Thursday, 20 September 2018

 Mr LANGUILLER (Tarneit) (12:16): I acknowledge the traditional custodians and owners of the land on which we are meeting. We pay our respects to them, their culture, their elders past, present and future and elders from other communities who may be here today.

Speaker, congratulations to you personally. Allow me to do the acknowledgement to country, if I may, in my mother tongue, with your indulgence, that of the house and particularly that of the member for Northcote: reconozco a los pueblos originarios de esta tierra, a sus ancianos pasados y presentes. También me gustaría reconocer mi lengua y mi patrimonio Latino Americano.

The Honourable the Speaker, the Honourable the Premier, the Honourable the Leader of the Opposition, parliamentary colleagues and friends, more than anything I have always been a political activist. At 13, I joined the student and trade union movements and fought for workers’ rights, student rights and human rights. I grew up in Uruguay, a military dictatorship where police brutality was rife — I experienced this personally. I was forced to flee as a refugee to Argentina and then Australia. I will always be grateful to both nations and peoples for giving me and my family safe haven.

Like all migrants and refugees, when I came to Australia I worked long hours in hard jobs, including factories, abattoirs and farms. Hard work was and is important, but education changed my life. I have always drawn much inspiration from Nelson Mandela, who said that education is the most powerful weapon which you can give to a young man or woman to transform their lives and that of their families, their community and indeed their nation. Australia provided me and my family shelter, access to affordable housing, employment and, importantly, access to formal education. For that my family and I are grateful.

As I reach the end of my parliamentary career my convictions, vocation and passion remain as vibrant as in my youth. That is why I stand with people with disabilities, injured workers, multicultural communities, Indigenous communities, the LGBTI community, people fighting for gender equality and indeed older Australians. That is why I am so proud of the Disability Act 2006. That is why I remain strongly committed to working with the International Federation on Ageing to continue to argue the case in the Open-ended Working Group on Ageing in the United Nations in order to establish a convention to protect the human rights of older persons. Much has been improved in those areas over the last decades, but much more must be done.

I also stand with the government and this Parliament in fighting the scourge of domestic violence. As my friend the late Fiona Richardson said:

We don’t just want to reduce family violence — we want to stop it before it starts. That requires dedicated, long-term action.

I commend her work. I commend the work of the Premier.

I first joined the labour movement and the Australian Labor Party because they are the story of working men and women. It is the story of migrants. It is the story of refugees. It is indeed the story of women and social justice. And it is the story of multiculturalism.

Multiculturalism is about celebrating diversity of cultures, language and faith. I also believe the best way to practice multiculturalism is through the empowerment of diverse communities through education. This government’s strong commitment to education, especially in the northern and western suburbs of Melbourne, in rebuilding the TAFE system and in the low-income earners of Victoria is a great expression of that, because multiculturalism goes hand in hand with social justice.

At this point I wish to note and thank the only university in Melbourne’s west, Victoria University, then the Footscray Institute of Technology, which provided me the opportunity to acquire a tertiary education underpinned by the policies of the former Labor Prime Minister Gough Whitlam. That is the Labor story, that is my story — the story of migrants, refugees and solidarity.

Immigration and multiculturalism will continue to be challenged. There are people in this country, but I am proud to say not many in Victoria, that would want to turn back the clock. We need to be mindful and vigilant against such regressive divisiveness. Australia has legislated for the respect of all Australians from all backgrounds through acts of Parliament such as the Racial Discrimination Act 1975. We must all continue to stand up for human rights. Despite some of the regressive rhetoric coming from some voices in Canberra, I believe that for most of the 43 years of the Racial Discrimination Act the act has done its job. It is an effective expression of fair dinkum multiculturalism. As the former race discrimination commissioner said of the act:

… it has proven to be a powerful instrument of justice. It has become an important part of Australia’s human rights architecture.

Multiculturalism works in Victoria not because it is something we do but because it is who we are.

Multicultural communities have underpinned our commercial engagement with China, India and indeed now Latin America. I commend the Premier of Victoria for his vision and the Victorian Minister for Trade and Investment for his vision and their outstanding work in launching Globally Connected: Victoria’s Latin America Trade and Investment Strategy. As the Premier stated:

This ambitious blueprint for Victorian engagement with Latin America will see our trade double in value in the next decade.

I believe we must continue to change the paradigm that used to define our relationship with Latin America from one of competition to one of collaboration and complementarity. I quote my friend the Minister for Trade and Investment, who said:

Our Latin America strategy will help Victorian companies deliver our products and services to new markets while expanding and creating more jobs here at home.

The Victorian government is also committed to working with Aboriginal Victorians towards Australia’s first treaty. May I repeat this: towards Australia’s first treaty. The Andrews Labor government has provided more than $37 million to support the treaty process and promote self-determination among Victorian Aboriginal communities. I am proud to have been Speaker at the time when Parliament first flew permanently the Aboriginal flag alongside the Australian and Victorian flags. I was also proud to have had the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags permanently placed in my Speaker’s office. I was also proud to be the Chair of the house that proposed the motion that Parliament give acknowledgement to country at the start of every sitting week. I commend the Premier and the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs on their stewardship of this issue, and I commend all members of this house who affirmed that motion unanimously. This is indeed a historical legacy for this great Parliament.

I am honoured to be the first Uruguayan to be elected to a Parliament outside Uruguay and to have represented the Latin American and Spanish communities of Victoria in Parliament. I was first elected as the member for Sunshine, then Derrimut and now Tarneit. I have enjoyed working in local communities, making a difference in schools and education, and being involved in the development of the Sunshine Hospital, which was to look after my mother, providing her with quality of care, dignity and much affection. I thank the government and I particularly extend my recognition to the Minister for Health.

For almost 15 years of my parliamentary career, along with hundreds of residents, I enjoyed campaigning — sometimes, not often — for the St Albans and Ginifer railway stations to be put underground, and to finally see it done by this government gives me enormous pleasure. Let me put this in a practical context: this great initiative cut 25 minutes travel time each way, allowing my father to spend more quality time with my mother whilst she was at Sunshine Hospital. I commend the minister on her great work. I commend and thank the ministers for public transport, health and education for their outstanding work in the west of Melbourne in seeing this done.

As the member for Tarneit, it has been my privilege to be involved with the Minister for Education in record funding investments in the electorate of Tarneit, in capital funding for Tarneit West primary school, Tarneit P–9 College and Tarneit Senior College, just to name a few, because every family in every community should have access to a good school close to home. In fact this government has committed greatly to Melbourne’s west in health, education, roads and infrastructure. A new ambulance station has been built in Hoppers Crossing, giving paramedics the facilities they need to respond to emergencies. The Tarneit railway station was opened to cater to the needs of the growing community. The West Gate tunnel project has also started. Once complete it will provide a vital second river crossing and greater access to Melbourne’s west. Just last week I was with the Minister for Roads and Road Safety to commence the works on Leakes Road, which is the latest road to be upgraded from the Western Roads $1.8 billion budget package. This is good for families, and it is indeed good for business.

Dear friends and colleagues, at the risk of leaving some people out, I would like to make a few personal thanks and acknowledgements. To my staff over my parliamentary life, thank you. There have been many — they have moved on to better things. I want to name especially some of those people: Nick, Sonia, Walter, Valeria, Carlos, Huezo, Mali, Gladys and Gerson. I am grateful. I could not have done it without you. I could not have gotten to this point without you.

Thank you also to my 2014 campaign manager, Jasvinder, and to my former parliamentary staff: the great Ray Purdey, Santhi Sinniah, Jeremy Walsh and Peter Lochert — outstanding servants of this Parliament. I welcome the first woman Clerk of this Parliament, Bridget Noonan. To the staff in the Parliament who make our work look so good — the Assembly, Hansard, maintenance, catering, finance, gardening and IT — you are second to none in this nation and indeed comparable to the best in the world.

To my longstanding friends over and above politics: Carlos, Asuncion, Patricia, Oscar, Henry, Marcia, John, Ruben, Jenny, Alejandro, Fabio, Alexis, Victor, Angel, Gabriel, Ariel, George, Jacqui, Trent, Jimmy, Anthony and indeed the Melbourne Victory family, thank you.

Thank you to my federal colleagues and friends who are ready to govern this great nation: Richard Marles, Tim Watts, Joanne Ryan, Peter Khalil and many others.

To my very special Labor friends in the state caucus who stood by me in good and tough times. I do not want to get emotional. There are too many to mention, but you know who you are. I thank you from the bottom of my heart. Indeed I thank you on behalf of my family.

To Stephen Conroy and Theo Theophanous, we three amigos have done it all together. It has been a tough ride but an enjoyable one. I would do it all again except one or two preselections. I think we could have done them a little bit better.

Thank you to the Victorian Parliament, to the Victorian multicultural community, to the Latin American and Spanish diplomatic and consular corps.

To my children and their mother, Natasha, Sebastian, Liam and Simon, I thank you all for your patience, understanding and support. I love you all dearly. You are amazing human beings. Now I am coming home. To my granddaughter, Antonia and her father, Esteban, to my brother Julio and to Karen and extended family, I look forward. To my mother and father — outstanding, bulletproof, decent, courageous. Everything you need from parents, I had it, particularly in difficult times in Uruguay. To my partner, Tatiana, and her family, I could not have gotten here without you, and you know it.

And finally to this great nation and its people, thank you. Thank you so much. Allow me to say this in my mother tongue: a esta gran nación y a este gran pueblo, le digo salud! Gracias!

Honourable members applauded.