's roles in leadership. I spoke about the trailblazing role of Joan Child in this parliament, being the first woman to serve as Speaker. It is fitting indeed that 26 years later we are here welcoming another woman as Speaker of this parliament. For other women and girls who may be looking at this place and thinking about what could potentially be their role within it, your election to the speakership today provides another role model for them. My personal congratulations go to you—my congratulations as Prime Minister and my congratulations as federal Labor leader. We will do everything we can to work with you. I cannot quite make that a guarantee of the best of behaviour on all occasions but I promise you we will be trying and respecting your office and your rulings and your efforts as Speaker.

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This has been a remarkable parliament in so many ways, and it is particularly remarkable in this sense: it is the first time in the history of the Commonwealth that we have had three speakers in the life of a single parliament. I hope, Madam Speaker, that you will learn from the example of the first Speaker of this parliament, the member for Scullin. I honour your words of respect earlier this evening for the first Speaker of this parliament, and I also honour your words of sympathy and appreciation for the second Speaker of this parliament. Whatever we think of the second Speaker of this parliament, this is a tragic night for him and for his family.

Madam Speaker, I regret the fact that you were unable to be the Deputy Speaker earlier in this parliament because the politics of this parliament meant that your own party did not see fit to nominate you as Deputy Speaker. I regret the fact that you were unable to accept our nomination as Speaker back in November of last year—I think you would have done an outstanding job in the chair after the member for Scullin was for one reason or another unable to continue. I do regret the fact that you have come late to this chair; nevertheless, let me say that you have served very competently in the time you have acted as Speaker in this chamber, and I am confident that you will discharge your duties faithfully and honourably for the duration of this parliament.

Warren Truss (Wide Bay, National Party, Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I congratulate you, Madam Speaker, on your election to this high office. You certainly served an unusual apprenticeship, but you come into the Speaker's chair to complete the work of the Speaker in this parliament with the experience of having chaired a number of question times and having been involved in the procedures of this House at a very intimate level. I congratulate you on your election. As the Leader of the Opposition said, we did try to nominate you once previously and that reflects our respect for you. Madam Speaker, you have a particularly challenging task—to build on the dignity and honour of the profession and to repair some of the hurt evident in the chamber today. I believe you will undertake that responsibility with great diligence and considerable ability.

I acknowledge also that this has been a particularly difficult day for your predecessor. I commend his decision to resign, and I know that his action can help to start the rebuilding process so that this House can deserve and earn the respect of the Australian people as it goes about its important work of legislating for the people of this country.

Congratulations on your election—we assure you of our support and we will try to be as well-behaved as the circumstances permit. You have demonstrated in the time you have been in the chair a willingness to deal with issues and with people in as sympathetic a way as possible, and we wish you well in your new position.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I hesitate to rise before the Leader of the House but I see he is otherwise detained at the crossbenches. I do congratulate you, Madam Speaker, on your unanimous election by the House tonight to the position of Speaker. This has been an extraordinary day in Australian politics—another chaotic and extraordinary day in the 43rd Parliament. I congratulate you on becoming the new Speaker of the House and, as you point out, on becoming the second woman to fill that role. I congratulate you on rising to this very high office. In doing so, I pay tribute to the member for Fisher, the previous Speaker, who showed the good judgement tonight to resign—judgement the Prime Minister failed to show today in the House. I will leave it at that, Madam Speaker, because I do not want to cast a pall over your election. But the fact remains that the member for Fisher showed the judgement tonight to resign, judgement which the Prime Minister, yet again, did not show today in this House.

Your election, Madam Speaker, is the culmination of my own nomination of you 11 months ago. The tumult which has gripped the House for the last 11 months—particularly the last six months—could all have been avoided if the Labor Party had accepted my nomination of you as Speaker 11 months ago. It is 11 months late but not too late, Madam Speaker, for you to make an indelible imprint on the parliament.

This is another unprecedented day—to have had three Speakers over the course of the 43rd Parliament. That is something I promise the clerks we will not have in the 44th Parliament. I am sure the Australian public will look forward to the 44th Parliament, whoever wins the coming election—whether it is the Labor Party or the coalition. I am absolutely certain the Australian public will never again invest in a hung parliament, given the chaos and scandal which has beset this parliament. I hope, Madam Speaker, that, in your tenure as Speaker, you will be able to restore some integrity to the parliament. As Manager of Opposition Business, I look forward to the opportunity of working closely with you to help restore that integrity.

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am going to speak to the resolution before the chair. I am sure, Madam Speaker, that you will be very strong in enforcing the standing orders as the Speaker of the House of Representatives. You and I know each other extremely well. You had a second child at around the same time we had our first child, so we certainly share an understanding of the difficulties of juggling family responsibilities with our representational roles. In your case, while dealing with those difficulties, you have managed to turn what was a marginal seat into a much safer seat for this side of politics.

You are someone who has gained a great deal of experience from serving as the Deputy Speaker and, before that, on the Speaker's panel. You have had the experience of discussions with regard to the application of the new standing orders of this parliament. At all times you have displayed integrity and a sense of respect for this magnificent chamber in which we have the honour of serving.

Madam Speaker—that is a nice thing to say—I congratulate you. This is indeed an honour I know your husband and dear Madeleine and John will be very pleased with. I think your election to this position is a credit to you and the way you have conducted yourself. As the Leader of the House of Representatives, I look forward to working with you.

Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On behalf of the Australian Greens, I congratulate you on your election to the role of Speaker. I know, from my experience of having worked with you on the selection committee, as well as having seen you in the parliament, that you take very seriously the at times competing obligations this unique parliament imposes on the Speaker. I have absolutely no doubt that, in the coming months, you will continue to exercise that very high standard of integrity. Once again, and on behalf of other members on the crossbenches, I congratulate you on your election.

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I understand, Madam Speaker, that the Governor-General will advise when she will be pleased to receive you as Speaker.