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E-mail: daniel_batt@ msn.com Volume 8 Number 5 EU srREEr June 1998 A magazine of public affairs, the arts and theology

'Laurie [Oakes] is somelhing of an amateur anarchist,' says Russell Barton, news editor for the ABC. 'If Laurie turns up to a doorstop, your heart 30 sinks,' says Innes CoNTENTS SHADES OF SIR JOHN Willox, press officer Blasts from the past: the February 4 Constitutional Convention was constrained for Alexander Downer. COMMENT by the events of November 1975. 'If Laurie mutters Ron McCallum on the groundshifts in Spencer Zifcak argues for a fresh look. "That was bullshit" the industrial landscape. 34 after your press 7 BOOKS conference, you know CAPITAL LETTER Peter Cochrane reviews Henry Reynolds' you are done for,' This Whispering In Om Hearts, 8 Michael McGirr explores Murray Bail's ~ays one of the Prime LETTERS Eucalyptus: A Novel (p36), John Uhr Minister's press reviews David Solom.on's Coming of secretaries. 10 Age: Charter fo r a New Australia (p3 7). - See 'Fit to print' THE MONTH'S TRAFFIC by Margaret Simons, p1 6. With Dewi Anggraeni, Peter Mares, James 37 Nichols, Margaret Simons, Sean Doyle. POETRY 'Schubert's Dog' by Peter Porter. 13 SUMMA THEOLOGIAE 39 MUSIC 16 Jim Davidson reviews the FIT TO PRINT 1998 Opera Australia season. This project has been assisted Margaret Simons asks the double-barrelled by the Commonwealth Government through the Australia Council. its question: does the Canberra press gallery 42 arts jwJding and advisory body. led public opinion or is the gallery led by a THEATRE new politics of information? Geoffrey Milne surveys the warts-and-all Cover design by Siobhan Jackson, theatre of playwright Daniel Keene. after Gustave Dore Graphi c ppl7- 19, 21-22, 24, 26, 24 29-30, 36 by Siobhan fackson. THE CLASH OF SYMBOLS 45 Graphic pl4 by Tim Mctherall. Andrew Hamilton on the politics FLASH IN THE PAN Cartoon p l 0 by Dean Moore. of communion. Reviews of the films The Object of Cartoon pl5 by Peter Fraser. Photographs p5 by Andrew Stark, My Affectioni Nil By Mouthi Twilighti pll by Bill Thomas. 25 and The Boys. Photograph pl2 courtesy ARCHIMEDES fames Nichols. 50 Eureka Street magazi ne 26 WATCHING BRIEF Jes uit Publications COUNTING OPTIONS PO Box 553, Ri chmond VIC 3 12 1 Paul Chadwick asks can a high-tech Tel (03) 9427 7311 51 Fax (03) 9428 4450 Grub Street guarantee m edia diversity? SPECIFIC LEVITY

V OLUME 8 NUMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 3 COMMENT

R oN M c CALLUM A magazine of public affairs. the arts and theology Publisher Daniel Madigan SJ New times, Editor Morag Fraser Ass is tan t editor Kate Manton new tactics Consulting editor Michael McGirr SJ I T " AN omN-QUDTm 'AYSydney: Edmund Campion, Gerard Windsor re-create the Flanders battlefields of the previous generation. Queensland: Peter Pierce When the history of the 1997- 1998 waterfront conflict is written, it is my belief that it will be concluded that advisors, South East Asia correspondent consultants and politicians were ca ught in a similar time warp. Jon Greenaway When framing scenarios to oust the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) from our wharves, they were guided m ore by the laws and Jesuit Editorial Board m anoeuvres of the heady 1980s than by the laws and strategies Peter L'Estrange SJ, Andrew Bullen SJ, of the '90s. Andrew Hamilton SJ The 1980s were not a good time for those trade unions that Peter Steele SJ, Bill Uren SJ relied principally upon industrial muscle to achieve their ends, because more often than not, these organisations fell foul of the Business m anager: Sylvana Scannapiego law. In England, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher led the Marketing m anager: Rosanne Turner charge by defeating the miners' union when its executive were Advertising representative: Ken Head foolish enough to call an illegal strike in contravention of the 1984 balloting laws. Patrons In Australia, section 45D of the Trade Practices Act, which Eureka Street gratefully acknowledges the outlawed secondary boycotts, was a brick wall that blocked the support of Colin and Angela Carter; the power of both the m ea t workers and the Builders Labourers trustees of the estate of Miss M. Condon; Federation. When attacking new slaugh tering arrangem ents in W.P. & M .W. Gurry. the meat industry, for example, the m eat workers acted in Eureka Street magazine, ISSN 1036- 1758, contravention of the secondary boycott laws and were ensnared Australia Post Print Post approved in legal proceedings concerning picketing, injunctions and pp349181/003 14, eventually massive damages. The Mudginberri litigation was is published ten times a year akin to the 1916 battle on the Somme-the 'Meaties' were bled by Eureka Street Magazine Pry Ltd, white. The Dollar Sweets litigation showed also that the rules of 300 Victoria Street, Richmond, Victoria 3 121 the common law could be used to prevent uncontrolled and ill­ Tel: 03 9427 73 11 Fax: 03 9428 4450 disciplined picketing. Even the pilots, who when in dispute with e- mail: [email protected] u the airlines in 1989 sought to escape the rigours of the law Responsibility for editori al content is accepted by through mass resignations, found themselves on the receiving Daniel Madigan, 300 Victoria Street, Richmond. end of common law litigation and administrative adjudication. Printed by Doran Printing, When the Coalition Government came to power in March 46 Industrial Drive, Braeside VIC 3 195. 1996, one of its first projects was to enact new industrial laws. © Jesuit Publications 1998 Two aspects of these laws warrant comment. First and foremost, Unsolicited manuscripts, in cluding poetry and the laws on strikes were tightened in order to limit legal strike fict ion, wi ll be returned only if accompanied by activity only to genuine negotiations for certified agreements a stamped, self-addressed envelope. Requests for during valid bargaining periods. The fl agship of these new laws permission to reprint material fro m the magazin e was a more tightly drafted section 45D of the Trade Practices should be addressed in wri ting to: Act- crafted to prevent trade union secondary boycotts. Section The editor, Eurel

4 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 Second, in order to outlaw the closed shop, new freedom of then, on Monday 4 May, by the High Court, with the provision that association laws were placed in the Workplace Relations Act. Ever the administrators were freed from some constraints which hac\ since their enactment at the turn of this century, our industrial affected their discretionary powers. On Thursday evening 7 May, laws have contained provisions prohibiting the victimisation of just one month after Patrick's late- night terminations, the MUA employees who happen to be members of trade unions. In the ' 70s, workforce was back working on the Melbourne and Sydney clocks. these protections were extended to conscientious objectors to trade At the time of writing, the future for the MUA and its waterside union m embership, provided they obtained exempting certificates. workers looks bleak. At best, many will lose their jobs through These laws-and this is crucial- madei t a criminal offence to victimise. redundancies. At worst, Patrick's restructured employing companies This m eant that persons who were victimised were required to will be wound up and cease stevedoring operations altogether. It is pursue remedies within a criminal, as distinct from a civil, paradigm. likely that in the near future, the MUA will h ave to accept the The Howard laws sought to make it easier for persons to seek presence of som e non-union employees on our wharves. While the redress, and so the new freedom of association laws were placed in MUA won the fr eedom of association battle in the courts hands the civil arena with civil penalties, civil awards of damages, and that clown, this is an extremely limited victory because it is clear there most special of equitable remedies, the mandatory injunction. will be h ea vy job losses, changed work practices and These new laws did not, however, simply protect-via civil "l i{ T som e non-unionist stevedores. rem edies-n on-unionists who wished to work in unionised industries. Rather, as fr eedom of association m easures, they V VHAT LESSONS can be learned from these events? First, never extended the same protection to unionist and non-unionist alike. assume that your opponents will adopt a pavlovian approach, Employers who engaged in conduct contrary to these freedom of continuing to do what they did a decade before. It is a mistake to association laws had the legal cards stacked against them. assume that persons, trade unions or corporations do not learn from When it was revealed in December 1997 that a group of Australian their blunders. When enacting its n ew industrial laws, the non-unionists was to receive stevedoring training in the Middle Government spoke loudly and often of limiting strikes on the East port of Dubai to equip them for waterfront. Little wonder the MUA decided employment in Australia, it was thought, to refrain from all-out strike action. They I have no doubt, that this might usher in a full­ could rely on other tactics, su ch as the blown strike by the MUA. A complete downing discipline of their m embers and international of tools would leave the way open for the assistance via the International Transport union to be crippled by section 4SD fines and Workers' Federation. Anyone caught up in a injunctions. When this did not occur Muclginberri tim e warp was bound to be immediately, it was hoped, I suspect, that the wrong-footed. late January 1998 sub-leasing of a portion of Secondly, in high profile industrial disputes Patrick's Melbourne Webb Dock to the which are covered by the m edia, perceptions National Farmers Federation's PCS Operations are of more significan ce than industrial Pty Ltd would set off a chain reaction where realities. By telegraphing the importance of not only would the MUA react, but oil and this dispute, the Government ensured high transport workers would lose their cool and m edia coverage. The video footage of guard call for sympath etic but illegal strike action. dogs and security personnel around midnight Although some immediate strike activity on Tuesday 7 April irrevocably altered the occurred, the threa t of Commission and/or public's perception of events. Increased public court sanctions stopped MUA industrial action support for the sacked workers followed, and in Melbourne where the union was bound by once a court had found in favour of the MUA's a certified agreement. However, n o su ch fr eedom of association claim, the Government agreements were binding upon the MUA and was in a 'no win' situation. Patrick Stevedores in either Sydney or Brisbane, Thirdly, picket lines which possess m ass and accordingly, the MUA was able to initiate public support are difficult to nullify via precise periods of industrial action at those ports and injunctions. Provided a perception of discipline claim that the action was protected. is maintained-even though in this instance violence did occur­ When the MUA got wind that its m embers were going to be it is hard, legally, to dislodge large groups of committed citizens. tenninatecl through some fancy corporate restructuring, they sought Lastly, although the Patrick's restructuring manoeuvres failed court protection, arguing that any dismissals were contrary both to in part, it would also be a mistake for the trade union movement to the new civil freedom of association provisions and to the common ge t caught up in a Patrick time warp. Legislation to come before the law. Approximately 12 hours before this matter was due to com e Federal Parliament later this year will facilitate corporate before Justice North in the Federal Court on Wednesday morning restructuring in order to enhance the Multilateral Investment 8 April, Patrick put their termination and restructuring plans in agreement (MAl). While the 1996 Howard industrial laws shifted operation. the focus from the Australian Industrial Commission to our courts, The rem ainder of the story to elate is well-known. On Tuesday I have no doubt that legislation facilitating corporate restructuring 21 April, Justice North held that the MUA had made an arguable will alter our focus again. But this time our gaze will shift from the case that legal breach es had occurred, and, through the u e of courts to the nation's corporate board rooms. injunctions, ordered that the workers resume their waterfront work, at least until the administrators had concluded their duties. Ron McCallum is professor at the Faculty of Law, University of This decision was subsequently upheld by a Full Federal Court and Sydney.

V oLUME 8 N uMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 5 Throughout the world ordinary people are doing extraordinary things...

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Caritas Australia ES69R THE CATHO LI C AG ENCY FO R OVERS EAS AID AND DEVELOPMENT The Brennan Court

T '"'"""" of d hi' im•ginod ''n' on Go"y). Ho h•d from the High Court Si'G'"'represents: the'~ endn •nprosecuted~:,~~~?. in the Tolai murdersd in Papua New Guinea, appeared of an era in which a generation of judges for Fijian sugar farmers in a signal defeat of Australian colonial almost entirely reshaped the common interests, and had represented the Northern Land Council in the law, and settled, probably for a long time, most of the outstanding Woodward royal commission hearings which had led to the Northern constitutional issues. It also ventured into fields, with its Mabo and Territory Aboriginal Land Rights Act. subsequent Wik decision, which made the power and importance What struck me at that first hearing was his capacity to grasp a of the court clear to all, and made the character and personalities of the point and to express, in a proposition of only a sentence or so, the judges a matter of public controversy. idea it contained. Later, the playing with that point might involve It is, of course, not a clean break. Mary Gaudron and Michael many pages of very technical and dusty reasoning but, if sometimes McHugh were there for the last part of the revolution, and Bill difficult for the layman, it was reasoning with the end in view. At Gummow and Michael Kirby-and probably even Ken Hayne- the same time, he was the foundation president ofthe Administrative belong to the broad philosophical set that marked judges such as Tony Appeals Tribunal, laying down broad principles of its operation Mason, Bill Deane, Gerry Brennan and John Toohey. which have survived to this day, even if the institution itself is now Most of the achievements and not a few of the controversies under sustained assault. There too he demonstrated something for (including Mabo) of that generation of judges pre-dated the day which he has received little credit in an environment of abuse of when Sir Gerard became Chief Justice and the court acquired the judges for judicial activism: a fine understanding of responsible shorthand title oftheBrennan Court. But Sir Gerard was a significant government and of the line between judicial review and the force in both the Gibb and Mason courts. Because those courts were substitution of the judge's value judgments on policy for often finely balanced, his was often the critical vote. 0 that of the legislature. One might say that with a 4-3 or 3-2 decision, any one of the majority votes is critical. But because Sir Gerard often had an NTHE FEDERALCouRT, heandDeaneandTooheyweregrabbing approach different from that of other judges, or drew the line in a an expanded federal jurisdiction with a breadth of thinking which different way (often borrowing arguments from both sides of the was making their promotions inevitable. But Brennan also wrote debate), his tended to be the judgment which set the limits of the some brilliant judgments on civil rights-particularly with the precedents created. The majority could use him for the result, but, murders at Huckitta by som e Aboriginal children-that will ring often, hewouldnotgoasfaras they wanted: theirjudgmentsrepresented loud long after the majority judgments are forgotten. Indeed, it was binding law only to the extent that he agreed with them. when he knew he was outnumbered that he wrote his most brilliant Though few judges ever devoted as much time or as much space and expansive judgments: on the High Court the judgment which to rigorous explanation of each stage of their reasoning, Sir Gerard most shows the measure and the passion of the man is his dissent cannot be called one of the court's adventurers. The more likely in Marion's case, involving the sterilisation of a retarded girl. that a decision upset settled law, or created new law, the less likely The Chief Justiceship is largely a position of honour: the court that he would write broad propositions going beyond the controversy administers itself collegiately. Brennan has always felt diffident at issue. Others, su ch as Deane and Toohey, painted with flourishes about giving interviews or discussing the particular work of the on big canvases, but Sir Gerard, while willing to make conceptual court; he fears that a court which issues press statements or leaps, tended to proceed incrementally, leaving the filling in of the summaries of decisions for journalists will give such interpretations canvas for later controversies. a status they should not have, compared with the formal process of Some of the other judges, for example, wrote expansive judgments reasoning. As a judge he was impervious to criticism of long on freedom of communication when they were considering, first, judgments from several individuals (making it uncertain, even to laws restricting political advertising and strident criticism of the specialist, what the binding points were); he did not oppose arbitration judges, then, later, several not-very-worthy defamation collaboration, but insisted that the responsibility for decision did cases. Brennan's judgments were not expansive. The court's retreat not shift from the individual judge. to a safer position in the Lange case was possible because of his Will the Gleeson court be much different? Murray Gleeson, like cau tion. Similarly, though he copped the brunt of the abuse from Brennan, is intensely private, but probably better able to deal with conservative quarters of the legal profession as a result of Mabo, his politicians. He may be somewhat more inclined to prop at fences was by far the m ost restrictive decision in a tight majority, and set which involve radical shifts in judicial thinking, but likely to the limits of it. And when Wik arose, h e held to the line of his Mabo follow the body of thinking the court has developed. The court has decision and found against the Aboriginal applicants. That Wik was few great challenges before it-largely because of the work of the won was not because of any retreat by him, but because the courts over the past 20 years-but there is plenty of room for consoli- majority decision in Mabo was not followed, either by those who dation, and the prospect of the court's getting a significant role in had been there before, or by the new judges on the court. settling any issues which arise from the shift to a republic. What is I saw Gerry Brennan do his first hearing as a judge-a not very unlikely,however, isavastchangeinstyleorintheoutputofthecourt. important matter in the ACT Supreme Court. He had gone there Sir Gerard Brennan leaves a court in better shape than some of after a career at the Brisbane bar in which he had become one of the the critics would suggest, having given it a legacy which extends first Catholic barristers to cross a strong sectarian line and receive beyond those three years which will be called the Brennan Court. briefs from the Protestant end of town (an achievement the more remarkable because the big end of town had always hated his father Jack Waterford is editor of the Canberra Times.

V OLUME 8 NuMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 7 L ETTERS ------

\\ ll .. ... lL church every Sunday is presumably of It 1111 II'- 1, tdll t 1 "l ll the former type whereas the word as I used it in my letter refers to the Light fantastic m 11 • lr l \ t l Ill" I' I hit ... l ,j Ill I latter. til ttl r Ill.!\ be It l d t t \ 1 ~ From Allen Volz, Toowoomba Turf There are many points of Catholic Ill h •I ·nul )I' I' LI 1 Lf Club Secretary beli efs which arc not found in any Ill tiL I lllllll ['lJ l'lC 'l lllhU Wh y is it when anything is done in ca pital 'c' creed- Grace, the Theol­ Victoria, Victorians assume it to be an lo t l \\IIIli "lllllH llhl d 'L-.s og ical Virtues, the Decalogue, the Au tralian fir t 1 It ultn t 1 •ll\ l 1111 mttLI Mora l Law, the Seven Sacramen ts, Eu re f< a SLreel (M arch 1998) pllltlllllllltlll'-l'-'l ltd the Immaculate Conception, Assump­ featured a report by Peter Pierce (turf \11. llll,l\.,] 1 \\ll[1 lll.ol tion, Papa I In fallibi lity, Purgatory and correspondent) that Australia's first so o n-but which arc nevertheless night thoroughbred race meeting was contained in scripture or have been conducted at Moonee Valley o n defined by Councils and Popes, are Australia Day. therefore found in the small 'c' creed Toowoomba Turf Club has been and consequently require the acU1 crence racing twilight under lights at Clifford of those who claim to be members of Park Racecourse since March 1992, / ~ the Catholi c Church. with an average of four night races The reservation of priestly under lights every week. ordination to men is not found in any The Club then staged Australia's capital 'c' creed, it is true, but it is an FIRST full night ra ce meeting with a ll exa mple of a small 'c' creed doctrine, seven events under lights (1000 lux on establish ed by the unanimous and track) on 4 September 1996 followed unbroken witness of the Great C hurch by Australia's SECOND o n New Your correspondent then s tated in its eastern and western mani­ Year's Eve 1996. that Winter would prov ide the test for festations and repeatedl y reaffirmed by Moonec Valley shared the honour night racing. Ha d he properly modern Popes, most recently in the of staging Australia's THIRD night researched his subj ect he would have present Pope's apostolic letter race m ee ting with the TTC on known: Ordinatio Sacerdotalis of May 1994. Australia Day this year. i) That Moonee Vall ey was not the Ms Uhr asserts tha t when first with ni ght thoroughbred racing; discussing the response of the ii) That neither MVRC nor TTC plan Congregation of the Doctrine of the to conduct night racing in winter. Faith, the Prefect, Cardinal Ratzinger, Pl ease point these facts out to Peter s tated that 'these matters are not Pi erce, if onl y for his own benefit. contained in the deposit of fait h' . It is Allen Volz n ot clear which response she is Toowoomba, QLD referring to, but it is presumably the Editor's note: Peter Pierce was born one dated 28 October 1995 and signed Agribusiness or in Ta smania and no w lives in by Ratzingcr which replied to a doubt reafforestation. Towns ville. He'll be visiting which had been raised as to whether Mining or recycling . Investors Toowoomba soon. the teaching of the apostolic letter, Exploitation or can choose that the Church ha no authority to sustainability. Through the AE Tru sts you confer priestly ordination on women, belongs to the deposit of fa ith. Greenhouse gases can invest your savings 'C' here The words that appear in the or solar energy. and superannuation in From Rev. Dr Christopher Dowel, Of', quotation attributed by Ms Uhr to Armaments or over 70 different Dean, Mannix College Ratzinger do not correspo nd with the community enterprises, each expertly For Ms Uhr's information (Letters, text of the respon c itself: 'This enterprise. selected for its unique Eurel

8 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 Walker, an early missionary to the Aborigines of NSW. The statem ent is quoted in his correspondence, Rev. Willia m Walker to Rev. Richard Watson, WMMS London, 29 November 1821, in the Bonwick Transcripts Eureka Street Talks (missionary boxes) BT 52 p. 1043-44. 'ART AND THE RELIGIOU S Tllis month, When Brisbane says 'W e have IMAGINATION' the writer of each letter w e taken the land from the Aborigines ... ', publish will receive a pack of there can be no doubt abo ut th e Rosemary Crumlin postcards featuring direction of his argument. Governor Brisbane admits that the Aborigines C urator of Beyond Belief: Modern cartoons and graphics, had tenure of the land. N o doubt a Art and the Religious Imagination by Em eka Street regulars, court case could explore the word s at the N ational Gallery of Victoria D ean Moore, Siobhan Jack son 'rem uneration' and 'their country'. Friedheim Mennekes SJ and Tim M etherall. Brisbane's last sentence is poorly Curator, Kunst-S tation phrased. Were the Ministers in His Sankt Peter, Centre for all, as belonging to the deposit of the Majesty's government suffering from fa ith' . M s Uhr and her circle are some delusion about Aboriginal land Contemporary Art, wasting their time. tenure? They are today! Koln, Germany. Christopher Dowd H ow did Brisban e preva il? An Sunday 5 July 1998 at 6.1 5pm Clayton, VIC offi cial despatch follows on his promise. It turns out to be a 'core' type St Carthage's Church, prom ise which becom es severely Royal Parade, Parkville, The stones shout revised. He makes his case. Melbourne. Entry by donation. I sh ould beg leave to From P.S.M. Procter recommend that yo ur Lordship would A recently rediscovered letter breaks be pleased to direct the sending out * new ground in the issue of Aboriginal annually a few gaudy Articles, such as 1998 Social Justice tenure of land in Australia. those presented to the Chiefs of the Lecture Governor Sir Thomas Brisbane North American Tribes, with a few Catholic Commission for Justice, made a startling admission in 1821. He fowling Pieces and T om ahawks, as Development and Peace said, 'Great things ought to be done. I feel confident it would be the m eans The Mother Country is transmitting of grea tly attaching these Chiefs to His 'WORKERS, U N IONS AND annually from 30 to 40,000 £of goods Majesty's Government, and become an T HE UNEMPLOYED' to the American Indian s, as a inducement for them to render service compensa tion for their country; we generally to any British Subject. Fr Peter Norden SJ have ta ken t he lan d fr om the 'T he am ou n t of t he present Director, Jesuit Social Services Aborigines of this country, and a I sh ould propose not to exceed remuneration ought to be nude, and 20 pounds, and to acco mpany the Tuesday 2 Ju ne 1998 at 8pm as far as I can prevail with the other requisitions.' St Ignatiu s Church Minis ters of His Ma jesty a t h om e T his is part of a despatch, Brisbane 326 C hurch St, Richmond, I will, for the am elioration of their to Bathurst, Despatch no.? of 1824, per M elbourne. Parking available at sufferings .. .' 'Ocean', 14 February 1824, in HRA rear of C hurch . One witness at the m eeting when ser.1 vol.xi p.226. T he analogy with $5 or free to pension ers t his remark was made was William the N orth Am erican situation m arks and studen ts. it out. ••••••••••••••••••••••• Of course, if the trin kets did arrive and were applied to * • Eureka Street • • • th e purpose for which th ey Brigidine celebration • Congratulates ... • w ere requested, we are left • with another problem. In some Kilbreda Coll ege marks 95 years way it may be possible to argue Barb ara O dachow ski from V ictoria, of education that Aboriginal land already w ith an open day at the school w inner of first prize in th e 1998 has been purchased with Jesuit Publications Raffle- $1 0, 000 trinke ts. However, as t here FRIENDS A ND PAST PUPILS worth of inte rn ati onal travel and was probably no consent by ARE W ELCOME accommodation for two people. one of the parties, it cannot be O ther prize-winners were: second a proper contract or payment. Saturday 20 June 1998 pri ze to j.S. & E. E. Stretch (W A), Would others care to 11am -3pm comment on the i mport­ third prize to j .M . Rowe (NSW ), ance of Governor Brisban e's Kilbreda College, 11 8 M enton e fourth prize to 0. & E. Toti nu (W AL adm issions? Parade, M en ton e VIC 3 194. fifth prize to Ri chard Smith (NSW). P.S.M. Procter T el: 03 9584 7766. ••••••••••••••••••••• Duffy, ACT

V o LUME 8 N uMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 9 THE MONTH'S TRAFFIC

Muhammad, decided to shift all state-owned had the effect of tying down almost all Bank enterpri e funds from private banks to state Indonesia 's own reserves. Every day when Rupiah burning banks. Since up to 50 per cent of the private the private banks ran dry before closing the banks' capital had come from state-owned balance, Bank Indonesia had to come good 0 NE OF THE SECTORS the IMF wants enterprises, they were left with a yawning with its promise. Indonesia to reform is the banking sector. gap in their reserves. The banks became Some bankers, it was alleged, did not While this international body may not have seriously anaemic, having to rely m erely on help the situation. Karni Ilyas, the editor­ gone very far in other sectors, it has at least depositors' money. U nfortuna tel y for them, in-chief of FORUM Keadilan, a news and left its mark on this one. Among the banking this happened at the same time as the onset law magazine, was told by one of his fraternity in Indonesia, IMF is known as an of monetary crisi in the region. Even this sources that some irresponsible bankers abbreviation for 'I'M Finished!' reliance on depositors came to an end when grabbed this opportunity to maximise their In the decade leading to the economic on 1 November the Minister for Finance own wealth. They allegedly doctored the and political crisis in Indonesia, there was liquidated 16 banks. balance of their banks, so that they would a proliferation of private banks luring Though it later became obvious that the receive the promised credit from Bank savings with high interest returns and even criteria for selecting the 16 banks were Indonesia. No sooner had they arrived than prizes. Until recently, not many people knew arbitrary at best and biased at worst, the the funds were transferred to the bankers' how shaky a number of them really were. Minister's action had eliminated in one fell private companies. The following day the The first shock for the public came at swoop any confidence the public still had banks failed to balance again. And so it the beginning of November last year when in private banks. This was aggravated further went on. a visit by the Deputy Executive Director of by the official statement that the When the new governor and board of the IMF, Stanley Fischer, was followed by Government would only guarantee directors woke up to what was happening, the closure of 16 of these banks. The closures depositors' money up to Rp20 million (then they promptly stopped issuing the liquidity were part of the restructure demanded by US$4000). Naturally, panicking depositors credits to private banks, and took over the the IMF. Bank Indonesia, the Indonesian rushed to their respective banks-even state management of 14 of those banks. reserve bank, partially underwrote the debt banks-and withdrew their money, US$10 billion of taxpayers' money forked to the depositors. And on 26 January this preferring to bury it or stash it under out by Bank Indonesia has now disappeared year, the Government formed a body called mattresses. During November alone, some into a black hole and those banks that the the Indonesian Bank Restructuring Agency, US$3 billion was withdrawn, and nobody reserve bank reportedly had tried to save known as IBRA, which was given sweeping would be surprised if some found its way died nonetheless. powers in order to remedy the ailing sector. into foreign banks. Nobody has come forward with a m ea Early in April, Stanley Fischer again Confronted with the result of its action­ culpa, and nobody has pointed the finger at visited Jakarta and within days 14 more big shells of banks empty of reserves, the anybody either, obviously heeding the banks got the chop. While this time the Government felt it had to do something proverb 'people who live in glass houses IBRA took over the management of the helpful. Bank Indonesia Liquidity Credits shouldn't throw stones'. The authorities, banks' finances, it was still Bank Indonesia were issued to ailing banks. However, this from the Police Force to the Attorney- which had to fork out the money to the General' office, arc still at a loss about creditors. WOW, I~ IS IS INCI

10 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 the Hotham or some other pub. One fore­ the current dispute. In 1938, wharfies at man wa s kn own as 'the Matchbox Man '. Port Kembla sparked a nine- week trike by Wharf playback: Wharfies had to go through the ritual of refusing to load pig-iron onto a ship bound borrowing matches fr om him ('Got a for Japan, whose soldiers were already INTHE BATTLE for hearts and minds on match?') and returning the box with a ten marching and massacring their way across Australia's waterfront, the wharfies have shilling note in it. China. received a pretty bad press. They stand Less well rem embered is the waterside accused of being overpaid and underworked, Communist-led unions like th e workers' support for independence in of featherbedding and rorting, of holding watersiders made som e absurd twists and Indonesia. the country to ransom . The MUA and its turns in policy as they attempted to remain Through its wartime alliances, the predecessor unions (s uch as the Waterside true to Moscow during World War II. Australian Government was committed to Workers Federation) are portrayed as selfish, Initially they opposed fa scism in Spain and the restoration of Dutch sovereignty in the thuggish and unpatriotic. Writing in The Germany, but when Stalin signed a pact N etherlands East Indies. The colonial Age, Ross Gittins dismissed support for the with Hitler, they dismissed the conflict in administration h ad sou ght refuge in sacked wharfies as misguided, concluding Europe as a bosses' war. When Germany Australia, setting up a government-in-exile that the drama of events 'seem ed to have attacked the Soviet Union, they threw their on the outskirts of Brisbane. However, blocked out all recollection of the long support behind the war effort once again. Sukarno's declaration of independence at history of the waterfront and the wharfies' With a Labor government in power, war the end of the war changed the political part in it'. in the Pacific and the US military pushing equation. On Friday 21 November 1945, Workplace Relations Minister Peter for a more efficient Au tralian waterfront, Indonesian seamen alerted local unions that Reith gave that history a personal twist when he recalled his father's m emory of landing at Balikpapan without tanks in 1945 'because the wharfies had refused to load them '. In the absence of grea ter detail, it is difficult to judge the veracity of this piece of Reith fa mily lore, though it is certainly true that the wharfies took industrial action during World War II. Busy ports and a labour shortage (with men away at the front) meant an opportunity to regain some of the ground lost under the 1928 Transport Workers-or ' Dog Collar'-Act. Under the legislation, waterside workers had to pay one shilling-equivalent to the price of a dog collar-for a permit to a n ew deal was n egotiated on the docks. cases of ammunition were being loaded on labour on the wharves. Unionists' cards The 'pick-up' system of casual labour hire to a Dutch ship in Brisbane harbou r. were pink while those of non-unionists was replaced by a roster of work gangs. A boycott was endorsed and by the following were brown, making it easy for employers Conditions improved but the wharfies Monday Austral ian ports were closed to the to discriminate between the two when did not exactly have it easy. Waterside loading of Dutch ships. hiring labour. At the 'pick-ups', preference workers were among those killed when The late M olly Bondan, an early was given to m e mbers of the small Japanese planes bombed Darwin harbour supporter of Indonesian independence, 'volunteer' Permanent and Casual Wharf and wartime workloads in all ports were recalled the impact of the trade union Labourers Union, P&C. (The NFF's decision enormous. In another sympathetic account action on Australian awareness of Asia: to christen its new non-union operation of the Melbourne docks, historian Wendy No matter what the Indonesians might P&C Stevedores was a provocative reference Lowenstein quotes dock worker Tom Hills: have said or done, and they had street-long to this period.) We were req uired to work two twelve demon strations in Sy dney and in In Ship to Shore, Rupert Lockwood's hour shifts, an eighty-four-hour week. Melbourne and in Brisbane .. . they could pro-union his tory of the M elbourne Wages were frozen but we earned good never have aroused the interest or even waterfront, a waterside worker recalls the money- it was the hours we pu t in ... have attained the attention of the press and indignity of the intense competition to get I remember working weeks at a time­ government in any way at all comparable hired by a foreman during the 1930s: these twelve hour days- without a break. to the way in which the strike did. And in turn, of course, with press and government It was well known that Patrick's fore men Two episodes in waterside history clash involvement, it was possible to obtain the took bribes. For a man to ge t a job he would particularly starkly with the image of a attention ... of the United Nations. have to tell the foreman that there were so union characterised solely by selfishness, many bottles of beer for him to collect at greed and bloody-minded militancy. Molly Bondan concluded that but for the Batman Hill, Great Britain, Markillies, The first has been recalled already during decisive trade union action to delay the

VOLUME 8 N UMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 11 Dutch ships, 'the whole hi story of the as the dawn is even now abo ut to pierce the The previous day's ceremony had been Republic would have been different' and night so let their memory inspire us to dedicated to the opening of the new Hellfire 'Indonesia would have resembled Indochina work for the coming new ligh t into the Pass Museum, a fine exhibition displaying much more closely'. dark places of the world. the fu ll history of the Japanese occupation In a letter to Prime Minister Chifley in of Thailand, and the subsequent construc­ 1947, P.E. Teppema, Netherlands Minister But apart from these m oments, the event tion of the Burma Railway. The Museum is to Australia, admitted the impact of the did not do justice to the occasion or to the 80 kilometres north-west of the bridge over bans: history: the constant flashing of cameras the River Kwai at the Hellfire Pass site. and a surreal sense of political points ticking The new Museum tells us that the It needs no comment that the over made it difficult to think about those construction of the Hellfire Pass cuttings continuation of the boycott pla ce a heavy perished lives and tortured souls. commenced on ANZAC Day, 25 April1943. financial burden on the Netherlands at a The section was behind schedule by time when the foreign exchange posi­ June 1943, and in July of that year, the tion is extremely difficult ... No gesture labour force was supplem ented with of goodwill could be more telling nor Australian and British prisoners to in­ have greater effect than if the Australian crease it to 1000 men in an attempt to government were to use their influence complete the section on schedule. for the termination of the shipping ban. The excavation of soil and solid rock, This was the time of the White to a depth of 20 metres, was carried out Australia policy. Yet between 1945 and with eight-pound hammers, steel tap 1949, Australian trade unions, led by drills, dynamite, picks, shovels, wide the waterside workers, actively opposed hoes and small cane baskets. The men the reimposition of white colonial rule laboured at Hellfire Pa s under intense in Indonesia. Wharfies have reason to be pressure from the Japanese engineers proud of certain moments in Australian and Korean guards at the height of the history, when their union had a much wettest monsoon season for many years. broader and more far-sighted percep­ From June 1943, until the work was tion of the national interest than the completed in August 1943, the prisoners government of the day. were forced to work 12 to 18-hour shifts -Peter Mares each day. The POWs applied the name 'Hellfire Pass' to the cuttings con­ structed during the attempts to catch Hell's history up on a failing schedule. The prisoners were forced to work at night by the light O N ANZAC DAY, hundreds of of fires, which, if viewed from above, Australians gathered in the ravine that gave the impression of the jaws of hell. is Hellfire Pass, Thailand, where m ore The deadline was achieved, but at the than 400 World War II prisoners of war price of many lives, several hundred died cutting a sheer passage through men dying between late June and early solid rock and jungle on the infamous Burma I found myself looking around the July 1943. Railway. forcibly-created cutting and waiting for In retrospect it was difficult to ignore The Memorial Service was ushered in at something magical to happen. The moment and also difficult to appreciate the Prime dawn by candlelight to the whining sounds never really came, except briefly, at the end Minister's presence, but the time he gave of a military pipe bag. Breaking the m oment, of a soulful yet nervous Last Post, when a and the words he spoke symbolise Prime Minister John Howard began his 'yeehaa' could be heard coming from the som ething important to us all: address to the sober audience-veterans, very ends of Hellfire Pass. It was just distant For all our heroes, they were armed with former POWs and survivors of the Death and reverberant enough to sound Australian human virtue alone, and their victory was Railway, in company with families, friends, and 'ocker', a ghostly tribute from one of over the darkest recesses of the human the Australian Navy officers to his fa llen sons and grandchildren. Mr Howard heart. expounded the sacredness of the event, his comrades. voice echoing through the surrounding After the Final Blessing, Mr Howard -James Nichols valleys via a dominating sound system proceeded 'campaign-like' through the devised especially for the occasion. tightly grouped crowd and could be heard The Reverend Michael Forer led the saying, 'G'day, how are you 1 Do I know A first draft order of service with poise, and the reader of you?' as TV crews jockeyed for position. the' Act of Remembrance', the Honourable I too was cau ght up in the moment AsE u REKA S T!iEET goes to press, the new­ Sir John Carrick, was moving, particularly as I snapped half a dozen photos when he look Sydney Writers Festival is only half w hen he read: came past me. An hour later and Mr Howard over, with the highlight weekend sessions was off in a Chinook h elicopter to the next still ahead. Any review of the success or We feel them still near u in spirit. We official engagement at the War Cemetery in otherwise of the new date, the new venue wish to be worthy of their great sacrifice ... Kanchanaburi, donning the Akubra. and the new organisers must therefore be

12 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 tentative, and perhaps necessarily unfair. This year was meant to be a coming of age-the year when Sydney's festival would cease to be poor cousin to Adelaide and Melbourne, and demonstrate that the Sun and Surf City could organise something uniquely exciting. The original vision was to make it a In the most recent edition of the Lutheran magazine, Currents in Theology and Mission spring writing festival by the water, in the (December 1997), Robert Kelly asks whether Luther's basic insight that we are saved by old international shipping terminal with faith alone does not nm clean counter to the modern Western belief that our success com es all of the Sydney trademarks of Bridge, by our own skills and hard work. There can be no middle ground between self-reliant Opera House and Harbour in view. capitalism and justification by faith alone. As well, this festival was to have a Kelly believes that in the United States, the dilemma is not even felt. In place of its different sort of program, with a strong inheritance, the church has tended to adopt medieval liturgies, hierarchical bishops or Asia-Pacific focus and an appeal to a more Jesuit retreats, or to b ecome like m ainstream Protestants. His diagnosis is clear, but his diverse group than the well-to-do miclclle­ rem edy seems limp-to work co-operatively and non-acquisitively, and to be deeply agecl women who always seem to swell the countercultural in holding that salvation is through God's grace alone. But would the audience when writers gather to talk. culture be troubled? But so long did the bureaucracy in the Claude Geffre treats the consequences of globalisation for the churches in Recherches office of the Minister for the Arts, Premier de Science Religieuse (1 998. 1) . In the face of the temptations to collapse into a homogenised Bob Carr, take to make decisions that for a Christianity or to retreat to a sectarian fw1damentalism, Geffre insists that churches while it looked as though there wouldn 't should retain their identity, but should focus on their relationship to the wider world. Life even be a Writers Festival in Sydney this will be countercultural when it is lived in love by a church sure of its identity and open to year. others. True, but not much bite here. At last the new venue got the noel, and Jose Gonzalez Faus, the doyen of Spanish theologians, who is unfortunately little May was announced as the elate. The latter known in the English -speaking world, is m ore sharply focused. In Revista Latinoamericana was a surprise to most of the industry. de Teologia (December 1997), h e insists that if theology is based on a pas ion for God, it Everyone had expected it to be September, must meet thegreatestargumentagainst God's existence: the plight of the poor. Furthermore, to tie in with the Premier's Literary Awards, only through solidarity with the poor will we have no option but to come as beggars before and make co-operation with the Melbourne God knowing in our bones that our salvation cannot come from our own works. He Writers' Festival possible. Organisers were concludes that while poverty may not be an ultimate question, we can deal with ultimate left with close to impossible deadlines. questions about the reality of God only when we grapple with penultimate questions. So has the vision been realised? Yes and Among these, the plight of the poor has precedence. no. The biggest disappointment is that Gonzalez Faus concludes movingly: attendances are well clown. Most sessions If I was convinced that the Kingdom of God has nothing to say about the growing misery and held to elate have been less than half full. the demonic world structures, on the grounds that its laws are autonomous and ethically Even the landmark 'Stolen Children' neutrali and if I was convinced that God is only to be found in an experience of peace or evening, held in the Sydney Town Hall, was silence, exclusively interior, aesthetic and metaphysical, and i not to be recognised in the only about three quarters full-a pity, since passion to change the situation I have described, then I believe that, out of solidarity with my those who heard it will remember Sir Ronald suffering brethren, I would have to abandon my faith in that God, and with Paul to be cast Wilson's speech for a long time. away for the sake of the brethren. God would not want that. Another disappointment is that the Asia­ Pacificfocus has not been realised. Shun taro In case anyone should believe that the tension between Christianity and Government Tanikawa, the eminent Japanese poet, and is new, Allen Brent writes on Ignatius of Antioch in Vigiliae Christianae (1998.1). Late in Samoan writer Sia Figiel were the only the first century, Ignatius was arrested for being a Christian, and was sent under guard to visitors of note from the region. They were Rome to satisfy the Colosseum's need for victims. On the way, he wrote ahead to the churches all but ignored by the mainstream media, h e was to visit, and was accompanied by Christians from the cities which he had just left. which means their sessions were no better Brent argues that Ignatius deliberately choreographed his journey to make it a parody a ttenclecl than far duller fare. and a refutation of the growing emperor cult. He went like a priest of the cult, accompanied The venue has heaps of potential, with by other cultic figures. He was to be sacrificed in Rome, after the example of Christ, the true rooms strung along a wharf, lots of space for Emperor, who died on the cross in order to destroy the cosmic power involved in emperor readers and writers to interact, and The worship. While Brent perhaps goes too far in making Ignatius a man of a single metaphor, Rocks only a short walk away. Not all this he sh ows strikingly how subversive of state ideologies was the Christian imagination in its potential was realised. beginnings. When crucifixion was still a common punishment administered for reasons of Signposting to the festival venue wa state, the God whose love was shown in a crucified man stood clearly against totalitarian totally inadequate. You didn't know you claims. Christian faith was creative in subverting the ideology of state control. had arrived at the right pier until you were Both for Ignatius and for Gonzalez Faus, being countercultural leads inevitably to right on top of it, and even then, locating visible conflict with the current idols. Australia's currently troublesom e Christians keep the rooms in which the various panel good company. • session were to be held was a matter of asking around until you found som eone Andrew Hamilton SJ teaches in the United Faculty of Theology, Melbourne.

V oLUME 8 N uMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 13 who knew. One signpost pointed straight of the Whitsundays. It sounds like just We didn't know any better and our elders down, seeming to suggest that the venue another playground in paradise. It is not. were equally ignorant. The Queensland was to be found at the bottom of the harbour. Between the ages of three and seventeen, Government of the time pretty well wrote All this, plus the low numbers, gave the I lived in Cairns. Two days after finishing the book on bigo try. festival a secluded, clubbish atmosphere. high school in November 1979, I left. In 1995, on a work trip to Alice Springs, This was both good and bad. The mix of the By then, tourism had grown, but didn't I had to confront a few of these childhood audience was refreshing-lots of young really boom until the ea rly 1980s. The prejudices. There, in the Todd Street Mall people, lots of practising writers, and world-on-holiday invaded the place, and and in the Todd's dry riverbed, were groups therefore lots of interesting and probably left bits of itself behind. of Aborigines, drinking, shouting, fighting. fruitful interaction. H el en Daniel 's Cairns in the 1970s was no ba stion of The old gut reaction hit m e-watch out, interview with David Ireland, for example, interracial harmony. There was only one they hate you because you 're white, cross had a prickly, writerly air about it quite Aboriginal boy in my class-he was a cheery to the oth er side of the street. But I'd different from what would have been kid, and well-liked. In my last two years, an travelled in some pretty rough countries, achieved had the audi ence been larger and Islander kid joined the roll; he excelled at had the occasional hostile reception, and less professional. sports, and was also popular. I didn't know not let it get to m e. And h ere I was, In all the sessions, better questions than any other Aborigines or Islanders. When anticipating an unpleasant incident out of usual were asked, and better answers given. I went out with my m ates on Friday and my own insecurity. The challenge was to All the sam e, as one writer was heard to Saturday nights, we' d see groups of deal with it. remark, the panel format common I am a freelance journalist, writ­ to writers' fe stivals rarely works, ing mostly about travel and tour­ and is beginning to look very tired. ism; I've also written so m e Surely a festival should m ean some­ Aboriginal-related pieces. I keep up thing more than authors grouped with the news, and consider myself together to discuss som e idea which reasonably well-inform ed. And, like supposedly links them, but in fact virtually everyone I know in Syd­ quite probably interests none of ney, I have no Aboriginal friends. them. In February of this year, I hap­ It is hard to think of an alterna­ pened to glance at a copy of The tive way of presenting writers, but Sunday Times Magazine, featuring som eone should be working on it. a cover story called 'Devil's Island'. In the m eantime, Sydney now Curious, I opened and began to read. probably has potentially the best venue of Aborigines drinking in the city parks, 'Devil's Island' was not about Papillon's any of the writers' fes tivals with the possi­ swayin g around b eer garden s, a nd Caribbean prison, it was about Palm Island. ble exception of Adelaide, but so far the sometimes brawling in the streets. At first, I had trouble believing the article­ ferment and flurry that are the real signs of These fi ghts scared m e, but rather than a m edia bea t-up, I supposed, maybe a case of a fecund festival have not m aterialised. admit to fear, my peers and I embraced self-righteous Pommie mud-slinging at the Given another year, more time to plan, loa thing. Among the worst schoolyard in­ old colony. I didn't want to believe it. But though, and the Sydney organisers may sults we used to throw at each other were, the people, the figures and the stori es are all excite us all. 'You're from Yarrabah', or 'Go back to there on the record for public scrutiny. -Margaret Simons Yarrabah'-Yarrabah was an Aboriginal set­ A dead son is a dead son. tlement a few kilometres around the coast How can this be? If things were that bad, Hell on the of Trinity Bay. No whitefella I knew had surely we would not only know about the ever been there, but we teenage white boys, place, but also know of some course of trying to work out who we were and what official action aim ed at all eviating the C oNSUJER~~~~~:~s~ facts about the hell we were doing in this tropical problem. Wrong. an island all too close to home. The World backwater, spoke of Yarrabah's reputed filth Palm Island had been a vision of hell Health Organisation identifies it as the and degeneracy. You'd think we'd all been to since 1918, when a penal ettlement was most violent place on earth outside a combat the mountain top. established by the Anglican C hurch. zon e. Life expectancy is a mere 40 years. In the primary school classroom we Authorities transported m ore tha n 40 The murder rate there is 15 times higher learnt nothing of Aborigines beyond the di fferent tribal groups, and the mission than on the mainland; the rate of serious 'noble savage' stereotype: they were good incarcerated them. Its regime was typical of assault is 30 time the national average. Up hunters, knew how to build a makeshift that described repeatedly before the 'stolen to 30 people live in each dwelling. The shelter in no time, and could make fire at generation' inquiry: a ban on indige nous unemploym ent rate is 88 per cent. Since will. Nothing a bout massacres, poisonings, l anguages, practices and b eliefs; the 1994, the island's inhabitants have been stolen children, social ruin. They existed as separation of families; slave labour; committing suicide at the rate of one a fallout, in a half-life. We were instructed to floggings. All this continued until the mid- m onth. feel sorry for them- not for what our 1970s-precisely when I was being taught What and where is this hellhole? Well, forebears had clone, but because they could what skilled hunters Aborigines were. When it's Palm Island, a gem of a pot just off the not progress, could not adapt to the winning white authorities finally left the island in coast from Ingham in far north Queensland, ways of white Australia. In high school, 1985, they dism antled everything-homes, surro unded by the glittering tourist resorts they weren't m entioned at all. shops, the dock, the timber mill-and took

14 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 it all away. The Queensland Government rites for laying his spirit to rest. They buried has since opened a shop that sells its goods Tambo in the wrong position but couldn't at double the mainland price. Today, the bring themselves to exhume him. The Palm Islanders own nothing: the island's young m en say that, since then, a Credits Government created a 'deed of grant in ghostly figure called the Hairy Man has trust', which 'loans' the island to its 3,500 appeared to the island's young m en at night; inhabitants. Whenever the state wants once he hands over a rope, and the youths do the again to ride roughshod over the islanders rest. and develop the place for tourism, no legal Whether you believe that Tambo' s ghost, impediment exists to stop it. seeking revenge for the wrongs done to To cap it all, for decades the state him, drives the youths to suicide, or whether government appropriated the wages of the it's an earthier cocktail of drink, drugs, island's slave labourers. The Aboriginal and despair and futility, the causal logic is clear: Islander Legal Secretariat in Brisbane is past brutalities are wreaking present havoc. currently preparing a case, which will be What I read about the island appalled launched in June this year, to have the me. The fact that I'd never heard of the money- more than $ 700 million- returned place before frightened m e. I'd lived a mere to the islanders. 150 kms away from it for 14 years, and on Last December in Canberra I saw the numerous occasions I'd been to Ingham to 'Captive Lives' exhibition, featuring an play soccer. Aborigine called Tambo. Tambo lived on Why do I have to learn about this place Palm Island until he was snatched by agents in an English magazin e, a publication that At the Australasian Catholic for P.T. Barnum's American circus in 1883. relatively few Australians would read? Why Press Association awards for Hauled off to the States with other has no Australian newspaper, magazine, 1998, Eureka Street won: television or radio current affairs program Aborigines, including his wife, Tambo was Best Ed itori al billed as a 'Cannibal Boomerang Thrower', devoted a fraction of its massive resources Andrew Hamilton, and led Barnum's parade. He died a year to this story? By any criterion, it's 'Zero Sums', on the later. It wasn't until1994 that his body was newsworthy- possibly more so now than excommunication of returned to Palm Island and buried; but his ever, given the prevalence of unresolved descendants no longer knew the correct Aboriginal issues in the media during the Sri Lankan Catholic theologian past year or two. Fr Tissa Balasuriya Som eone should go up - March 1997. there and write the story Best Magazine Front Cover "that must be written. The Photograph by Bill Thomas, present Queensland Gov­ design by Siobhan Jackson ernment sh ould take (see above)-December 1997. immediate action to rectify the injustice-put At the Australasian Religious it on their list- and the Press Association awards for politicians and bureau­ 1998, Eureka Street won: crats responsible for past human rights abuses Best l ayout (Magazines) sh ould be brou ght to Siobhan Jackson and the book. production team . -Sean Doyle Best Feature (Newspaper or Magazine) This month's contribu­ H. A. Willis, 'The Colour tors: Dewi Anggraeni is of Blood', on injustices the Australia Correspond­ to Aborigines in ent for FORUM Keadilan Western Australia and the Jakarta Po st; - January/February 1997. Peter Mares presents Asia Pacific on ABC Radio and was highly commended fo r National at 8pm each Best Story by a New or weeknight and at Sam Non-Professional Writer on Saturdays; James Tracey Leonard, 'In at the Nich olls is a freelance Death', on her experiences writer; Margaret Simons in Mother T eresa's Kalighat is a journalist and H ostel for the dying novelist; Sean Doyle is a - October 1997. \ freelance writer.

VOLUME 8 N UMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 15 THE MED IA Fit to print

(I could tell you a lot/ but you got/ to be true to your code,' crooned Frank Sinatra in (One For My Baby'.

Margaret Simons spent time in Canberra's press gallery, bars, taxis and corridors of power, analysing the codes and asking whether journalists sing that sarn e old song.

but the real 'eye' of Parliament House is the or 'Canberra thinks .. .' In the pub, you W.""' TO TH< n"ion•l e>pi"l on an autumn Sunday afternoon, past smooth Ministerial Entrance, which is at the back. would discuss what 'we', meaning the paper, hills corkscrewed with the futile tracks When you see ministers on television they should be doing, and then it was, 'Th ere's that sheep m ake, the grass chewed close to are likely to be standing at the Ministerial too much Canberra', or 'Canberra is out of the ground. I wa sitting in the back. Four­ Entrance. Thi is where they do 'doorstops', touch'. month-old Lachlan was asleep. Clare, nearly which is the modern substitute for a sit­ In this context Canberra meant our two, needed to be. I pretended to nod off, down press conference. Once upon a time a bureau, and usually, a single person-chief hoping she would mimic m e, and sh e did. doorstop meant being caught unprepared political correspondent Michelle Grattan, Too well. Head on one side, eyelashes by a watchful media. These days, they are a woman with fuse-wire hair, thick glasses brushing her check. But when I opened my rather like the span taneous demonstrati ons and hunched shoulders, legendary for her eyes to peek at her I found she was watching in Orwell's Animal Farm. Doorstops are capacity for hard work and her alleged lack me back. Little lizard eyes-a slit of wet announced by press release. The advantage of a personal life. There were so many between the lids, and a smile at the gam e for the politicians is that they can always stories about Michell e. One night w hen she we were playing. Slowly, slowly, her eyes walk away. was m ad! y typing, a pen firmly between her fell all the way shut. Then the flicker, and The Ministerial Entrance is set up for teeth, a drunken sub-editor was said to a wicked laugh when she ca ught me doorstops. There are special boxes set into the have drawn out his penis and laid it on the watching. pillars. Open them up, and there are all the desk in front of her, with a suggestion that So we continued. Pretending to sleep. plugs and special power paints the television this was what she really needed. 'Put it Pretending not to watch . Catching each crews need to broa dcast to th e away cobber,' she was meant to have said, other out. Watching m e, watching you, nation. Watching m e. Watching you. without a pause. 'Put it away.' while the capital grew closer and the road There was another story about how she hummed and the gum trees were sketches YARS AGO when I was a journalist on had, m any times, sa t by the bedside of a of grey on pasty margarine-yellow. The The Age, career advice was given in the colleagu e's dying child. They say Michelle pretence took over. At last she turned pub, after ambition and envy had been used to read her fairy stories. Lots of people inward, and was sunk in her imprecise two­ softened and sentimentalised by the wash told you this story, and they would always year-old dreams, her limbs abandoned to of beer. It was in the pub that the editor begin by saying: 'Not many people will tell gravity, the job of watching left to me. I was surprised me one night by saying that I was you this about Michelle, but .. .' still watching as we rolled out of buggered­ a journalist in mid-career. I was only 25, I wonder if any of the stories were true? up sheep country and into the low-rise and had rather fa ncied I was still at the To junior reporters like me, Michelle was a office block city, towards the immaculate beginning. 'Career paths are shorter these collection of such stories. And of course, green mound of Pa rliament Hou e. days,' he said, and told me that if I wanted she was her copy, which usually dominated There are four doors to Parliament to be anything in journalism, I must go to the front page. House. Four eyes looking out from under Canberra and learn how government I n ever took my editor's advice. I used to the turf. The public entrance at the front, worked. take pride in saying that it was a career hardly ever used by the people who work Canberra u eel to m ean many thing in ambition of mine to avoid the capital. there, is for tourists and for show. those days, but never a city. In the headlong I presented this as principle, but really, each The Senate side door is to the west and the rush to deadline in the evening, you would time the opportunity was presented it was House of Representatives door to the east, hear the newsdesk say 'Canberra is fi ling' really som e doom ed love affair or personal

16 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 timidity, a cleaving to the intimacy of the conversations in cafeteria and corridor are be properly maintained that this adequacy office I knew, that kept m e in Melbourne. about code, about shared kn owledge, and feels like excess. And all this work is done N ow, 12 years later, my editor had been what is and is not done. You do things for unobtrusively in these early hours, when proved right. Twenty-fi ve had been mid­ people. You becom e powerful. In these the rush to the six o'clock news is still a career, and now that career was behind m e. things, the press gallery's politics are like long way away, and the television m onitors At last I was in Canberra, but this time I was those of any other office. N otices in the on the second floor of the Senate side of there to watch the watch ers. I had enough tearooms for people to wash up their mugs. Parliament House are tuned to Humphrey contacts-former colleagues and friends­ Photos of parties on the wall. Shared jokes. B. Bear. to get a security pass and a desk. N ot enough, Shared views. But these people are The heavy-hitters of the gallery are still I thought, to be compromised by what I was watching for u s. in bed, or eating toast, or in their dressing sure was a club. gowns reading the newspapers and listening The truth is, of course, that as oon as IS NINE o'C LOC K on the m orning of to AM, or feeling guilty about not reading you get in touch with old friends you are 16 February 1998. Australia is poised to the papers and not listening to AM, because compromised. They were good to m e. They send troops to a foreign war. Th e High they are trying to juggle the rest of their fe tched m e coff ee, invited m y family fo r Court is shortly to m ake a decision on the lives. dinner, spoke freely and looked off ended Hindma rsh Is land case. The Federal Laura Tin gle h as ju s t resign ed as when it becam e clear I m eant to quote Pa rlia m e n t is con s idering the Wik Canberra bureau chief for The Age. This is them . Michelle Grattan 's first words to m e legislation . The Government is talking of the third time she has changed em ployer in were: 'You don' t happen to want a cat changing the way we are taxed. the last five years, but she has m oved a total do you ? I fo und this kitten w andering of about 25 metres along the pink corridors. around outside Parliam ent House last night, This m orning she has no job to go to, and all alone, so I took it in. But you see, I have has dozed off listening to AM, and woken dogs ... ' just in time to hear' ... and now in fi nancial And so som etim es I found m yself want­ news ... ' ing to pull m y punches. Wanting to be nice. Her husband is Alan Ramsey. Once he 'The reason Graham Richardson was so was a Michelle Grattan equivalent, a God powerful was becau se he did things for correspondent. N ow h e writes a twice­ people. H e is a very nice m an ,' said weekly column for the Sydney Morning Pia Cumming, chief political correspondent Herald. For once she won't have to give him for the Sun-Herald. her standard line abou t why she has to go in A little later, she asked m e to treat what early. 'Som e of us have to file m ore than she had told m e about her own private life The preceding week, Cheryl Kernot, twice a week, darling.' 'sensitively'. Pia Cumming was co-author Labor MP-to-be, has attacked journalists Margot Kingston is sit ting at hom e of the first article publish ed that named the for intruding into her private life, writing playing solitaire and chewing nicorettes. former student with whom Cheryl Kernot about her 20-year-old affair with h er fo rmer She is invited regularly on to ABC Radio to had had an aff air. student. It has been said, in various columns give commentary on politics, but is Was that a legitimate story? I asked. and letters to the editor and even in restricted from doing so in her own paper. 'Absolutely,' she replied. editorials, that something has changed in 'Do I want to be a hack all m y life?' she is Margot Kings ton, correspondent for the the way the Australian m edia do their asking herself. She won't m ake it into the Sydney Morning Herald, and the gallery's work- that they are more willing than ever offi ce much before lunchtime. token radical, said it all in one of her articles to intrude into the personal. Laurie Oakes, chief political correspond­ about the whispers that were circulating in The offices of the parliamentary press ent for the Nine N etwork ... who knows corridors when the Liberal leadership was gallery take up the whole of the second what Laurie Oakes is doing? Ask anyone in up for grabs: 'Journalists can only tell you floor of the Senate side of Parliam ent House. the gallery, or any of the political minders, what's really going on in code. Politicians This is a place of gleaming parquet corridors who they believe to be the leading journalist, only talk to us because both sides play by and pink carpet. At this hour the offices of and they all say 'Laurie Oakes'. He breaks strict rules. We can't tell you directly what the nation's m edia companies are m ostly the stories-about John Sharp's expense they really say. deserted. Only a few junior radio journalists claims, about Howard's directorship of the 'We must solemn! y report bogus pledges are on duty. Menzies Centre. All manner of stories. The of loyalty and hypocritical m edia bashing. Meanwhile, Parliam ent House is being Prime Minister appears frequently with With this type of story, it is absolutely manicured. The high windows are being Oakes on the Sunday program. Oakes writes necessary to slant stories one way or the cleaned with mops specially designed for a column fo r The Bulletin . other- that is, engage in some comment in the nooks and crannies. The lawns and 'Laurie is som ething of an am ateur news pieces, to give the public an inkling of garden courtyards are fl awless. They use anarchist,' says Russell Barton, news editor what's going on. And to write unsourced specially designed mowers to m ow between forthe ABC. 'If Laurie turns up to a doorstop, comment pieces going as far as we can to the flags tones. The drink fountains are being your heart sinks,' says Innes Willox, press explain, as far as we know, what we have stocked with cardboard cups. In the four officer for Alexander Downer. 'If Laurie judged might be happening.' weeks I spend in Canberra, I never find a mutters "That was bulls hit" after your press T o deal with people, to be part of a drink fountain tha t is n ot adequately conference, you know you are done for,' community, is to make alliances and stocked with cardboard cups. It is so says one of the Prime Minister's press compromises, and in Parliam ent House the unusual, these days, for a public building to secretaries.

V OLUME 8 N UMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 17 What does Laurie do before the working you get an idea of what is happening that One o'clock, and a notice goes up on the day begins? One imagines his great soft day . T oday, as w ell as the n otices boa rd announcing that Anderson will have body contained in a silk dressing gown, his announcing Hill's and Kerr's press a doorstop at the Ministerial Entrance at survey of the papers lordly and detached. Or conferences there is a letter from the Smith three. When the time comes, cam eras are perhaps his wife is nagging him. Or perhaps Family thanking the press gallery for raising packed up and carted down. A long, loose he is walking ou t to the compost bin, a bowl $2000 to buy Christmas presents for needy crocodile of notebook -carrying reporters of kitchen rubbish in his hand. Or perhaps children. Someone has written above it. makes its way down the lifts and thro ugh he is playing the glockenspiel. I don't know 'Cheryl, the Medi a aren 't all bad. ' Opposite the corridors. They are talking am ong how Laurie Oa kes spends his m ornings, the notice boa rd are the boxes into which themselves. There is a party on Saturday because he wouldn't talk to me. 'I don 't press releases are distributed. Every m edia night. N ot everyone ca n go. It has been want to talk about the press gallery,' he said orga nisa tion has one. In fact, som e media called at short notice. 'I'm sorry, I'm sorry,' to me in his office on the second fl oor of the orga nisations exist for nothing but having a says the hostess. 'One day I'll get m y act Senate side of Parliam ent House. 'I hate the box and channelling the information that together. ' press ga llery.' lands in it to paying clients. On the walls There is a divergence of opinion on The 'Is there anything I can say that will next to the boxes are two locked wooden A ustl'Cl lian's story. The transcript of a radio change your m ind?' frames, where the Prime Minister and the interview given by Hill on the issue has 'No.' Leader of the Opposition post their m edi a already been circulated in the boxes. He So there they all are, reading or not schedules for the cl ay. said, 'I can't be held responsible for the fact reading the papers, and this morning is Now the reporters are arriving for work that the Labor Party's onl y go t three bush unusual, because The Australian has broken and ga thering around the noticeboarcl and seats as opposed to 40 Coalition. That's a story. the boxes. Michell e is still looking fo r a somebody else's problem.' The Environment Writer, Stephen Lunn, hom e for that kitten. Someone else is 'Good yarn,' says a commercial radio has documents released under Freedom of complaining about Hill's 'presser'. 'Ten reporter. Information legisla tion. They show that minutes notice of som ething happening in 'Yeah. ' the m oney raised fr om the sale of part of Cairns. What are we meant to do ? Beam up 'N ot a bad line of Hill's though. When T els tra, w h ich was to b e used fo r Scotty?' you've got all the rural seats, yo u should get enviro nmental projects, has nearly all been In the A u tralian office, the burea u chief most of the mon ey.' spent in Liberal and National Party seats. is having trouble persuading the author of 'Yeah.' The distribution of mon ey is decided the scoop, Stephen Lunn, to com e in to 'Good yarn though .' exclusively by Robert work. Lunn is meant to start holidays today 'Ob, I don't know.' Hill and John Ander­ before being transferred to the Melbourne The camera operators set up little step­ son, the Ministers for offi ce. He wasn't planning to come in . ladders at the Ministerial Entrance. This is En vironment a nd The bureau chief exerts som e pressure. so they will be able to get several angles of Primary Industries 'The editor, quite legitimately in my view, the Minister talking-fr om eye level, from respecti vely. was expecting you to com e in and do the knee level (they drop, almost as one, to It looks like the fo llow up.' their knees), and fr om above. equ ivale nt of th e Lunn co mes in. The Minister com es out, and says that sports- rorts affair At midday the television monitor in the tory is an outrageous bea t-up, that the that saw Ros Kell y the press ga llery offices are broadcasting m oney is m ost needed in rural areas, which sacked when Labor Kerri-Anne Kennerley. Her guest is John just happen to be Coalition seats. He also was in power, but as Pasquarelli, former head of staff for Pauline says that there was n o n eed for The usual things aren't so Hanson, and once a fa miliar sight wandering A ustralian to use documents obtained under clear. By ten o'clock the corridors of the second fl oor of the Freedom of Information legislation. The in the morning there Senate side of Parliament House. He has complete documentation on how the grants are already notices just published a book on his former boss. were decided is available for anyone to on the board in the The ga llery m embers ga ther round the see. press gallery. One m onitors. Kerri-Anne accuses Pasquarelli The Minister walks off . The camera announces a press of being a liar. The gallery roars and claps. operators pack up their stepladders and confer ence to be She does it again, and they cheer. unplug their cameras from the pillars of held at 11.30am in Meanwhile, one of the Government's Parliament House. Anderson's press Hobart by the Shadow m edia minders is leaning over Lunn as be secretary is busy handing around fl ow charts Minis te r for th e writes his follow-up story. They laugh of the grant-a warding decision-making Envirmu11ent, Dw1can together. As the minder walks away, Lunn process. He spruiks them: 'Flow diagrams, Kerr. 'Revelations in toda y's Australian .. . says: 'So the PM's office says for the record flow diagrams, excellent for radio,' and is (sic) prima facie evidence of rorting on a that Senator Robert Hill is very lucky to everyone laughs. grand scale' it sa ys . And another notice have his job today,' then laughs. The Now it is nearly five o'clock. The six announces that Hill will hold a press ministerial minder grins, and walks on. Is it o'clock newses are almost in the can. I am conference in Cairns. a joke? It must be, another reporter says sitting in a corner of the A ustralian office, This noticeboard is at an important part when I tell the story later in the day. buried in press clippings, when I sense that of the second floor of the Senate side of Nobody is suggesting that Hill is on the something is going on. There is a rustling, Parliament House. Look at the board, and skids. an organising on the second flo or of the

18 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 Senate side of Parliament House. People are the heads of the television announcers. many issues-one for the country media, moving fast. They are excited. What is it? Then the television offices gradually empty. and one for the b oxes in Canberra. I wander out into the pink corridor and see In the newspaper offices, the clatter 'The gallery can interpret political speak. film crews urgently lugging equipment. continues for an hour or two. Then the The bush can't.' I catch a glimpse of Michelle Grattan's blue gallery goes home. H e also said his dress disappearing down the corridor. 'Godspeed' says the headline on the Minister was often Michelle will know what is happening. I set Daily Telegraph the n ext day. frustrated at not being out to follow her. Meanwhile, The Australian is the only able to get on the six Down the pink carpet corridor. Down a paper to follow up comprehensively on the o'clock n ew s . Rural white staircase, along more parquet, round National Heritage Trust story. The Age issues were rarely good a corner, through heavy glass doors high carries a small item pooh-poohing it. The television, but soon they enough to allow access for giants. Down Financial Review and the ABC carry straight were going to have an another corridor. She keeps getting ahead of reports of the allegations, and the item to do with sniffer me, but always there is that glimpse of the Government's response. Most commercial dogs at airports. 'Cute blue dress, the click of her heels on the television newses do not cover the story. dogs, cute minister. That parquet. By the end of the week, the environ­ will make it.' Then uddenly we are in a cool stone m ent story is dead. And the big success courtyard, and it is clear that we have arrived. The next day, I ask Margot Kingston story of the previous year A circle of reporters is grouped arotmd the h ow the gallery suddenly knew about had been an announce­ heavy wooden doors at the far end. Almost Howard's press conference. I had seen no ment of drought assist­ directly above is the giant Australian fl ag announcement, heard no telephone calls. ance grants. The press that sits at the apex of Parliament House, 'They probably rang the bells,' she said. secretary had organised and on either side of the wooden doors there She tells m e that when something the media conference is another, normal-sized flag. There is a urgent-or fake urgent-is happening, those on a Sunday, on a farm lectern in the middle, and the fl ags are putting press releases into the boxes or property n ear Quean­ spaced just the right distance from the posting notices on the board ring a bell so beyan, and the entire lectern to appear in any shot of the speaker. that everyone will know to go down and Sunday-rostered gallery This is a courtyard of stone and water­ have a look. The bells, I find out later, were m embers had attended. The Minister had a fountain surrounds a four-humped rung ten minutes before Howard's press copped some flak, he said, for holding the sculpture in the middle. Wisteria covers conference to announce the departure of conference n ear Canberra, rather than trellises on either side, but the green barely Australians for a foreign war. som ewh ere like Longreach, where the softens the stone. A man in a suit and ti e 'The bells, the bells,' I say, doing my m oney was actually going to be spent. com es up to m e. hunchback of Notre Dame impression . 'I told him, do you expect the gallery to 'Who are you ?' he demands Margo t doesn 't smile. decamp to Longreach ? N o. And the fact is 'Margaret Simons. Who are you?' The next week, I do two interviews with that we got on all the newses that night, He looks at me. I expect to be expelled, Government media minders. which we wouldn't have done any other but he moves on. Innes Willox was once my chief of staff way.' Now the Prime Minister is standing at on The Age. Now he m anages the m edia for I asked whether any reporters had asked the lectern, and h e is announcing that Alexander Downer. H e says that sometimes, to see the documentation on the National tomorrow, our troops will leave for what when someone in the gallery breaks a story, Heritage grants that both Anderson and looks as though it is going to be another the rest of the gallety kills it. There is a bias Hill had said was available to anyone who Gulf War. The Prime Minister says he knows against breaking ranks. asked. that all Aus tralians will wish them He says, 'Last year Lindsay Murdoch on N ot one reporter had asked for it. Godspeed. The Age broke a story about Downer 'Can I see it?' I said. As we walk away, one of the Australian supposedly not paying duty on some cigars His eyebrows went up. 'Well, it's a huge reporters says, 'Lunny didn't get to ask any he brought into the country. It wasn't volume of stuff, you know. Very dull.' questions.' a story. He didn't h ave to pay the duty, 'But I can see it?' 'What about?' but when I woke up and read that story, 'I'll have to check. Did he really say 'His greenie story.' I thought, "Bugger, there goes my week." that? Did he really say it was available?' 'Ah.' I thought I'd have to spend the whole week 'Yes.' But now there is no time. The press killing that story. But when! went up to the 'Um. I wasn't aware of that.' conference was called just in time to m ake gallery and began to talk to people, I found the six o'clock newses, not in time for the they had already killed it. The reporters on M ARGOT KI NGSTON was the only reporters to gather any dissenting opinion. other papers were calling it a beat-up. They person I wanted to interview whom I had In the public areas of Parliament House, were quite sympathetic to m e. I didn't have forewarned of my arrival in Canberra. I knew the last tourists are leaving. The sun sets. to do a thing. They killed it for me.' He she would tell m e the gossip. Kingston is The lights come on. Clatter clatter go the pauses. 'The gallery kills its own.' not only a reporter, but also a player of the keyboards on the second floor of the Senate My second interview was with John game of politics. She talks quite plainly side of Parliament House. Anderson's press secretary. He spent a lot about how various stories she has written Now the six o'clock newses are playing. of time explaining how he handles different have influenced the course of events. Other 'Godspeed' say the little topic boxes behind media. He writes two press releases on reporters don't put it this way. They talk

V OLUME 8 N UMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 19 about 'breaking' news. This m ea ns they has broken stories, and pursued others after Yet the reporting of the Canberra press publish som ething fi rst. Sometimes the they had been dropped. She broke the story gallery is full of such distancing. Politicians breaking news is a leak of a report or an about N oel C richton-Browne telling a have kneejerk reactions. They call for things. opinion due to be released anyway. Breaking journalist he would 'screw her tits off' if she They condemn things. They appeal to things. it simply means getting it first. Other tim es, quoted him. She pursued Ros Kelly over the They do all sorts of things that are pres en ted breaking news means publishing something sports rorts affair long after the rest of the in a coded language, a sort of politics-speak that would otherwise remain secret, such gallery had dropped off the story. Eventually that is not only distant from the way things as Laurie Oakes' breaking of the stories they were forced to pick it up again. She really happen or are decided upon, but also about ministers' abuse of expense accounts. also broke significant aspects of the story masks the personal element, the aching But reporters rarely examine, let alone talk about Graham Richardson and the Marshall heart, the compromised belief, the fr iends about, how they decide what to break and Islands affair. and enemies and who drink out of whose what to let lie. 'The gallery went very soft on Richo,' coffee cup, and who lies to whom, and who Kingston is what a journalist should she says. 'You see the perception was that loves whom, and all the other whispers and be-discriminatingly indiscreet. he would survive, so they didn't go for him. shoutsandjoysand sa dnessesthathappen How does the press ga llery cope with And when he got back on to the front in that big well-kept building her? bench, there was hardly a murmur.' rr under the smooth green lawn. She says, 'I think the structuralists think The gallery, she says, doesn't necessarily I am probably a good person to have around.' like a scoop. The N ational Heritage story .l. HE TERM 'God correspondent' needs to 'The structuralists?' wouldn't have been picked up because, be explained. It com es from Laura Tingle, 'The ones who think about the whole 'There would be pressure-becau se they wife of Alan Ramsey who used to be one. Or animal of the gallery. They would think had it and we didn't- to talk it down. To perhaps still is . that I fill a positive role.' say that it wasn't a good story. And everyone Ask gallery members and political To others, she is anathema. hates the Oz anyway, because they never minders to describe the stratification of the One of her former bosses said to m e: attribute follow-ups. If we follow up an Oz gallery, and they tell you there are three 'Ah, Margot. Yes we were always talking story we'll say where it came from, but they levels. There is only a small amount of about how to manage Margot, but of course never do that when they follow up ours.' disagreement about who belongs on which the truth is she is quite unmanageable. But But in spite of everything, Margot, always level. First there are the young and the then she does break stories.' in love with her work, likes the gallery. She restless- junior reporters who com e in, And Innes Willox said to me: 'Margot even claims to like the fa ct that it runs as a a tte nd whatever events a nd press will pick up stories that nobody else will pack. 'I think it's good for journalism,' she conferences they need to attend, churn out touch. She mus t h ave the hide of a says. 'Everyone knows if you've made a their stuff- he says this, she says that- and rhinoceros to do that in this place.' mistake. Everyone knows if you 've broken go hom e, or more likely go on to a hectic I got to know Margot when we both a story. We police each other to som e extent. social life. worked out of the Fairfax newspapers' office We all watch each other.' She claims that On the highest level (a nd again there is in Brisbane. She was writing for the Times the gallery did not promote Pauline only a sm all amount of disagreem ent about on Sunday and I was correspondent for The Hanson-that was done by radio talkback who belongs on it) are the gallery leaders. Age. She was a chain smoker-impo sibly shows and non-gallery journalists. The These are, most agree, Glenn Milne, who thin, impossibly pale- always dropping gallery members who did give Hanson what works for the Seven Network, bu t also cigarette ash over my desk while she asked the pack judged to be too good a run were writes a weekly column in The Australian; for my opinion on some current event of the constantly chaffed about it, she says, And Paul Kelly, when he is in town; and Laurie day. She didn't always listen to my reply. If how hard is it to run your own race within Oakes, although some put him on another I go t angry with her, sh e would just blink, the pack, with such 'policing' going on? She level, all by himself. These people have the and keep talking. She sat at her computer blinks and doesn't really answer. Margot power to lead ga llery opinion. Some of the all folded up like a tortured paperclip, and just does what Margot does. Utterly ex-God correspondents are on this level. tapped away. I liked her immensely, which vulnerable. Utterly undentable. Others are no longer part of the gallery, or does not at all conflict with the fact that have shifted sideways. Michelle Grattan, there were times when she was hard to stand. I N THE INTRODUCTION to The Faber Book of now working for the Australian Financial Now, ten years later, Margot and I meet Reportage, John Carey, Merton Professor of Review, is generally agreed to be running a at Ossies, the coffee shop in the non-p ublic English at Oxford University, talked about different race because she writes for what area of Parliament House where Ministers how reporters must resist the slide of many journalists deem a 'boutiqu e' and reporters and office workers queue language into sameness, and distancing from publication. Of course, the fact is that the together for their excellent cappuccinos in the real. He talks about how language can Financial Review is one of the few outlets a self-conscious show of camaraderie, an either confront u s with the vivid, the for lengthy articles on policy. elite sort of egalitarianism. frightening or the unaccustomed, or do the The gallery can also be led by people I have just come from another staged opposite-muffle any such alarms. who aren't actually there. The ABC's 7.30 doorstop event, where everyon e was 'The good reporter must cultivate the Report is influential, although its anchor, polished and reasonable. Margot was late, innocent eye, but he must not be innocent,' Kerry O'Brien, works from Sydney. depressed, in aT-shirt and a waistcoat with Carey claims. The reporter must talk about Then in the middle are the heavy-hitters, a torn shoulder seam, blinking palely in the blood, and killing, and war, not adopt the and Laura Tingle is one of these. They are sunlight of the manicured courtyard. circumlocutions of casualties and offences people in their 30s or 40s. They hold senior Since she came to Canberra, Kingston and strategy. jobs and cover important specialties.

20 EUREKA STREET • j uNE 1998 Sometimes they head bureaus. The But really, Tingle says, the God on. As well, the political minders might expectation is that they get below the correspondent is dead, and sh e feels ring you. They might give you a spin, and surface, talk to Ministers privately, and ambivalent about the passing. On the one you think about all that, and out of that report what is really going on. hand, political reporting has changed and comes a point of view.' While I am sitting with Tingle in 0 ies, people are tired of being told what to think 'And how do the hifts happen? ' I ask. one of the staff m embers for the Health by journali ts. On the other hand, there 'How is it that the whole ga llery seems to Minister, Michael Wooldridge, drops by. isn't the same deep engagement with policy change its mind at once?' 'My bloke's going to give you a ring later. issues now that there once was. I talk about the way the ga llery changed We thought you and the boy might like to So what does a heavy-hitter actually do? its mind about Alexander Downer as leader catch up for dinner tonight.' The 'boy' Before Tingle ge ts into work in the of the Liberal Party-one day 'young Turk', referred to i Ramsey. Or Alan. morning, she will have read or glanced the next day, 'dickhead'. I knew Tingle only from her picture by­ through all the newspapers and listened to Tingle denies tha t there is much line in which she looked inappropriately the radio news and current events. She caucusing. ' Perhaps among the junior girlish for a heavy-hitting reporter- long arrives at the office at around l0.30am. journalists, and the radio journalists.' But blonde curls, and a small pointy face. Now, Sometimes, on those days when she is mostly the agreem ent comes 'because we're face to face, she looks older, the blonde hair writing a feature or a comment piece for the all watching the same things, reading the cropped into a wavy bob and her eyes Saturday sections of the newspapers, she same stuff-there are only so many ways crystalline blue. will arrive much earlier, at 5 or6am, because that you can write that World War II started I had rung her on my first today.' trip to Canberra. She had just At the end of last year, she resigned from The Age as their says, there was a view in the Canberra bureau chief, sick, as gallery that Howard was in she puts it, of constant inter­ trouble, and that he might lose ference and lack of attention to the election. N ow that view has her requests. 'They didn't seem changed. The ga llery sees him to realise that when I said we as being on the front foot again. n eeded more staff I might 'And how is that view arrived actually m ean it.' She refused to at? What are the mechanics of talk to me then. 'I'm just sick of that?' the gallery at the m om ent,' she 'Well, he cam e back this year said. 'I don' t want to talk about very assertive, and Labor were it or anything connected with it.' that is the only time when sustained thought in a bit of a decline after their conference. But by the time I return four weeks is possible. The piece will be finished by It's largely in the tone of the rhetoric, the la ter, Tingle is back in the gallery, mid-morning, and then she can get on with tone of a press conference. He might respond a few m etres down the hallway in the the rest of the day. to you, "I reject the tone of that question"­ Sydney Morning Herald office, and willing These days, thanks to modern m edia you know, very assertively, and of course to talk. managem ent, a frightening amount of it's all fraudulent. You know it's being done Sh e says, 'When I started in journalism, verbiage is available to the press gallery. because someone told him that in q ualita ti ve there were the God correspondents. Paul When she has worked as a bureau chief, one polling people said he wasn't assertive Kelly would ring up and say "I will be of Tingle's first jobs for the day was to look enough . And then it comes across in writing tonight", and som etimes you through the transcripts of what the Prime Parliament. It's a "no surrender" sort of wouldn't even know what he was writing Minister had been saying. There would be style.' about, but space would be made available. press conferences, radio interviews, five or 'And so the gallery changes its mind?' "I will be writing tonight." It was like six transcripts on her desk every m orning. 'Yes. We are terribly vulnerable to Moses descending with the tabl ets.' 'The workload just dulls the senses. You n being sold a line. ' Paul Kelly used to be Canberra bureau have to read them all. He may have said it chief for The Australian, then became editor all before, but what you are looking for is L RLIAMENT IS SITTING . It is the end of of the paper for a few years, during which not just something new, but a rhetorical March. The Wik legislation will shortly fail time it becam e known among print brea kthrough, a new way of saying some­ to pass the Senate for the second time. All journalists as the best paper in Australia. thing, that gives you an indication of what the politicians and their minders are in Mic h elle Grattan was the Kelly is happening under the surface.' town, and although life continues much equiva lent at The Age. She had influence 'T extual analysis?' I suggest. This term the same on the second floor of the Senate and sometimes even control over what ran has been suggested to m e by one of the God side of Parliament House, there is a sense of w here. And Alan Ramsey was another God correspondents, who has said that working the place being more crowded, of there correspondent. in Canberra these days is a bit like being in being more people to talk to, and more to Over cappuccino in Ossies, Tingle refers Hong Kong in the last days of British power. do. Under the noticeboard and around the to her husband Alan Ramsey in two ways. You watch China, watch what they say, boxes are cardboard cartons piled with When she talks about their personal life she and analyse it for true meaning. copies of the reports being tabled in calls him' Alan'. When she is talking about Tingle says: 'Yes that's it. That's it Parliam nt that day. Most of them are the phenomenon, the public guru, the exactly. You are analysing the text, rea ding centimetres thick. Most have to be read, or journalist, she calls him 'Ramsay'. into it with your knowledge of what's going scanned. Or, since that is impossible, at

V OLUME 8 N UMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 21 least the press release folded into the front an entrance to the press gallery. There arc Ian Sinclair. Sinkers, knowing this, is cover will have to be read. Or scanned. four rows of tiered seats. The heavy-hitters supposed to be reluctant to expel them. The monitors are on along the pink of the gallery sit close to the front. I sit in I congratulate Cole-Adams on his corridors, but people are only half li stening. the back row. T he only other person in this account of question time the previous day. The proceedings arc sleepy, routine. But all row is Paul Kelly, who is only half listening. 'Politics is m ostly theatre,' he says. 'I think that chMark Latham . In a column Cole-Adam s is som ething of a wise old main event, begins in the blue-green published later in the week, Kelly will man of the gall ery. 'There are an awful lot chamber of the House of Representatives. describe it as a heavy read, but a genuine of young reporters around who tend to write On the second floor in the public area, attempt to redefine what Labor might stand things like 'in an unprecedented move .. .' I sec people queuing up to be searched, for in the era of footloose capital and he says. 'What it really means is, "I don't metal-detected and let in, but I don't want predatory multinationals. Now he is remember anything like this happening to sit with the public. I want to sit with the absorbed in his reading, but occasionally he before, and I have been here nearly three journalists. If only I walk looks up and smiles clown at the years."' around the chamber for long big fish, with the air of someone And on another occasion, he says, ' Like enough, I must find the press who has heard it all before. most human activities, politics is gallery door, I think. And so Below us the heads of the deeply comic.' I begi n, clown green-grey press gallery are like coconuts. corridors. Now question Each one h as a notebook and I AM SITTING in the Prime Minister's press time has begun. I can hear from here it is possible to get a office. There are about half a dozen staff the voices, great angry boom­ good view of their doodles. They here, mainly well-dressed yo ung women, ing male voices, through the draw circles, and tents, and sitting at word processors. They have on corridors. Occa ionally turreted castles with flags on disk transcripts of every press conference, I catch a glimpse clown into them. One draws a series of of every radio interview, and they can call the chamber, and I can see interconnecting staircases. them up to order. It is one of these transcripts sui ted bodies lolling on The Treasurer, Pe ter I am waiting for. Government and Opposition Costello, is on his feet . He is While I am waiting, one of the minclcrs benches. But most of all there replying to a Dorothy Dixer, tells me that Parliament House is actuall y is the noise. Roars and asked with a lmost comic not very good for media. The blue room, booms, as I walk around on weariness by a backbencher: 'Is where press conferences are normally held, the second floor on the House the Treasurer aware of ... will is all wrong. The Minister or Prime Minister of Representatives side of the Treasurer explain the is standing up. The journalists are sitting Parliament House, trying to Government's position on ... ' cl own- too comfortable. 'We've got stuck find a way in. 'I thank the member for her in there for 55 minutes sometimes, with I give up on the second floor, and go question,' starts Costello ... and then them just lolling around throwing in cl own to the ground. Again, the booming, launches into an attack. Boom boom. Hands questions.' That is why the Prime Minister's again the glances through windows, except on hips. Leaning forward over the table. courtyard- that place of stone and water­ now I am on the same level as the speakers, The Opposition assumes attitudes of disdain is being used more often. But what this and what I can see is the people in the and mockery. Then the reply. Boom boom. mincler would really like is a set-up like public gallery above looking clown- pink A pointing of the finger. Roars of laughter. that used by Jeff Kennett in Victoria. There poised faces, like characters in a Rembrandt The occasional titter from the gallery, the Premier is seated on a dais, and the painting, and above them in a special accompanied by a cessation of doodles and reporters are in ranks beneath him. That glassed-off area, the rows of fa lling socks the beginning of note-taking. Costello is works well. and scuffed knees on the legs of the school attacking Mark Latham, and through him The radio in the pressroom is tuned to children, brought to see democracy in the Labor Party. Latham's ideas don't accord John Laws. While I wait, one of the young action. with Labor Party policy, you see. women makes a telephone call to some On this level there are several entrances, Inconsistency is weakness. Inconsi tency media monitoring service. She wants a but all of them are marked 'locked door', is bad. transcript of something on the John Laws 'no entry', or 'n1embers only'. Question time finishes, and suddenly, show. 'It was about twenty minutes ago. Up to the third floor then, far above the there is a great exit. All the big fish leave. Something about tax. It was only short, just performers, and here there is more light The press ga llery empties. The eddies settle. a throwaway line and a bit more, but we than anywhere else. The ceiling of the The booming stops. On the floor of the want it. Yes. Thanks.' chamber is a great window, and you feel Parliament a solitary figure stands and reads In a recent article published in AQ that you are ncar the surface of things, at out petitions. Magazine, Paul Kelly commented that when the top of the sea, where the sun ca n be seen Later, Peter Cole-Adams, chief political he was a boy, John Laws wa a elise jockey. and even felt, but the big fish- the life of correspondent for the Canberra Times, tells He played music. Kelly used to listen to this aq uarium-are clown below. Boom me over coffee that question time has been him when he did his homework. Now John boom go the voices in the grey-green very rowdy lately. The rumour is that Leo Laws is the m ost important political chamber. McLeay, the Opposition w hip, has a pot of commentator in the country. Eventually, back on the second floor, money on his desk for the first ALP member Meanwhile, Kelly wrote, the influence I find the un ma rkecl wooden doors that give who gets expelled by the new Speaker, of the newspapers (natural home of the God

22 EUREKA STREET • JuNE. 1998 correspondent) has declined, and in any developed,' the correspondent says. Now, I catch a taxi from the ran k opposite The case they no longer engage regularly with the gall ery is on the outside. Grange to go back to my hotel. We whip up deep policy issues. Kelly wrote, 'When have 'Is there no influence then ?' to Capital Hill, where Parliament House is you read something worthwhile about the 'The media influence how the ga me is fl oodlit. On the plaza at the front, a Japanese health system in this country, or about the played. We don't influence policy.' man in a suit is standing in front of a difficulties in the education system ? television camera, talking earnestly. Why I believe that the press gallery is a declining I HAVE BEEN told I must go to Manuka ishe there7 Whataretheymaking? A company fo rce and a declining institution. People while Parliament is sitting, because that is video? An advertisement? A documentary? may applaud that but the question is, what's where the social life happens. The Grange Then as we turn north towards the heart substituting for it? Who really cares about bar, particularly, is m ea nt to be the scene of of the continent and the centre of the city, the old-fa shioned political story? What m any affection and defections, although the taxi driver says to me gruffly, 'Have you happened in Cabinet yesterday? When did Laura Tingle says sh e hasn't been there for heard the good news?' Thinking he must be you last read what happened in Cabinet a long time. It's m ore for the young people, talking about Wik, I turn towards him, but yesterday? It rarely happens because of she says. 'The young reporters and the young he is offering m e a booklet about the Baha'i modern media managem ent.' staffers go there, and I guess it is useful if faith. My instinct is to reject it, but I stop I m eet a former God in Ossies. Like all you are new, to develop contacts, and hear myself. Aiter all, it is only a short journey to the former Gods, this correspondent does what is going on, but I think you'd only get m y hotel. In the next few minutes, he shows not want to be identified. The correspondent low level gossip there. The senior people me several of the volumes of Baha'i literature agrees with m e vigorously when I say that have a different scen e ... ' he carries with him, and tells m e how the I have been following the ga llery around as N evertheless, I go. It is the night that great prophet early this century got the it troops from one event to another, and the Wik legislation goes before the Senate leaders of the world's nations together to that reporting in the gallery seems to m e to for the second time. It is the day before the encourage co-operation. But they dicln'tlisten. be very stagey. High Court hands down its decision on the 'Unfortunately that is why World War I The correspondent says that the ga llery Hindmarsh Island case. It is a fine and cool happened, and World War II. ' He shrugs. has had three distinct eras. In the old days, night. The taxi drops me off outside The 'But at least we have the United Nations.' immediately after the war, the ga llery was Grange. How long had he been sitting on that much smaller, and briefings from politicians The dark and silky quiet of well-off rank, I wonder; how long has he spent on were frequent and intimate. This was the suburbia is only a few hundred m etres away, other Canberra ranks, how often has he cosy stage. Then came som ething else-a but here the street is lit up, the cafes have watched the people who know the corridors period the correspondent has trouble tag­ tables on the footpath and piped music of power, the people who analyse the texts, ging-through the '60s and '70s. Then, in comes out of every little eatery. Men in and who write the texts, and who gain or the '80s and '90s, it has becom e theatrical. baggy coarse-weave pants and black skivvies lose or regain their jobs on the texts. This is the stagey stage. and women in little black dresses wander How long had he been sitting there, I press the correspondent to find a tag for along the sidewalk. The restaurants are all with his taxi full of faith, thinking about the '60s ancl '70s, which were of course the full. They have windows almost down to the reasons things happen, and a lonely p eriod when the power of the God ground level, so you can look through and prophet who wasn't listened to, and how correspondent was at its peale Aiter much see who is ea ting with whom. that has made all the difference? pressing, the correspondent calls it the 'free The Grange is quiet tonight, the bar But at least we have the United marke t' period, when people went in staff almost leaping over the counter in '"'"f' Nations. different directions, when they developed their eagerness to serve you a drink. A man their own contacts across a broad fi eld, and a woman, still in workday clothes, are .1. HE NEXT DAY we clri ve out of Canberra. within the bureaucracy as well as within sitting in a booth. H e is a reporter. She is a It is a sunny clay, but the forecast is for sleet Parliam ent. It was also the time when junior political staffer. They have a bottle and rain, and we are trying to get home policy- makers in the bureaucracy and the of wine empty between them and are before it arrives. politicians read the papers, and could be leaning towards each other-every touch Lachlan and Clare sleep, and wake, and influenced by what they saw there. or lack of touch significant. cry, and eat, growing older every second. The former God correspondent tells me At the bar sit another couple. He is on What side of the divide will they end up that the young people in the ga llery these the mobile phone for almost an hour. She on? Will they be on the outside, sitting in days are far more cynical than the older plays with her straw, occasionally using it the dark, turning to tale of prophets and people. This, the former God says, is part of to pick her teeth. 'T ell m e mate,' he says journalists? broader trends. It is a sadder world, a more into his m obile, 'Is it a marginal seat ? If it is, Or will they be the ones on the inside, cynical world, and people are cynical about no worries ... ' He sees m e, and looks at m e amid the light and the chatter, confident politics. This is, of course, partly because it suspicious! y. that they know, if not the answers, then at i reported to them cynically. In a coffee shop across the way, a junior least where the answers are to be had? 'I suppose we came from a gen eration minister is diningwitha woman. It em erges, And if they are in the cl ark, how will that didn' t have much to be cynical as I listen in, that she is divorced with they find out what is going on? • about.' children, and he is single with a big house. 'We w e re part of an intellectual 'Ah, but at least your place is home,' he Margaret Simons is a novelist and journalist. community. The gallery leaders were part says. 'You say you've forgotten what it's This essay, commissioned for Eureka Street, of a whole intellectual community in this like to be alone, but at least you don 't go is part of work in progress for a book of town that was part of how policy was home to an empty house ... ' reportage.

VOLUME 8 N UMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 23 THE CHURCH ==r--­ ANDREW H AMILTON The clash of symbols

S'M'O" '" the hfoblood of chmch". a lack of passion for the unity of the church. criteria, instances of harsh treatment receive They are also of interest to politicians, If Catholics accepted without any wide publicity, and a very large number of among whom Victorian Premier, Jeffrey qualification that the Eucharist can be divorced and remarried Catholics are Kennett, is a master. So, Kennett's decision received only within church boundaries, excluded from receiving the Eucharist. As a to make an issue of his exclusion from the desire of a Kennett or a Clinton to be result, many Catholics are troubled because receiving communion in Catholic churches allowed to communicate would have been they cannot recognise in the church the deserves reflection. seen as simply impertinent. But they do not compassion of Christ, and so question its The practice of Eucharistic hospitality­ assume this, and with good reason. For Eucharistic discipline. the giving and receiving of communion the Second Vatican Council emphasised When B.ill Clinton and Jeff Kennett seek outside church bounda- to receive communion at Catholic Masses, ries- differs among the therefore, many Catholics will be at least churches. Generally, the ambivalent about their church's position. Orthodox and Catholic Ambivalence may be compounded by the churchesdiscourageit, while symbolism which attaches in the secular other mainstream churches culture to admission to communion. offer communion to those In public controversy, the issue is who are in good standing normally discussed in terms of inclusion with their own churche . and exclusion, approval and disapproval, Underlying these differ­ and acceptance and rejection. To be offered ent practices are divergent the Eucharist is a symbol of approval and symbolic frameworks. For acceptance. To be refused is assumed to Catholics and Orthodox, indicate disapproval and rejection. Indeed, the central symbol is the image of the early what Christians have in common their it was commonly assumed that the fuss church gathered in a common faith and way baptism and following of Jesus, and as a made about President Clinton reflected his of life under the Apostles. The united body result, where there was exceptional benefit m oral qualities, and not his church of Christ, the church receives the one to be gained, it allowed sacramental allegiance. The disapproval implied in the Eucharistic body of Christ. For a divided hospitality under exceptional circum­ refusal of communion has more weight church to receive the Eucharist would be to stances. On occasions like weddings or the when it is held, even inarticulately, that act out a lie. From this symbolic framework first communion of a child, for example, the churches have a unique access to God it follows that those who are publicly the local bishop can grant the request of and so reflect God's approval or disapproval. outside the faith and life of the church, such non-Catholics to receive the Eucharist. So, Critics see the denial of communion as an as non-Catholics and the divorced who have the symbolic link between communion in offence against fair trading, and one which remarried, may not receive the Eucharist. the church and reception of Eucharistic undermines the claim of the church For Anglican and most mainstream communion is not without exception. ~ to represent the whole community. Protestant Churches, the controlling Many Catholics, too, express discomfort symbol is the practice of Jesus as it is with their church's Eucharistic discipline l. HE DESIRE of Clinton and Kennett to described in the Gospels. He ate with sin­ because it seems to reflect a harshness that receive communion in Catholic churches ners, feel the crowds, and embodied in his should be foreign to the church. They believe should perhaps be seen against this back­ life the non-discriminatory love of God. It that the public life of the church should ground. It would be too cynical to see in it follows that the Eucharist should also be express the values by which Jesus lived: simply a pitch for the Catholic vote or an inclusive, so that all who are baptised should justice, hospitality and compassion. These opportunity to make a little mischief for be invited to receive it. In the Eucharist, values appeared more clearly in the church their critics among Catholic Bishops. It Christ feeds the hungry. of an earlier clay, when the church shows an appreciation of the symbolic force Each of these approaches to the Euchari t represented a fairly marginal group in of acceptance, inclusion and approval, and is coherent. But conflict can arise when society, when the service to the poor, especially of an approval which transcends each party interprets the other's practice in especially by women religious, was visible political and national divisions. It is as the light of its own symbolism. and massive, and when relatively few were close to a metaphysical symbol of legitimacy Anglicans, for example, can see the excluded from communion by their life that a democratic leader can approach. refusal of Catholics to receive communion choices. In such a church, a strict Eucharistic Catholics, like myself, who can see no in their churches as self-righteous and discipline did not argue against compassion. reason why the church should accommodate inh ospitable, while Catholics can regard the Today, however, Catholic membership its symbols to this kind of interest, may Anglican invitation to all to attend as .is not distinctive, ministry to the poor is find more food for thought in the decision indicating a low esteem for the Eucharist and less visible and more subject to managerial of Mary McAleese, the President of the

24 EUREKA STREET • JUNE 1998 Irish Republic, to receive communion at a non-Catholic Eucharist in Belfast. Although she has not replied to strong criticism by Catholic leaders in Ireland, her action was, clearly, carefully considered. It combined Tell it lilze it is in a powerful way the secular symbolism of u !NG SATELLITE TECHNOLOGY to track mutton birds as they travel15,000 kilometres to acceptance and inclusion, and the Christian Antarctica and back for a feedi uncovering previously hidden galaxies relatively close to our symbolism of reconciliation that is at the owni eavesdropping on bacteria signalling to one anotheri embarking on a journey to the h eart of th e Eucharist. The ges ture centre of the earth via computer-w hatever else was achieved by theNa tional Science Fomm, recognised the importance within sectarian ScienceNOW!, it certainly put to rest any idea that Australia lacks creative young scientists. violence of the religious grounds offered for The aim of ScienceNOW!, held last month at the Melbourne Exhibition Centre, was rejection, exclusion and disapproval. to generate an understanding of the excitement of science and of discovery by giving Certainly, as the Bishops pointed out, young researchers the chance to tell their stories to the media and the public. The focus her action was in conflict with the of the activity was a series of sessions entitled 'Fresh Science', for which universities and symbolism that links communion to research institutes and organisations were asked to nominate young scientists undertak­ church. But it showed clearly why the force ing exciting work. of that symbolic link will be difficult to The 17 projects the Fresh Science researchers presented were significant and fa scinating, recognise unless the life of the Church but even more pleasing to the organisers was the fact that there were plenty more in the embodies clearly Christ's acceptance, wings. In fact, with only six weeks notice, 90 nominations rolled into the organising compassion and reconciliation. Issues of committee from every state. The selection of the final 17 was made not solely on due process, the place of women in the scientific significance, but on criteria that included the likelihood of media interest, the church, the welcome given to the divorced apparent ability of the scientist to present his or her material, and the level of peer review and remarried, and the option for the poor, the work had undergone. are not peripheral to Catholic life. They In scientific terms, many of the projects that did not make it to ScienceNOW! were shape things as central as the understanding just as worthy or important as those included. But for one reason or another-perhaps too of the Eucharist. much publicity in the past, perhaps too difficult a topic to make easily understandable­ they did not quite fit the criteria. For some nominations-an advance in the treatment of Andrew Hamilton SJ teaches in the United breast cancer comes to mind-the selection committee decided it was simply too early to go Faculty of Theology, Melbourne. public. These projects may well show up at next year's forum, again to be held in Melbourne. Among the standouts that did not make it to the ScienceNOW! podium was an National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health important new theory on the stmcture of atoms which has been recognised worldwide as resolving theoretical problems underlying basic chemistry. Then there was the young -=='==;:! CSIRO scientist who has helped create the world's largest terrestrial robot, out of 5000 .. .:. ..: ' .!;;_ . ~=- tonnes of coal excavating machinery worth more than $50 million. This lumbering Develop ing Health Conference dragline can now be controlled by the movement of a computer mouse. 11-12 November 1998 An engineer at a mral university campus has harnessed the energy of the sun to power Changin g political and eco nomi c environments refrigerators. His technology makes it possible to store vaccines and other important during the 1990s are challenges for people involved medicines in remote areas of the developing world, thereby giving them access to a in public health , wherever they are located. On the quality of healthcare they have never known before. A computer scientist at an urban occasion of its lOth anniversary, the National Centre campus has been teaching computers to paint the Mona Lisa, and in the process testing for Epidemiology and Popu lation Health is holding a new ways of approaching complex problems with computers. nati onal conference on the theme Developing Health. Our local film and television industry have made us well aware of Australian Keynote speakers to include: creativity in the arts. Some of the most watched shows on world television, for example, Richard Feachem, World Bank are made in Australia. At the beginning of the '60s that would have been unthinkable. David Sanders, Universf~y ofth e Western Cape, Announcing the world's largest-ever transfer of funds into scientific research, the US So uth Africa Basil Hetzel, AC , lutemalional Council Iodine president, Bill Clinton, said recently that he was hoping the money would be used to Deficiency Disorders counter the image of the future portrayed in the 'Road Warrior' (Mad Max) movies. It is Rhonda Galbally, AO , Vic Healib!University of an extraordinary affirmation of the power of the Australian arts that a US president Melbourne should admit that a series of Australian movies have affected the outlook of a generation Liz Furler, Dept ofH eallh & Family Services of Americans! Thi s conference is for anyone working in th e But what does it say about popular images of science and the future? And what will public heal th fi eld and students are parti cularl y it take for Australian science and technology to gain equivalent recognition without welcome. stereotype or distortion? For further details (and how to submit an abstract) A first step would be toportrayscience for what it is, a natural human activity. Science contact Ms Valda Gallagh er: is not some sort of inexorable alien practice with a life, outlook and agenda of its own­ Emai l: dev.health @nceph .anu .edu .au a view so often carried in the media through statements such as 'Science says ... ' and' ... Tel : 02 6249 562 7 Fax: 02 6249 0740 known to science'. Science is a systematic means of satisfying what is perhaps the most J!!!l_ TilE AUSTRA LI A:\ human of all traits, curiosity. ~ NATIONAL l 'NI\'EINTY ScienceNOW! and its fresh researchers have gone a long way to demonstrating that.• O.fficial conference carrier ANSETTAUSTRALIA Tim Thwaites is a freelance science writer.

VoLUME 8 N UMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 25 Paul Chadwick on media diversity

Structural reform of the Australian media is unlil

M Y STORY STARTS with a beaten their contacts. Public figures will often and the bush. But the number of substantive green book, my journalist's contact book. have one view of a particular media outlet titles is declining too. Since 1987, 15 All journalists have them. Each is a and another of a particular journalist who metropolitan daily and Sunday newspapers unique resource. They record the many works for it. have been closed. In 1992, a federal people with whom we make contact in So the contact books of Australia's parliamentary committee concluded that order to gather the scrapings of life's daily journalists are key elements in prospects the metropolitan markets were not chaos. Some are experts in particular fields. for greater diversity in the information contestable, the barriers to entry had grown Some are ascending the ladder to available through the media to Australians so high. The prospects for new general- prominence in their own area-perhaps as citizens. Each contact book is a strand in readership non-daily titles must be assessed politics, art, business, law, medicine, the thread that binds journalists together as in the light of the closure of the Independent education, or the community sector. And journalists. Many of them are employees or Monthly and the Republican. The long- while they pursue their specialist field, we casuals or freelancers dependent on a term trend in circulation is also down, generalists flit in and out of their lives in shrinking number of media conglomerates, especially on weekdays. Saturday and search of information or advice or direction and what they produce may be steadily Sunday circulations have climbed, although to other contacts. adding to the hoard of intellectual property they have not kept pace with population In this book a journalist will note the which those few organisations control. But growth. changes in people's lives: the names of their journalists are far more than this, if they These trends may actually be good fo r children or their new spouse; their changing choose to conceive of themselves so. The the major publishers, who appear to be addresses; their various professional roles basic element in m edia, the essential holding their share of total advertising and appointments. Contact between the lubricant for any media owner's power, is revenue. As a business proposition, it may journalist and each person varies in each journalist's contact book. Over this be an advantage to publish fewer titles and frequency and intensity. Some connections the individual journalist is sovereign. sell them in smaller numbers. But the are fleeting; some are hostile, even while That fact needs to be kept in mind implications for diversity are another they are enduring because of the mutual because the other prospects for genuine matter. dependence of, say, the political reporter diversity emerging from the current media What of television? Since the upheaval and the politician. But other contacts scene are bleak. initiated by the Hawke Government in produce lasting friendships. Trust is built The press continues to fall into fewer 1986, Australia has developed three steadily between particular journalists and and fewer hands, in the cities, the suburbs American-style commercial networks

26 EUREKA STREET • Ju NE 1998 which have gradually bought or enslaved diversity and localism in media and as a politicians I expect nothing that would run the regional stations. We have tortuously pillar of civic life: seriously counter to the existing large media introduced pay TV, only to find that this organisations because: first new 'm edium' since the mid '50s is Broadcasting presents the stark logic of a • They are scared of them, and perceive, controlled by the existing m edia. wider iss ue. If yo u are seeking the modern rightly or w rongly, that their electoral fate This repeats an old pattern in Australian canon of the arts, the unive rsa ll y accepted can be critically affected by the large media m edia policy m aking: when Joe Lyons texts, yo u have to look to the international orga nisations. oversaw the introduction of commercial market. The airport lounge is our ca noni c • M edia p olicy is fi ltered by, and wireless, the press proprietors soon had it architecture. Japanese design in ca rs and som etimes originates fro m , the media within their keeping. So, too, when Bob household goods offers us our canonic art. orga nisations. Bo th Labo r and Liberal Menzies set the rule fo r free- to-air America n soap opera our ca nonic fi ction. Governments invariably have a quad of television. Those are the great wells of common staffers who move between public positions N o surprise, then, to find that the allusion in a world of nations subj ect to a and executive or Consultancy roles in the Howard Government's recent decision on global economy. Those have become major media organisations. I call them the digital television gave a massive advantage the materials of shared mea ning. real Shadow Cabinet. N either major party to the existing commercial n etworks, has sh own the expertise, m otive or interest including a promise to immunise them HESEES T H E PROGRESS of that global independently to formulate policies which from direct competition from the introduc­ economy as the continued working- through would put the public interest fi rst. tion of digital television in 2001 until 2008. of the victory of Reason, of Enlightenment • The m edia have conflicts of interest, so The technology offers diversity aplenty. thinking. Drawing back to broadcasting, he there is rarely an opportunity for dissent or But control of it seem s to be falling to the ays: seriou s alternatives to develop mom entum sam e players, who are making formidable and public support. Alone among public .. . to the generati ons born between the a lli a n ces with each o the r : Rupe rt policy issues, m edia issues involve the 1920s and the 1970s, the disappea rance of Murdoch's N ews Corporation with T elstra; fortunes of the m edia outlets on which we the public places and public spaces on which Kerry Packer's Nine Network with Microsoft. rely for information and debate about the public service broadcas ting was built What does the non-commercial m edia pros and cons of proposed action or inaction. symboli zes the disintegration of the moral offer as prospects for diversity? The When major m edia policy i s being housing of the political world. The cultural remarkable efforts of the Friends of the formulated, coverage tends to be either conseque nces of the loss of tha t AB C and its many supporters have beaten muted or elf-serving. When matters are institutional power would be inca lculabl e. back, for now, what appears to have been an settled, then debate breaks out as a kind of a tte mpt t o weak en the Au s tralia n Smith thinks things will get worse before rueful post-mortem . Fresh approaches are Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) so that its they get better, but he does predict for in this way foreclosed. audience could m ore readily be drawn away public service broadcasting 'a painful way The digital television decision is an by commercial operators hungry for viewers back in the aftermath of the technological example. Only after Cabinet had taken its from the right 'demographic'. Expectfurther upheavals of the present decade'. far-reaching decision did the m edia provide attempts. N aturally the literature contains various in-depth reporting of the high stakes The defence of the ABC is about more proposals to improve the diversity of the involved and the intensity of the lobbying than the protection of the single most current information m edia. Som e would which took place. So far, I have found no important contributor t o diversity in be adaptable to Australians conditions, coverage of the question: Having given such Australia's information m edia. T o insist on others less so. Generally speaking they a lot, what does the Federal Government the importance of the ABC is al o to insist include: expect in return? on the idea that civic institutions still • structural reform to reduce the size of The su ggestion s w hich I h ave for matter. This is contested territory in a period the largest players; improving the diversity of the current in which the state's infliction of punishment • use of competition law to prevent abuse Australian m edia scene are based on two through imprisonment can be seen as a of m arket dominance; conclusions: first, structural reform is proper activity to subject to the profit • intern al change t o devolve power unlikely and the trend is still to bigness; motive. In Vic toria, the Premier has through the largest organisations; second, to seek tighter regulation of content routinely referred to the Cabinet as a • encouragem ent of new voices through would be a mistake. 'm anagem ent tean1'. public subsidy; and If some sort of statutory tribunal were This them e is briefl y trea ted in the • m easures to improve access to 1nedia to be set up to police journali sm standards British communications scholar Anthony for audiences so that people can do m ore it would be used, sooner or later, as a tool to Smith's 1994 T.S. Eliot Memorial Lectures than just view and listen- they can also punish or suppress the best of journalism, (published as Software for the Self. Culture speak. not the worst of it. That is what history and Technology, Faber & Faber 1996). I hold out little hope that any Australian teaches. (The one limited exception would Smith argues that complete privatisation government, of w h a t ever political be a statutory right of reply, which would of broadcas ting is as impossible as complexion, would seriously embrace any compulsorily add speech, not suppress or complete regulation in pursuit of quality. such reform proposals, with the possible punish it. This can be reconciled with free But, speaking in the context of the BBC, exception of competition law- because its speech principles and is a jus tifiable Smith is far less sanguine for Britain than administration is in the hands of a statutory response to the concentrated nature of the I a m about Australia ' s ca pacity to authority which sometimes shows a Australian m edia, which has aspects of a maintain the ABC both as a source of surprisingly s trong spine . Fro m the common carrier. )

V O LUME 8 N UMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 27 On th ese bases, my modest more seriously. But the pro blem is that suggestions would be: media people do not believe a government New from Cambridge • to encourage greater conscious will legislate and so think they can continue separation by journalists of their to treat the question of accountability with Anti-Disciplinary Protest information function, which has non­ the kind of breezy arrogance we see, fo r Sixties Radicalism and market consequences such as the instance, in the television satire Frontline. maintenance of an informed electorate But if this is the journalists' attitude, they Postmodernism and the oiling of civil society, from take a bigger risk. As professional users of JULIE STEPHEN S their entertainment function, which the right to free speech, they need the friends belongs in the marketplace of fun. of free speech to be ready to line up with This original analysis of sixties anti­ • to protect and strengthen the ABC, them when challenges arise, as from time radicalism draws on a wide range ISCIPLINAR in particular its information function. to time they will. How long do journalists of rare and lively sources. The protest • to gen e rate within media think they can take for granted the support author offers new interpretations organisations an expectation of of those who love free speech when the of the relationship between the editorial independence. media organisations themselves sixties and the current political When subjected to public inquiry appear to be part of the problem? and theoretical landscape. the major media organisations usually tend to claim that we need not be UT WH AT OF the new m edia? What are May 1998 184 pages B 0 521 62033 3 Hb $90.00 concerned about concentration of the fresh prospects for greater diversity? (By 0 521 62976 4 Pb $29.95 ownership because, although they do new media I include the various discrete own m any outlets, they devolve sources of content such as CD-ROMs and editorial power within the group. purpose-built program libraries. But chiefly The Untouchables Fairfax, for exa mple, has a formal charter I m ean the internet.) Subordination, Poverty and the State in Modern India of editorial independence. Part of the In sketching some of the preconditions purpose of such charters is to separate for improved diversity in the information OLIVER MENDELSOHN AND MARIKA VICZIANY cl early the commercial dimension of a available to Australians citizens, I make In a compell ing account of the lives of those at the bottom of for-profit media outlet from its public certain assumptions. Indian society, the authors explore the construction of the dimen sion, in particular to avoid • First, that Australians hunger to be Untouchables as a social and political category, the historical conflicts of interest. But, even as trea ted more seriously as citizens. I do not background which led to such a definition, and their position window-dressing, the grant of formal believe people want to be 'amused to death'. in India today. T he authors argue that, despite efforts to editorial independence is in retreat. At The intensity of interest in the recent ameliorate their co ndition, a considerable edifice of discrimi­ Fairfax in Sydney and Melbourne, the Constitutional Convention fortifies me in nation persists. publish er's position combines the this conviction. May 1998 308 pages positions of editor-in-chief and senior • Second, that digitisation and compres­ 0 521 55362 8 Hardback $95 .00 business executive. As Michelle Grattan sion techniques really will bring about the 0 521 55671 6 Paperba ck $36.95 recently pointed out in a speech at 'end of scarcity' which has limited so Queensland University, this 'removal severely the number of broadcasting Shelf Life of the church/state division and the opportunities and m ade government Supermarkets and the Changing Cultures of apparent acceptance that this is not rationing of spectrum a necessity. Consumption only n ecessary but an inevitable, • Third, that som e of the important acceptable and desirable development' barriers to entry into newspaper publishing KIM HUMPHERY is n ew, m os tly unre marked a nd will n ot apply in the on-line world, happening a t a time when media especially the huge cost of printing presses, A history and cultural analysis of the organisations tend to have a wider range newsprint supplies and a swift, broad supermarket in twentieth-century of potential conflicts. distribution system. Australia. It traces the ascendency of It is time for jo urnalis t s a nd • Fourth, that reasonably soon there will the supermarket over the counrer develop a form of 'di service grocery store, drawing on audiences to act up about this blurring of gital cash' which will oral history among other sources. It what h as previously been seen as allow multiple low-price tran sactions is also a critical discussion of con­ a critical distinction. There are good involving information products on the sumer society and of the work of reasons for separating the role of the internet. cultural analysts on consumption. comme rcial m edia outlet as • Fifth, we should assume that our public a busin ess-subject to government policy-makers will not so far fail us that, in June 1998 280 pages 5 ...r .. ..uaa 0 521 62316 2 Hardback $90.00 • Ch •"l'"'l (.ultunl regulation and seeking custom from this age of technological plenty, Australia c. I "'P I'll 0 521 62630 7 Paperback $34.95 advertisers-and its role as an institu­ repeats its historical pattern of allowing tion with public responsibilities­ the dominant few in the old media to become checking and antagonising government ga tekeepers of the new. and, if necessary, embarrassing advertisers On the basis of these assumptions, what through its journalistic disclosures. is required for Australia to improve the Media orga nisations and individual diversity of its information media ? journalists co uld do much to add to We must have universal access to the diversity if they took self-regulation internet: city and country; rich and poor; to

28 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 listen and read and to be h eard and to that we all grow thicker skins. Harsh words I imagine the day when some of our best publish. Whether this accords with the are inevitable, even desirable. Civic life journalists, and many of our brightest calculations now being done about returns m eans debate and debate means mistakes. developing journalists, establish on the from a privatised T elstra, I do not know. If the potential of a 'wired society' is not to internet the equivalent of a newspaper or a But there is little doubt that the technology be chilled, or policed by the state or by the radio or TV station. Slowly, reputations exists for Australia to ensure universal biggest corporate service-providers, then will grow: we will find web sites we trust; access. We took 400 years to spread literacy, the law of defamation will have to be we will return to them; pay our digital mass printing and public libraries rethought from the threshold questions: cover price; com e to know their person­ sufficiently far to achieve almost universal What is a reputation? What constitutes alities; cheer with them when they please access to books. It should be possible to use harm to it? When might harm be justified? us; and fume when they fail. the wonderful opportunities of these This kind of reform requires a new sort of The early stages of this liberation of technologies to spread more quickly the audience. People who walk on Grub Street journalis t s from the m a jor media power that knowledge gives. must mind where they step. As malicious organisations can be found in the United There should be universal access to an gossip and unsubstantiated rumour ge ts its States. I do not mean the infamous Matt information commons. In other words, we brief but wide dissemination, all of us will Drudge, (a lthough even he fits neatly into

Media organisations and individual journalists could do 1nuch to add to diversity if they took self-regulation n1ore seriously. But the problem is that n1edia people do not believe a government will legislate and so think they can continue to treat the question of accountability with the kind of breezy arrogance we see, for instance, in the television satire Frontline . .. . How long do journalists think they can take for granted the support of those who love free speech when the 1nedia organisations themselves appear to be part of the problen1!

must guard against the hoarding of data and have to require new standards of verification the idea of a new Grub Street). Rather the images, the collective artefacts of m emory before we give credence. We mus t far-sighted projects some philanthropic and experience which all should be able to automatically distrust attacks that do not foundations have funded. These foundations mine and from which new art and politics offer the target a chance to reply. Given the have financed sm all teams of experienced, are manufactured. In practical term s, this ease with which we can communicate with journalist to investiga te corners of will require careful attention to intellectual the target, we should seek out a reply American life the mass m edia have property rules which were fashioned for ourselves. neglected. The fruits of these investigations other times and other media. Copyright The duty to self-regulate will apply to are then widely disseminated, both through law, with it ugly history of an alliance us all. existing media organisations like between private monopolists and state Assume that m ost of us will get on with established newspapers or book publishers, censors, will have to be rethought. It is our lives and continue to rely on professional and through newer avenues. almost seven years since Rupert Murdoch, information miners, gatherers, manufac­ I hope Australian philanthropists will writing in the N ews Corporation annual turers, distillers and presenters for the basic consider seeding this model. It may be the report, declared that the company's greatest diet we require to be informed. Where will beginning of a much more diverse, healthy assets were not its newspapers or television new professional sources arise? In some media culture. stations, but its copyrights. ways, the new m edia are purer information To adapt an earlier call to action, There must be reform of laws governing businesses than the old. I do not mean that journalists have nothing to lose but their speech. Laws regulating pornography and the information will necessarily be of higher chain owners. laws restricting speech which might quality, rather that presses, paper, ink and prejudice a fair trial are already under transmitters will be less and less relevant. Paul Chadwick's next book on the media pressure from the internet. If we are all to The key asset will be the information will be published in 1999 by Macmillan. become writers and publishers and broad­ offered. And the core elem ents for ga thering This article is an edited version of an address casters, the law of defamation will need to it remain journalistic skill and contacts­ given t o the Victorian Free Speech be rethought. The law will have to require the many equivalents of my old green book. Association.

V oLUME 8 N uMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 29 T HE N ATION SPEN CER Z IFCAK Shades of • :r :r I 'r I 111 ' Sir Jo n Kerr's ghost stalked the corridors of Old Parliament House during the Constitutional Convention. Having initiated Australia's most cataclysmic constitutional event-the dismissal of the Whitlam Government in 1975-it was Kerr again who did more than anyone else to determine the Convention's eventual outcome.

IN19 75, Kem emoved Whitbm to b'e.k the i mp".e office of head of state and it was this that was critical in created by the Senate's refusal to pass supply. It was in determining the form the new republic would take. his formal power to do so, but con stitutional convention The fear that a republican president may act like a dictated that the power would rarely, if ever, be u sed and renegade, and the necessity fo r his or her control, was certainly not in the political circumstances which then best exemplifi ed in the position taken by Richard presented them selves. This action stunned the nation, McGarvie and his supporters. wounded the body politic and left scars which run deep McGarvie advocated the most minimal constitutional even today. alteration imaginable to eff ect the republic. The Queen's These scars were evident in alm ost every aspect of role would be taken over by a small constitutional Convention discussion. For Kerr's intervention had council comprising fo rmer governors and judges selected revealed clearly the breadth and fo rce of the head of by formula. The council would appoint and dismiss the state's powers under the present Constitution. It had president on the prime minister's recom mendation. dem onstrated that a head of state might not be trusted to McGarvie, a former governor and form er judge, argued use those pow ers in accordan ce with tradition al tha t any m ore ext en sive change to A u stralia's constitutional understandings. And it had hurt, angered con stitutional arrangem ents may imperil Australian and polarised. dem ocracy. Within that framework, his primary concern 1975, then , was a republican m om ent in two was to ensure that no president could act politically in a paradoxical senses. Kerr's intervention demonstrated w ay that would des ta bilise prime-ministerial conclusively that Australia had an independent h ead of government. Any president th at did so would be state since Kerr rem oved Whitlam without reference to dismissable instan tly at the prime minister's behest. the Crown. At the same time, Whittam's dismissal In my model, the sanction of prompt dismissa l for ignited republican sentiment. After th e Queen 's breach continues the binding conve ntion, essential to representative dismissed the dem ocratically elected democracy, that the head of state's powers are exercised prime m inister it was, surely, only a matter of time as minis ters of the elected go vernment advise. As elected before the m onarchy would give way to an Australian pres idents would in practice be undismissable, the con­ republic. vention would not bind them. Substituting a codified The February Convention was dominated by two legal obliga tion wo uld simply not be practical. them es directly related to these events. First, there was the popular opinion in fa vour of the republic. This T he McGarvie model did not cater to the possibility ensured that the delegates would take the next, important that a presiden t, elected either popularly or repres­ step in severing ties with the Crown. Second, the delegates entatively through parliament, might act with discretion brought to the Convention a profound mistrust of the and within convention. It was with the dangers of a

30 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 republican presidency that McGarvie was concerned. which laid the ground for the final defeat of populist The extent of this anxiety became clear as further tance. There were three main reasons for this. details of the model emerged. The constitutional council First, the Australian Republican Movement (ARM) could consist only of governors and judges as, presum­ argued forcefully that there was considerable danger in ably, only they would have the training and experience to an Australian republican model that embraced direct understand the proper operation of the Westminster election because, unlike the position in other comparable system. All retired, their ages could vary, but only from countries, the Senate retained the constitutional power 65-79. The council would have no discretion with respect to block supply. Given this, it was almost inevitable that to the prime minister's recommendations as to the events of 1975 would reoccur. If they did, the prime appointment and dismissal. Whether proper or improper, minister of the day would find him/herself confronted the council would be obliged to give them effect. The with a president having a strong popular mandate, making sanction for failing to do so would be swift and decisive. it significantly more likely that the wounding constit­ Like the president, the council would be subject to utional strife of the time would be experienced yet again. instant dismissal at the prime minister's behest. This possibility might be averted if the Senate's The thought that a president might act constructively, power to block supply were removed. But, the ARM albeit ymbolically, to moderate the effect of overweening argued, a constitutional amendment to thi effect required executive government and hence enhance the quality of a degree of political agreement that was nowhere to be Au tralian democracy did not inform McGarvie's seen. As soon as the question was raised conception. Instead, it was imperative to keep Sir John among politicians or in the populace, Kerr's successors 'on a short leash', to use Bill the old enmities re-emerged resplendent. It might be better Hayden's most unfortunate expression. Second, were the president to be elected directly, it would be necessary to construct A T THE OPPOSITE END of the republican spectrum, the at least partially to codify his or her convention delegates who supported the direct election powers. Disagreements about 1975 an Australian of the president were also ensnared by Kerr. Unlike the would make this difficult, although the McGarvie faction, these populist republicans were willing problem is by no means insuperable. presidency on to trust the election of the president to the people and to Third, opponents of the popular trust that the president so chosen would act with restraint model made much of the argument that the assumption as the symbol and representative of the nation. In the a directly elected president would climate of mistrust which prevailed, however, their path constitute a new, competing and that the president to home would inevitably be a difficult one. destabilising source of democratic power They argued that a directly elected ceremonial at the heart of executive government. is to be trusted presidency could successfully be combined with prime The bifurcation of power so created, ministerial government and that overseas experience they said, would produce uncertainty, rather than feared. demonstrated the success of the cohabitation. In any confusion and conflict. Paul Kelly case, Australian democracy could only be improved were (international editorfor The Au tralian), If we needlessly the president and prime minister to check and balance normally moderate in outlook, took off one another. Capitalising on the self-evident disillusion­ his gloves whenever direct election suppose that the ment with conventional political practice and buoyed by delegates made their presence felt. opinion polls which sugge ted that popular election was It will mean a new and powerful president will be the model favoured by most Australians, the populist politician in Canberra living at republicans pressed their case fervently. Yarralum la (far more magnificent than a 'tearaway', we A head of state nominated by a prime minister and the Lodge); this would represent an even approved without debate or scrutiny by parliament, greater centralisation of power in may deny ourselves irrespective of the required majority, could not by any Canberra; it would institutionalise stretch of the imagination be described as representing rivalry and conflict within the heart of consideration of all Australians. Office holders are bonded to those who executive power; it would create vast have the power to nominate, appoint and sack them. The possibility for strife and conflict. forms of presidency power of nomination is a sovereign power and in a The unstated assumption here was democratic republic can belong only to the electorate as that a directly elected president would which will enhance, both a symbolic and practical expression of the political be likely to spin out of control, trampling supremacy of citizens over State power in all it We tminster convention, confronting balance and improve manife tations. the prime minister and casting the The demotic appeal of this position was inadequate, legislature aside. Yet apart from the our democratic however, to overcome the pragmatism and mistrust so events of 19 75, it is quite unclear why pre ent among convention delegates and the parallel uch an extreme assumption should traditions. scepticism of the mainstream media. With editorial necessarily have been made. headlines like 'A Recipe for Political Mayhem' even It is more likely that a new president, like the public confidence in the direct election model began governors-general who succeeded Kerr, would absorb the steadily to erode. And again it was the events of 197 political and constitutional lessons of 19 75 and behave

VOLUME 8 N UMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 31 accordingly. Certainly, the evidence from countries such of former politicians like Hasluck and Hayden when as Ireland, Iceland and Austria, each of which directly they ascended to the governor-general's office adds elect their president, provides little sustenance for those strength to such a contention. who believe in the president as renegade. Few among the delegates, however, were prepared to Further, the problem was framed by the presumption embrace such an alternative perspective, to displace that a president assumed only power upon election. But their anxiety with assurance, and to place their confidence equally, election by the people would be likely to engender in both the president and the people. The power of this in any new incumbent a solemn, purposeful and anxiety was such that no significant change to the compensating sense of responsibility. The performance present Constitution was contemplated as practical and

Iceland does it differently • • •

I N "C

32 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 with that a raft of crea tive republican opportunities m ay our democratic fabric will arise. As Sir Gerard Brennan well have been lost. rem arked in a speech in February at Bond University, the The ARM had argu ed for several years that the system has become unbalanced, ceding president should be elected by a two-thirds majority of a too much power to the executive at the Above all, joint sitting of the Aus tralian Parliament. The expense of parliam ent and the courts. requirem ent for a two- thirds majority is calculated to The traditional parliam entary m echa­ the head of en sure that a successful candidate has cross-party nism s for keeping the governmen t in parliamentary support. This m odel is common in Europe check are in considerable disarray. Prim e and appears to work well. Properly constructed, there is minister and party possess an unrivalled state must act no reason to think it would not be effective in Australia. authority. Without vigilance, 'efficiency m ay give way to tyranny'. as the guardian The ARM proposes (that) the head of state be chosen by In these circumstances, it would a bipartisan special majority of the Federal Parliament. In have been prescient and sensible to of the Constitution. that way we will always have a hea d of state who has the implem ent n ew con s ti tutio n al confi dence of both sides of parliament and will be able, if arrangem ents which would ensure that The president call ed upon, to act as the consti tutional umpire without a president in the role of constitutional allega tions of political partisanship. guardian would have had a degree of stands for the Cleverly, the ARM styled its m odel 'bipartisan', independe n ce secured by t enure making it linguistically difficult to challenge. It also sufficien t to m eet any political threat or Constitution positioned the m odel between its two rivals, enhancing danger. And yet it is precisely the the prospect that it would be adopted as a compromise. opposite that has occurred. against those The model was carried through the Convention by a In m ost Europ ean presidential committed and disciplined m embership, it was favoured m odels, in order to enhance his or her who might uproot strongly by the Labor side of politics and when Jeff role as gu ardian, the president is Kennett gave it his imprim atur in a short but decisive gu aranteed a t erm of offi ce which or abuse it. intervention it finally hook off its competitors. is generally longer than that of an y single To en sure the m odel's su ccess, h owever, its government and his or her rem oval is He or she acts proponents m ade critical concessions to populists and made deliberately difficult. By contrast, conservatives alike. To attract the advocates of direct in Australia we have just delivered the to supervise election, the ARM m ade the process of nomination m ore fate of th e con stitution 's protector open . To appease McGarvie, it made the dismissal of the directly into the hands of its principal the conduct of president much easier. And it is here again that antagonist. This is an error which, if not Sir John Kerr's influence is di scernible. rectified, we may live to regret deeply. politics and The Con stitution al Con vention 0 RIGINALLY, the ARM had proposed that the presiden t produced m any positive outcom es. government and should be elected and dismissed by a two-thirds majority Delegates agreed on a preamble of which of parliam ent. In response to argument from McGarvie, we may genuinely be proud. They arrived who suggested that no president would be removable if at a conclusion with a sufficient degree may intervene a bipartisan m ajority were required, it m odified its of consensus to persuade the Prim e position prior to the convention by suggesting that a Minister that the republican question where either simple parliam entary majority might suffice for dismissal. should be put to the people and in doing At the convention, in order to ensure that McGarvie's so they avoided the breakdown so m any the executive or supporters would not vote for the present constitutional had predicted. Perhaps m ost hearten­ system in favour of the preferred republican m odel, the ingly, they persuaded m any of us that legislature act ARM changed tack again, opting finally for the president's inclusive, democratic fo rums of this dismissal by the prime minister alone. kind have a very constructive role to beyond their Like the McGarvie model, then, the ARM compromise play in the discussion and resolution of institutionalises mistrust of the president. In doing so, it important social issues. proper legal or places the fate of the head of state directly in the hands But in taking a negative rather than of the prime minister of the day . It is worth refl ecting fo r positive attitude towards the presidency, constitutional a mom ent on the implications of such an arrangem ent. the Convention m ay have missed a Above all, the head of state must act as the guardian splendid constitution al m om ent in authority. of the Constitution . The president stands for the which to s trengthen and entren ch Constitution against those who might uproot or abuse it. Australia's dem ocratic heritage. Instead, we have a usable He or she acts to supervise the conduct of politics and but flawed republican m odel borne of anxiety rather government and may intervene where either the executive than hope or aspiration . Si r John still h as much to or legislature act beyond their proper l egal or an swer for . constitutional authority. Any sober analysis of the workings of our current Spencer Zifcak is Associate Professor of Law at LaTrobe system of government will disclose that it is fr om the University in Melbourne, where he teaches constitutional executive that the m ost significant potential threat to law. See also 'Reshaping the republic', pp37- 39.

V OLUME 8 N UMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 33 BooKs

P ETER C OCHRANE Period peacemalzers

Thi~ \\lhispcring In Our Hearts, 1-knrv Reynolds, A llen ;md U nw1n, 19\IX 1'- I'N I 1'6-1-lK 'iX I 7 Pl' l Sl7.9') I N 1932 six Japanese trepang fisherm en a Methodist missionary in N ew South these possibilities were voiced from the and a white Northern Territory policeman Wales, likened the Aborigines to the ancient earliest colonial times. were speared to death by Yolngu Aborigines Britons resisting the Roman legions. Robert Another of Reynolds' achievements is in Arnhem Land and an officially sanctioned Menli Lyon, a settler and linguist at the to show that in the work of these reformers punitiveexpeditionsetouttoexactaterrible Swan River Settle m e nt in Western we find a record of fine oratory, powerful revenge. Australia, described the warrior Yagan as a writing and great drama. Their passion for Reprisals of this kind had been a routine patriot who 'distinguished himself in the justice, and some kind of equality for response on th e Australian frontier for defence of his country'. On Yagan's capture, indigenous people, put them at odds with more thanacentury.AsHenryReynolds m ost of their contemporaries. Some lived writes in This Whispering in Our Hearts: as fringe-dwellers among their own race, 'White fe lla violence was bad at any while others had to leave the country. But time. When driven by vengeance and in taking a stand they left a remarkable fierce racial solidarity it was awesome.' record. John Saunders' sermon in 1838, What was different this time, how- perhaps the fi rst preached in the colonies ever, was the extent of opposition to the on behalf of the Aborigines, is a 'passionate, foreshadowed slaughter, and the out- eloquent defence of human equality'. Ro bert come. The expedition was stopped by the Menli Lyon gave speeches that all school- sheer weight of public protest and bad children should read. The editorials in the publicity. Queenslander in 1880, 13 in all, under the Reynolds' book more or less con- Lyon spent time with heading 'The Way We Civilise', are one of eludes on this high note though his him and concluded the great calls to conscience in our history . m ain purpose is to sketch out an earlier that 'the whole tribe are bards', since it How did these individual efforts fi nally history. Much of This Whispering in Our seem ed much of their oral tradition and gathera momentumstrongandwideenough Hearts is an account of a threadbare line- history was handed down in verse. to become a humanitarian movement? The age, hardly deserving the word 'movement', With rare exceptions these individuals answer is addressed in the concluding of courageous and som etimes eccentric were not opposed to colonisation. They chapters of Reynolds' work, and the planned reformers who knew what was happening simply believed it 'need not be so brutal, so expedition against the Yolngu was a catalyst. to the Aboriginal people and would not be lacking in compassion, so drenched in The press had advertised the expedition in silenced. Their courage in 'stripping away blood'. They were moved, varyingly, by advance, with headlines such as 'Govern- euphemism, breaking complicit silences, ideas such as 'Judgm ent', or the biblical ment Prepares Punitive Expedition against [and] savaging the romantic image of the notion of common origin and nobility, or Blacks .. . Massacre of Whites in Arnhem white pioneer' marks them out. Reynolds British justice or equality, or a combination Land Feared'. But enough was already provides a collective portrait, tracing the of these. Some were driven by specific known of what these white expeditions did fighting years of select missionaries, objectives- feminists,forinstance, wanted to blac ks to galvanise a network of clergymen and others of humanitarian to protect black women from white men; concerned reformers into action. inclination. Thenames aremostlyunfamiliar others laboured, mostly in vain, to bring Police parties at large in the bush were to us-Lancelot Threlkeld, Robert Menli murderers to trial. But whatever their answerable to no-one. Wholesale massacre Lyon, Louis Giustiniani, father and son John philosophical grounding and whatever their was too often the result. In the 1920s public and EmestGribble, Mary Bennett and others. obj ectives, they gen erally believed that opinion had been stirred by two horrendous What they shared in common was an anguish Aborigines owned the land and deserved 'a slaughters of black m en, women and that was ageless and a refusal to repress the reasonable share in the soil'. children in northern Australia. The first at whispering of that anguish in their hearts. The fundamentally disturbing issue is Forrest River in the Kimberleys in 1926led 'Deeply then are we in arrears to these prior ownership. The humanitarians knew to a Royal Commission which, for the fi rs t injured Beings at whose expense we live that the community's refusal to acknowledge time, found in favour of the victims rather andprosper',wroteone ofthem,whosigned prior ownership made n egotiation or thanthekillers.The deathtoll was probably himself 'Gentleman', 170 years ago. reconciliation impossible. Perhaps their around 100. The expedition burnt the bodies Many of these reformers had, by chance finest rhetoric was directed at the theft of on specially constructed pyres at four or intent, becom e close to Aboriginal people. Aboriginal land. Some were prepared to pay different sites, and evidence-teeth and Some took the trouble not only to befriend rent. Others to share the land in various pulverised bone and bits of clothing-was them but also to learn their dialects and to ways. For the rest of society, understandably, gathered from the ashes. Two years later at study their culture and so came to see it they were pariahs. Today it is important for Coniston in Central Australia, a Gallipoli sympathe tically. Lancelot Threlkeld, black and white Australians to know that veteran named George Murray led a

34 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 massacre in which possibly 100 Aborigines responsible for the killings and it marked and Melbourne. Eleanor Dark comes to died. Murray coolly admitted to killing 17. the end of official punitive expeditions. But mind. Margaret Preston too. And where The international setting in the 1920s what it could not do was get the Yolngu might Reynolds have position ed Inky had also changed the moral mood. After the men a fair trial in the Northern Territory. Stephenson , who surely had a whispering first world war the idealism inspired by the The Yolngu charged with killing the in his heart? Stephenson published the Abo­ Leagu e of Nations was related to the policeman was a man called Tuckiar. He riginal Progressive Association's journal practical business of responsibility for was sentenced to death with little attention Abo Call. He also h elpe d publish mandated territories. The Leagu e lifted to dubious evidence and the mitiga ting Capricornia. He is no more complex or humanitarian hopes because its Charter details of his case. Apparently the policeman contradictory than som e of the trouble­ bound member nations to protect and uplift had raped hi wife. makers who do fi gure in this book. The their 'native peoples'. Austra lia h ad Again there was a nationwide outcry internationalism of many communists also accepted the mandate for German N ew and Tuckiar's case was elevated to the drew them into the struggle while the rise Guinea in 1920 and humanitarians expected High Court. In November 1934, the Court of fascism was s urely a catalyst for its newly acquired obligations there to unanimously quashed his conviction in a rethinking the 'race problem '. extend to Aborigines in Australia. But pointed ruling which made it clear that It would be as easy to idealise the men Australia's international commitments courts were not places to affirm white and women Reynolds has resurrected as it stood in sharp contradiction to the plight of dominance and settler solidarity. is for some historians to dismiss them as its own indigenous people. Tuckiar was 'soft' racists whose caring too often m erely The conditions of Aboriginalla bour drew rel eased from facilitated the marginalisa tion and attention at hom e and abroad. That destruction of indigenous people. John remarkable agitator, Mary Bennett, Howard's 'see no evil ... ' approach to the took her allegations of slavery on past is no worse than the ungenerous strand pastoral stations to the British among historians which sees all white Commonwealth Leagu e. Some endeavour as undifferentiated 'racism'. Yet anthropologists began to speak out. the ironies of purpose or motivation are The International Labour Organ­ inescapable. George Augustus Robinson isation in Geneva became involved, promised the Tasmanian Aborigines refuge as did British huma nitarian on Flinders Island. Instead they got a orga nisations such as the prestigious G.A. Robinson esq. miserable and permanent banishment. Anti-Slavery Society. A broader and Ernest Gribble, the Superintendent at the far be tter connected movem ent of gaol and was never seen again. It was widely Forrest River mission, was tireless in his humanitarians was rallying to the cause believed he was shot by the police and hi pur uit of the killers in 1926, but, as with a new intensity. By the late 1920s, the body dumped in Darwin harbour. But A.P. Elkin insisted, he was also a ruthless Federal Government was worrying out loud humanitarians could still welcome the High paternalis t, an ' uncouth tyrant' who about Australia's international standing. Court verdict. As Reynolds writes: 'The separated children from parents and married The Attorney-General John Latham told ethos of the frontier had been decisively them in late adolescence without a care for the Armadale branch of the Australian repudiated.' In its time this judgem ent was traditional ties and obligations. Women's N ational League that the Forrest as important as the Mabo verdict would be Many of these agitators were turbulent, River Royal Commission would be read all 60 years later. Yet only now, thanks to oppositional souls, looking for outlets for over the world and he could think of no Henry Reynolds, is it reinstated in our pent up energies, wanting a cause, and other event 'which would so dis- history. The case which has been widely finding confirmation of their rightness in credit the reputation of Australia'. remembered from that period is the High the isolation and deri sion they encountered. Court judgement on the civil rights of a Their ostracism seem s only to h ave UST AFEW YEARS LATER the expedition against visiting European, Egan Kisch. Perhaps in confirmed their sense of purpose. 'I glory in Ie Yolngus was about to depart, but the keeping with this kind of sublimation the this work', wrote Lancelot Threlkeld, the public response was unprecedented. indexer has left Tuckiar out of Reynolds' Methodist missionary in 1825, 'because it Telegrams poured in to the Prime Minister, index. is so much despised'. But, as Reynolds Joe Lyons, from church es, missionary Like Reynolds' previou books, this one rightly argu es, they deserve the m ost organisations, feminist groups, unions, the makes a valuable contribution to our generous treatment by the historian. They ALP and pacifists. Anthropologists and understanding of Australian history and to copped more than enough in their own bishops penned letters of protest. There contemporary politics. It only falters, it time: 'Some of them undoubtedly were was pressure from London, from the British seem s to m e, in the concluding chapters raci ts in the way we under tand the term Commonwealth Leagu e, the Anti-Slavery where the parameters of the humanitarian today', he argues. 'They were people of Society and the Society of Friends. Joe Lyons m ovem ent are seriou sly understated and their period. But if inquiry and was so shocked he declared that 'nothing the analysis, consequently, falls short. It is understanding stops there we miss the even remotely resembling an organised hard to imagine why Xavier Herbert does passion for justice, the anger about cruelty massacre had ever been thought of seriously not get a mention in a book about anti­ and indifference which drove [them] along for a moment in Cabinet'. racist activism which concludes with the lonely, thankless and unpopular paths.' The war party was scrapped and a 'peace achievem ents of the 1930s. Or for that party' sent, instead, into Yolngu country. It matter the circles of active humanitarians Peter Cochrane is a freelance historian based managed to bring back the five m en allegedly in the literary and artistic world of Sydney in Sydney.

VOLUME 8 NUM BER 5 • EUREKA STREET 35 BooKs: 2 MICH AEL M c GIRR By gum

Eucalyptm;: A NoHI, Murr.1~ lt1il, rl'xt l'uhli,hing, I lJlJK . 1\BN I :-.7·,h.f7 (,~ .f, I'RI' SllJ.lJ,

A s A NO VELIST, Murray Bail would Homesicl

36 EUREKA STREET • ] UNE 1998 POETRY

Schubert's Dog

The ladies are waving their declamatory scarves To welcome back our darling 'Little Mushroom', And I'm at my old place behind his chair, A furry pedal to his wandering art . The ladies' dresses reach right to the floori A dog might look at ankles and think breasts. But I h ave ears to h ear what they cannot: Franz pounds the pedal, several lyric dwarfs A middle rage composed of poisoned sweets Are strangling queens by shores of Alpine lakes. Inside Gemutlichkeit, a breakdown of The very air which carries joy to them. Bitter and sweet, the cliche underlined­ We have these old materials, the flesh, He won't live long and dogs live sh orter still, The hearing, logarithms elevated But what's proportion got to do with it? Like the Host and anchored everywhere. For while he plays a slippered substitute For life makes living sweetly pleonastic. What wished-for ending nestles in high waists? He must go on, he says to Kupelwieser, A big word for a dog and bigger still The storm of life will not blow out: the only For angels of the keyboard keyed to God Cure for masterpieces is to die. Whom these respectables have camphored in Their consciences, like silence after singing. Peter Porter

BooKs: 3 JoHN UHR Reshaping the republic Coming of Age: Charter for a New Austmlia, D.wJd <;;olomon, Umverslty of Q ueensland Press, I 99K, I~BN () 7022 3031 h, RRI' $29.9:1 DA vm SoLOMON's Commg of Age wms reference work leading up to the referendum, But the real value of Coming of Age is its the prize for being the first book to deal because it provides an accessible and fair- attempt to reframe the republic debate in with theFebmaryConstitutionalConvention. minded exposition of the options facing us. terms of constitutional renewal that extend And given the Convention's many More generally, it is a model of political beyond the narrow confines of the debate wordsmiths, it is unlikely to be the last. analysis written for the public at large (no overthe president. The first and last chapters The public debate over the republic is footnotes and quite limited references to illustrate this. about to enter an important new phase, sources) yet it contains a very helpful index. The first examines 'the system under requiring unaccustomed initiative from the The book is more than an exposition of strain' in an informative summary of the Government. The Convention has completed the options for a republic, but for many it record ofrecent commissions ofinquiry into its business and the republican ball is now will be primarily useful for its calm and system-wide scandals, from Fitzgerald to in the monarchist court of Prime Minister careful listing of the debating points for and WA Inc. The Federal Government also gets John Howard. We can expect a statement against the many proposals for attention through such iceberg tips as the from the Howard Government about how it cons ti tu tiona! change. Solomon is not at all Colston affair. Solomon's paint is that the willproceedtohonomthefinalConvention impatient with the modest task of votingpublichavegoodreasontodoubtthe recommendation for a referendum on assembling a kind of debaters' kit oftalking institutional integrity of our system of so- proposals for a republican head of state. points. Many of the ten chapters contain called responsible government. Popular Solomon's book was written, sensibly, convenient summaries of the key points in demands for a say in the election of the well before the event. It is not an instant dispute in the many issues aired during the president can then be seen to reflect a much history but a timely preview of the range of Convention. For example, the contest deeper demand for popular control over the issues likely to arise in the wake of the between republicans and monarchists is system at large. Convention. It might well have been reduced to dot points in three pages in the The final chapter is called 'The Coming intended as something of a handbook for chapter called 'The Republic-For and of Age', which here refers to Solomon's the Convention, but it will survive that Against'. So too the arguments over citizen- general thesis that it is time that the event, and could become a standard initiated referendum. Australian people exercised their rights of

VoLUME 8 N uMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 37 popular sovereignty. The lesson is that republicanism may be the best hope we enhance public discussion of a republican republicanism is about popular government have of regaining public trust in Australian Australia. Neither the title nor the subtitle and the sad truth about the Keating government. explicitly refers to the republic. Compare minimalist version is that it refines our Many establishment republicans this with Turnbull's The Reluctant system of parliamentary guardianship rather appreciate the threat that popular election Republic or John Hirst's A Republican than rekindles our faith in dem ocratic poses to the political class. Malcolm Manifesto or Tony Abbott's The Minimal self-government. Tumbull's Australian Republican Movement Monarchy. The absence of the republic in Solomon began writing on the republic (ARM) won the war of numbers in the his title accords with Solomon's declaration debate at the time when John Kerr Convention with its warning to fellow that he has 'no single agenda to impose, but inadvertently launched its modern phase republicans about the dangerous conseq­ many possibilities' which he wants to with the mobilisation of community uences of popular election of a president. explore. But what is the general model of resentment against his sacking of Prime The warning was that popular election republicanism which leads him on his Minister Whitlam (for whom Solomon was would undermine the power and credibility exploration of Australian possibilities? The press secretary). His adventurous little book of the prime minister and of the system of answer is disconcertingly clear:' something of 1976, Elect the Governor-General!, was party government enjoyed by the majority like that in the United States'. Do we really a pioneering argument for popular election leader in the House of Representatives. want to remodel Australia along American of the effective head of state. Coming of Age Solomon has no brief for the office of lines I At first blush it seems misplaced to can be seen as Solomon's remake of that prime minister or the parliamentary system try to move the debate over electing a head early story about democracy in Australia. it represents. He is closer to the 'real of state into the unexplored territory of an While the republican camp squabbles over republicans' like Tim Costello and Pat imaginary republic loosely model­ the merits of popular election of the new O'Shane in favouring popular election, but led on US principles. office of head of state, Solomon goes many a sign of his distance from other republicans steps further and calls for popular election is his elevation of the elected president into SOLOMON'S EFFORT of political of the head of government, which he hopes the head of government as well as the head imagination pays off. It is a surprisingly the president will become. of state. fresh picture of how we might reorganise He initially holds back on identifying Solomon 's book is both clever and bold. political power into t hree related all the institutional consequences of his It is clever in enlisting the rhetoric of the institutions. For him, the United States version of popular election. His immediate conservatives in the cause of his radical version of republicanism is really one of task is to draw attention to the merits of the version of republicanism. For example, he many possible variations on the theme of case for popular election of a president. quotes at length from Sir David Smith the separation of powers. If real republican­ In this sense, his book is the background (former official secretary to many governors­ ism requires a separation of powers, then argument for the position put unsuccessfully general and Australians for a Constitutional we can come up with a local version adapted by such Convention delega tes as the three Monarchy (ACM) delegate to the Constitu­ to Australian circumstances. Labor opposition leaders in Western tional Convention) about the growing fail­ The fir t step is a remodelled political Australia (Gallop), South Australia (Rann), ings of our Australian system of executive to replace the prime ministership. and Queensland (Beattie) . Solomon warns government. The evidence of the last dec­ Popular election of a president shifts the monarchists as well as republicans that it ade is indisputable, especially at the state highest office right out of parliament, is 'a serious mistake' to underestimate level, as uncovered by a generation of com­ bringing new public legitimacy to the the depth of popular feeling for election of missions of inquiry, from Fitzgerald in top job and enabling its incumbent to select the head of state. At one level, this means Queensland to the latest and most able, the a Cabinet from among 'the best and brightest' that the republican movement will not Commission on Government in Western available Australians, not confined to the succeed at the ballot box if it turns its face Australia. This certainly makes it difficult predictable political class represented in away from the calls for popular election of for conservatives to make their case that the parliament. Second, parliament could then the president. He insists that the electorate system 'ain't broke', and implausible for con­ be remodelled as a productive legislature 'clearly want to have a say'-a 'real say' and servatives to pretend that retention of the rather than the electoral college it now is. a 'direct say', not simply in the selection of monarchy is essential to the recovery of Here the details get a little fuzzy, but the a head of state but in the way we political health. deci ive reach of the reform does not: out """r govern ourselves. And the boldness of Coming of Age is goes the Senate, and in comes something like evident in Solomon's refu alto defend Prime the newly reformed New Zealand Parliament, .lHERE IS AL o a deeper m eaning which Minister Keating against charges that his a unicameral assembly with substantial relates to the intensity of community discovery of republicanism was 'a political proportional representation. Third, the High cynicism about the established political ploy'. With this non-intervention in the Court gets a new l ease of life as an system. It is as though Solomon is also battle over the original intent of Keating's independent branch of government supported warning conservatives that popular election minimalist model of a republic, Solomon in the best of worlds with a bill of rights, is the price one has to pay for retention of goes on to try to save republicanism from inspired in no small measure by the resurgence the rest of the inherited system of the minimalist republicans. This is not of the Supreme Court of Canada in the wake government, and that without it, the system a book to warm the heart of the federal of that country's Charter of Rights. will slowly lose its public legitimacy. We Labor party, the ARM, the ACM or the One could take in turn each branch of fai l to appreciate the task before us if we Howard coalition. Solomon's imaginary republic and dismiss the public crisis of confidence in Solomon's ambition is to think through investigate its likely impacts. He spends our current systems of government. Real the republican options and thereby to most of his initial time on executive and

38 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 legislative powers. He wants to save The High Court gets the lightest There is more in this welcome book. parliament by ridding it of a bullying makeover. Cynics will ask whether this The chapter on federalism is the best short executive, and also to enhance the prospects finally reveals the origin of Solomon's overview I have seen on the problems and of political leadership by allowing th e republican vision. It is that ancient form of possible solutions facing Australia as a president to select a Cabinet of real calibre. republicanism a sociated not so much with federation. There are limits to Solomon's But the branch of government he wants to separation of powers, which is a typically range of issues demanding constitutional alter the least is the one from which I suspect modern form of liberal republicanism, but renewal. Issues of race and reconciliation he hopes for the most: the judiciary. The with divide and rule- in this case, are not prominent, and there is no agenda of task here is not so much institu tiona! reform reorganising and dividing the executive and gender. Multiculturalism i less important as institutional nurture. The High Court legislative ins ti tu tions so that the judiciary here than are multi-m ember proportional has already demonstrated its interest in can be better placed to rule. parliaments. But the overall achievement promoting a republican agenda of popular I have my doubts. Solomonisalawyerand is impressive: 180 or so pages which refigure sovereignty and civic rights. Solomon an expert commentator on the place of the the republic and invite us to imagine a appears simply to want to give it the space law in Australian politics. His deft treat­ wider range of political possibilities than to get on with the job, and so he spends m entof the conservative attack on the Court's the meagre minimalism on offer. more time specifying the perils of recent recent moves to protect political rights is political attacks on the legitimacy of the intended to show the vulnerability of John Uhr i with the ANU's Public Policy judiciary than on imagining a new sort of popular rights and the advantages of a bill of Program and is the author of Deliberative judicial institution to replace the High Court. rights, not the virtues of the judiciary as such. Democra cy in Australia (CUP, 1998) .

MUSIC J!M D AVIDSON Palpable hits and misses

Opera Au~tralia, 1998. Jplll~CJll(;. Cll Taundc; lannlwu~cr: A!oclanw Buucrfl\'; nwlci,\!!IC\ u/ the Carmcllln; Machcth.

T HREE of my favourite operas The opera has therefore to be pelted of the stage during the opening storm scen e; scheduled for production, I was feeling along from time to time to gain in this production Anke H oppner was rather spoilt this season. That is, until it plausibility-partly to help its projection relatively inflexible, as if having decided began to spoil itself. as another sorry episode in the tragic history on what seem ed to be the single most First up was Gluck's m ast erpiece, of the house of Atreus. Maria Callas, as effective tone and ge ture, sh e should stick Iphigenie en Tauride. An opera I never Iphigenie, used to hurl herself to the front with it throughout. But Peter Coleman­ expected to see in Melbourne, it was Wright's Orestes more than made up an ambitious choice. Much more for it in a flaw less performance, en ergised than the better-known beautifully graduated and superbly Orpheus and Eurydice, the score sung. I have never heard him in better manages to combine a neoclassical form. Other roles were patchy: Thoas' linearity with emotional intensity: big aria was taken too fast to convey even great Romantics uch as Berlioz any sense of kingly fright, while and Delacroix held it in high regard. Anthony Elek's performan ce as But a contemporary audience has Pylades was uneven . difficulty with it, despite the amplitude The production, though, had a and distinction of the music. The great deal going for it. Tauris (the elevated tone and the grand gesture, present Crimea) was the edge of the even when perfectly proportioned, classical world; we therefore had are a long way removed from us now; tilte d walls bearing classical and when the only love interest is cornices-which not only seemed to that between two m en, there i an be quoting the house style of Oberle additional problem . A postmodern neoclassicism, but suggested that we audience has difficulty enough coping were seeing even the Scythians with the high-minded, but when the through Greek eyes-as in a sense, people involved are a pair of gays who following Euripedes, we are. But at refuse to behave transgressively, but the centre of the stage were a eries of on the contrary behave nobly, then poles surmounted by human heads; the scrambling of the categories an assertion of barbarism. It is part of become too much. To unfamiliar the intelligence of Michael Cow's music is added unfamiliar territory. Giambattista Tiepolo, The Sacrifices oflphigenia (detail),fre co, 1757 production that the line between

V oLUME 8 N uMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 39 barbarism and civilisation is constantly Tannhiiuser presents a challenge in the questionable. As was the persistence of being interrogated. When it is time for one way it begins not only with an orgy, but a wraith-like bat figures, who sloped around of the Scythian dances, we get it all right, stale one at that. The Venusberg scene can in odd corners to remind us, no doubt, of the and with people in the costume of 1779-a often seem totally disjunctive from what claims of the Venusberg. But they were as nea t way, you think at first, of putting follows; but here it was never more than a much supernumeraries as the hyperactive across its sense of stylisation. But then it simple contrast. A wonderful lightness of Furies in Iphigenie. While dance in Au tralia becom es plainer that these courtiers are touch pervaded the shepherd scene and its may now have come of age [as Dame Edna playing with fire as well as with 'barbarism'; easy coalescence into the arrival of the would say) there is absolutely no need for it their movements become more disordered, hunting party. Here the audience was to infantilise opera. more threa tening, until one person comes positioned into experiencing something of Tannhiiuser was well-sung on the night close to lopping off the head of another. Tannhauser's relief and joy, both by the way I went. Although I found Bernadette Cullen First performed ten years before the French the music was handled and by th e a little too magisterial as Venus, Lisa revolution, what was intended as an direction, even if the latter allowed the Casteen was a splendid Elisabeth. She had innocent tambourin becomes instead a appearance of a dachshund-and a sung the role here much earlier in her career, totentanz for the ancien regime. predictable audience gasp-to upstage one when her voice was almost too light fo r the But what can be radically insightful one of the most stirring fanfares in all opera. part, but now it has both ballast and minute can also be intrusive and distracting Indeed Elke Neidhardt's direction was flexibility. There had been complaints about the next. And so it was in the third act, highly effective throughout. Michael Scott­ the n asality of Horst Hoffma nn as w hen both Orestes and Pylades plead with Mitchell produced for her a Venusberg Tannhauser, but I was far more struck by Iphigenie-and with each other-for dea th, bathed in cloud and sh afts of light in the relative sweetness of his voice and the rather than allow the friend to be executed iridescent green, making it as dank and zest of his interpretation. The surprise in in his stead. This was shaping promisingly, throbbing as the obsession it postulates. many respects was Michael Lewis as with the crescendo of their trio taken Later, the hunting party were in traditional Wolfram, since he brought to the part a crisp daringly fa st; but then, when there are great nineteenth-century German costume, while firmness which at once enriched the sing­ supplicatory phrases hanging in the air as in the Hall of Song the minstrels appeared ing and gave the role a strength it often lacks. Py lades is begging before Orestes, the Furies in suits, the Landgraf decked out as a comic In short this was an outstanding suddenly went into overdrive, bouncing opera baron. But it wasn't simply a case of Tannhiiuser, capable of constructing a logic around on the adj acent beds [yes, beds!) as if updating the opera to Wagner's own time; at those points where Wagner had provided participating in an orgy. It was crass, and a the Hall itself threw back to the audience little. It made greater sense of the work fo r woeful display of a lack of almost a facsimile of a contemporary me than any other I have seen. This, after confidence in the splendid music. theatre, while Tannhauser's ambigu ous all, is the one Wagner opera the master costume, already sighted in the first act, could not leave alone, tinkering with it M UCH WAS EXPECTED of Tannhiiuser. now served to pass him off as something right up to a few years before his dea th. It is Word had come from Sydney of all sorts of resembling a pop star. The master stroke, no wonder then that so many [o ther) novel ties in the production, leading to though, occurred after his sexy lyric breaks productions have not been quite serious disagreements between director and up the party; here, as is sometimes the case able to bring it into focus either. conductor; but here in Melbourne it was to with early Wagner, the composer's reach be given under the baton of Simone Young. exceeded his grasp, and the music simply SOMEONE HAS to be the bad fairy. And What would happen when her skills and does not rise sufficiently to meet the amidst all the praise that has been heaped considerable reputation were factored into challenge. N eidhardt therefore found on Moffatt Oxenbould's Madam a Butterfly, the equation? another way to achieve the same effect, I have to say that it did not work for m e. It Some splendid music-making, for one banishing part of the hall up-stage and was elegant enough: the set with its screens thing. The third act prelude is the supreme bringing forth the rest to achieve a and neatly compartm ented segments test: it always sounds as though Wagner constricted sense of space, which was then suggested nothing so much as a m odern had lost the final version, and at the last darkened. No less impressive was the way apartment, and certainly came into its own minute slipped in this draft as a substitute. that the third act, often simply a sequence in the love duet, since in this enclosed Young's reading, with its carefully of splendid numbers, was clamped together setting the entire focus fell on Butterfly and articulated crescendi, came as near to more effectively by placing it in an almost Pinkerton. But everywhere else the opera making a decent piece of music of it as ruined Hall, the site now of a corrugated needs its Japanese setting to work properly: I would ever expect to hear. No less skilful iron fence, while never for one m oment the music itself often relies on an additive was the strong emphasis on the rhythm in allowing a character to remain alone on the of cherry blossom, and without a visual the music of Tannhauser [i ncluding his stage. prompt is reduced on occasion to almost love song) and the competitors in the Hall And the famous sample bags in the pointless scribblings in the orchestra. More of Song; it actually sounded like the Pilgrims' Chorus? These were not nearly as significantly, the story is the quintessential minstrelsy it is meant to be. No detail was jarring as one had been led to believe. After orientalist tale, and in its own sentimental too small to be overlooked: the definition all, medieval religion was fixated on relics, way posits exotic innocence against given to the winds during Tannhauser's so this was not a wilful interpretation, imperialist exploitation. Ken Russell, in Rome narration made them echo the bells particularly as Bibles with crosses on them his memorable production of some ten years he was then alluding to. But then the were produced at a key moment. The ago, modernised the set too; but he also capacity to shape a whole act was evident ambling in of the pilgrims, rather than their magnified the el ement of we tern too, most strikingly at the beginning. entering in a slow march, was much more exploitation. If that is not done, then it is

40 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 best if Butterfly remains in a simple corners of the set, intriguing in their not really allow him to display his talents dwelling, to remind us that all this is taking indifference, have b een promoted to for the bittersweet, the brittle or the place-still-in the third world. Otherwise multiculturals just itching to get involved neurasthenic. The two most memorable the work loses balance, and not even the in the action. The spirited Despina, Amelia performances were Rosamund Illing as creditable performances of Cheryl Barker Farrugia, tells the girls about love as if she the second Mother Superior, powerfully as Butterfly and Jay Hunter Morris as were a Brunswick Street punic And there's and beautifully projecting great wisdom as Pinkerton could save it. much by-play, now, between the two boys well as concern, and Claire Gormley as Verdi's Macbeth, it has to be said, is not a nd the cynical Don Alfonso, who Blanche, a wonclerfull y differentia ted much of an opera: the one really good tune incidentally could be a little m ore worldly­ performance that kept offering insights and in it occurs as Lady MacE floats in as a wise, even rueful, than David Brennan displayed the capacities of h er somnambulant, and then drifts off again, allows. It is not all loss; the first glimpse the r-r voice impressively. without having remembered to give us the girls get of the Albanians frozen in their aforementioned melody at full throttle. Still, splendour was a nice trick. Even so, we are .lHE SEASON has been attacked as being it can be made to work so long as you have edged away from the eighteenth century conservative, but in its own way, given the snappy direction and a first-rate cast. and even more from the quite specific setting nature of opera audiences, it was quite Unfortunately, Opera Australia saw its listing the opera has in Naples. Cosi is an elaborate daring. The Gluck was a bole\ choice, and as an opportunity to drag out an ancient parlour gam e, a chamber opera built around with the Wagner a palpable hit-to which production from the seventies, some would add the Puccini. Only which did nothing so much as to Macbeth was a disaster, although remind us how far we have advanced A postmodern audience has difficulty enough palming off The Carmelites as since then . The chunky sets coping with the high-minded, but when the representative of twentieth-century suggested stone walls, dungeons and opera is a bit of a sleight of hand. All portcullis, the dark costumes studs people involved are a pair of gays who refuse indications are that when Simone if not leather. The late Frank Thring to behave transgressively, but on the contrary Young takes ch arge of the would have loved it. N ow there was company's artistic policy in three som e point in the recent revival of behave nobly, then the scrambling of the years' time, we will see more a pleasantly fustian Lucia, since categories becomes too much. twentieth-century works. There there the story was filtered through might also be a move away from the Sir Walter Scott's romantic French bias in the repertoire, a sensibility. But there was none in reviving ensembles; its formalities should not be m arked characteristic of the company for this production; it even seem ed to bore the loosened too much, or else its emotional quite som e time. singers. Claire Primrose was a spirited Lady geometries come to seem as contrived as N evertheless, traditional operatic fare Macbeth, but Barry Anderson as the gent theorem s. Still, to hear' Un' aura amorosa' will remain the staple. This is not only himself sang the role in a totally uninflected sung as beautifully as it was by David because of the laggardl y taste of traditional way through the first two acts. Rather better Hobson alone made it worthwhile attending opera-goers; it is also because there is now from that point of view was Arend Baumann the performance. a cleavage between massed-force opera (even as Banquo; but then with the prospect of his Poulenc's Dialogues of the Carmelites if it should be contemporary) and the newer, h eirs becoming kings of Scotland, he had is a distinctly strange work. When sen sual fringe-theatre, increasingly mixed-m edia som ething to look forward to. people repent, or turn reflective, the result contemporary form, which even in subject It is a sad fact in opera that a production is an opera like Parsifal or this one-mostly matter often revels in its contemporaneity. is rarely as satisfying as it was the first time set in a convent. So suffused is it with The gap m ay well prove unbridgeable. round. In order to conceal a growing religious feeling that the empty seats after Moreover, the new movement in opera may tattin ess, or to accommodate different the first interval suggested that a number of come to seem-once a major figure comes singers, perhaps to elicit a more direct people who were not Catholic hac\ wondered to work in it-as significant in its own way engagem ent on the part of the cast, the what they were doing there. This is a very as the reforms of Wagner or Gluck. But even thing is m oved on, modula t ed-and wordy opera-with a libre tto m ore then, there will still be a place for what som e times tarnish ed. Whe n Opera distinguish ed than the music-which could be termed museum-culture opera, so Australia's present Co i fan tutte was first probably accounts for the decision to sing long as the performances remain lively. produced, the partnership of director the work in English. Radical productions will help ensure this, Goran Jarvefelt and designer Carl Friedrich The results were not as bad as feared, and are in fact essential to the process. For Oberle resulted in a revelation: to the light although in a few places the right word hac\ opera is now the m ain way a large number and elegance of an airy set, supplem ented clearly not been manoeuvred into the right of people encounter the basic myths of our by a judicious range of stage properties, was position at the right time. More seriously, culture. Once upon a time these were the brought an econom y of gesture and a sense with the exception of the moment when province of literature; people usee\ to read of restraint, l eaven ed by exuberant the death sentence is read to the nuns, there key scen es from novels out loud, or commit behaviour. The second act duet between are far too few places where one is struck by the great Shakespeare speeches to m emory. the two girls, for example, took place in two the rightness of the musical setting. All N ot any more. Now, for betterorforworse­ beds as they compared notes on their suitors. could not have been lost in translation. ancl thanks to recordings- they are more Now the brass beds have gone. Elsewhere A s urprise, really, given Poulenc's likely to be familiar with operatic arias. • stage furniture lies about with neither logic reputation as a song-writer. But perhaps the nor elegance, while the exotic presences at opera-despite the stunning climax-does Jim Davidson is Eureka Street's opera critic.

VoLUME 8 NuMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 41 THEATRE Going for brol

Geoffrey Milne on the tough theatre of Damel Keene.

M mou •N<· "''" ph ywngh' story which has toured Daniel Keene is a man on a mission. After very successfully inside nearly 20 years of writing steadily for the and outside Australia. In theatre, his present ambition is to produce Adelaide, he is best known for a string of the cast) found his milieu. In some ways, he 20 new plays over a period of 12 months. plays for the Red Shed, most of them has devoted his attention to society's In February of this year, for example, commissioned by that company, beginning battlers and underclasses ever since. five separate pieces of his were produced by in 1993 with All Souls. After Rusden, he and som e former class­ three different theatre companies in two Keene, in fact, has maintained a quiet mates formed a thea tre group known a cities: Lorna for Play box Theatre Centre in but strong presence in the na tiona! Skelta. Early work included what he calls Melbourne; three shortish plays under the repertoire throughout the present decade. 'editing jobs', but highly original works al o generic title of The Keene/Taylor Project From 1990 to the end of 1997, he was the soon began to flow from his compulsive pen #2 in a Brotherhood of St Laurence furniture equal-ninth most frequently produced as early as 1979 at La Mama, where Car Crash distribution centre and later at La Mama playwright in the country (with Chekhov), at O.K. Corral was first performed by Skelta. Theatre; then The Architect's Wall<-a new after Shakespeare, William on, N owra, Keene has returned 'hon1e' to La Mama play commissioned by the Red Shed Thea tre Enright, Beckett, Pinter, Sewell and Gow. on several occasions before the current Company and the Adelaide Festival of the In 1994, he tied for third on the national series. Echoes of Ruby Dark was premiered Arts-opened at the Arts Theatre in playwrights' leader-board, with three there in 1982 and another of his earlier Adelaide. For a period of about a week and separate productions of his two-bander Low plays, a steamy study of a brother-sister a half, all three productions were running and single productions of two other plays, relationship entitled Th e Hour Before My simultaneously-a remarkable achievement Because You Are Min e for the Red Shed and Brother Dies, was given a revival there in for a playwright who is not a household All Souls for Griffin in Sydney. Over the 1986 (with Lindzee Smith and Keene's long­ name like David Williamson, Louis Nowra, sam e period, he has had still other plays term associate Rhonda Wilson) in a season Nicholas Enright or Michael Gow. produced in Sydney, Hobart, Melbourne, which also included plays by Phil Other works to have appeared in the cur­ Brisbane, Canberra and N ew York, as well Motherwell and American playwright James rent 20-play project include Rules of Thumb as on Swiss radio and in cities in Poland Purdy, introduced to Melbourne audiences and two more in the Keene/Taylor Project #1. and France. by Lindzee Smith. At this stage, he's over half-way there, and Like many of his peers, Daniel Keene In some ways, a link between Greenwich there are more production projects brewing. got his first brea ks as a writer in the creative Village (home of the original La Mama) and The Keene/Taylor Project #3 opens on 5 June. hotbed of the Melbourne fringe theatre, Carlton-long envisaged by Melbourne La Daniel Keene's current wave of visibility particularly at La Mama. While at Rusden Mama founder Betty Burstall- was finally and success is not as sudden as it might College in the late 1970s he was influenced made palpable by Keene and Smith. The appear to regular theatre-goers. He is to some extent by Lindzee Smith, engaged Hour ... is by no m eans the only play of probably best known nationally as the at the College as a sessional lecturer but Keene's to have had successful showings in principal author (with composers Dalmazio whose main claim to fame at the time was New York City and Melbourne, and it is by Babare and Boris Conley, director Geoff as a director of the Australian Performing no means the only play of his that explores Hooke, puppetry director Michele Spooner Group at the Pram Factory. Smith arranged the stretched relationships between people and others) of the remarkable Cho Cho Sa n a transfer to the Back Theatre at the Pram of desperately living out their lives on the for Handspan Theatre in 1984 and Playbox one of his Rusden projects-a production of extreme edge of society. David Hare's play about revolutionary ------in 1987. This was an opera/puppetry/drama Above: Malcolm Robertson in Keene/Taylor reinterpretation of the Madama Butterfly China, Fan shen-and Keene (a m ember of Theatre Project. Photo by Zoe Burton.

42 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 The February/March Keene/ Taylor But the plays are shot through with Corpus Christi College Proiect season is a classic case. The evening prodigious energy and ironic humour. Conference Centre, Clayton began with a short preliminary encounter At one point in Night, A Wall, Two ~=- ~- . between a poverty-stricken single mother Men, the younger man curses his heart and her fostered-out and now returned condition in a mighty dialogue with his daughter, entitled Neither Lost Nor Found, elder partner, claiming that his 'ticker which explores the tentatively growing won't last its appointed distance'. To relationship between the two. The middle which his mate replies: 'Well, what is piece, Untitled Monologue, is a startlingly your "appointed distance", you dumb well-written and persuasively performed cunt? When it gives out, that's it! That monodrama about a young boy who moves is your appointed span!' And so the from the bush to the city in search of work, argument rages, to a point of hilarious which he fails to find. He ekes out his but poignant comic infinity. But, at the existence in a boarding house populated same time, neither of the two is mostly by elderly men who have all been prepared to give up the ghost: however Established in 1923, the venue provides year­ there and (not) done that long before. The futile the life, it is to be cherished until round quality single bedroom and en-suite dramatic narrative is developed through a the last free apple they can con out of accommodation, a unique chapel which was series of letters which the boy composes for the various welfare agencies has been originally built to hold 140 seminarians, his father (who never writes back), intercut devoured-or tucked away in the kick meeting room facilities, a magnificent dining with scenes with a woman who seduces for tomorrow. him in a bar and scenes at the police station I asked Daniel Keene why he is so room which seats 180 and excellent catering where he inevitably ends up as a result of obsessed by the idea of portraying life in service for all conferencing needs. this dangerous liaison. A brilliantly extremis. His reply was that: Peaceful courtyard and garden outlooks contrived three-way conversation (the boy it's critical for the theatre to do so; it is provide an ideal setting for retreats, work­ with father, police inquisitor and woman) death not to. When I go to theatres like shops, in-service and dining functions. Home brings this edgy little piece to a that [pointing over his shoulder from cooked meals, plentiful and delicious. ~ stark finale. Young & Jackson 's pub, where we met Please direct your enquiries to Cheryl, for a reflective beer, to the Victorian Arts HE THIRD PLAY of the set, called Night, .1. Centre[ all I see is characters who earn Helen or Shona on 03 9544 5132 A Wall, Two Men, is a poetic exploration of $80,000 a year in plays appealing to people the relationship between two unnamed who earn$80,000a year. Our theatres give street-dwelling deros living a largely noc­ the impression that we are a totally turnal life on the fringes of our affluent city. white-collar society, which is a pretence. They argue, drink, curse and joke about the My theatre is about portraying characters injustice of it all-much like Samuel [of the growing underclass] with dignity, Art Monthly Beckett's tramps in Waiting for Godot, to even if their behaviour is indefensible. which one or two probably unnecessary . 1 US TR.J/J I textual homages are made- before dossing Keene is not alone in his mission to down together for yet another night with develop a poetics of dignity in despair. their backs against the wall ... and another Artistic director of the current 20-play day of the same. mission, Ariette Taylor, and a ho t of IN THE jLNE ISSLE The raw material of this work sounds outstanding actors, are all involved in grim and depressing. But then Daniel the project and many (like Greg Stone, .\rt education in Sydney; Keene's work is about the battlers and the Malcolm Robertson, Daniel Spielman, "here would you study~ C:ourtne~ 1'-idd underclass of Australian society. The Hour Jane Bayly) have parts specially written Before My Brother Dies, for example, is for their particular tal ents and talks to the institutions set in the prison cell of a condemned man sensibilities. who is forced (through a contact visit with There is a profoundly funny-or Yirginia Fraser steps into the his sister) to review his life in the hour tragic-irony abou t Keene's present world of Te Papa, '\ew Zealand's before his death. circumstances. H e is living on an Low, as another, is about an ill-matched Australia Council fellowship, with a ne\\ '\ational \ luseum but till-death-us-do-part couple of ageing specific aim and objective to allow him crims who resort to increasingly desperate to continue to write plays for the Red Bernard Smith rdkcts on earh (but comically flawed) hold-ups in order to Shed Theatre in Adelaide. Red Shed has correspondence \\ ith Russell I )rysdalc make ends meet. Their ends never do meet had its Australia Council Funding cut ... (Keene's plays have a tendency not to off, which means that they are no longer have 'endings' in the orthodox dramatur­ able to produce Keene's plays. Or Out now gical sense; what happens when the lights anybody else's. go down leaves u s with yet more questions S-l .. iO, ji-r1111 good f,ord:slwps aut! II<' II'Silgt'IIIS. about what might happen if they were to Geoffrey Milne is head of theatre and Or phon,· fll r,}-/ 1) .NSf! ji11· your su/Js,nptiou come up again.) drama at LaTrobe University.

VOLUME 8 NUMB ER 5 • EUREKA STREET 43 When Nina falls housing tenement in South London. pregnant to Vince she For 128 scarifying minutes the film decides she wants to depicts the internal conflict within four bring up the baby generations of one London family. with her gay flatmate, Central to the action is the psychotic George (Paul Rudd). Raymond (a superb performance by Ray with whom she has Winstone)-a violent, cruel, unpredictable falle n in love. But petty criminal, who seeks to impose his George is in love with ranting will on everyone with whom he has Paul (Amo Gulinello) contact. As Valerie, his wife, Kathy Burke who is kept by Rodney gives a moving performance which won (Nigel Hawthorne) who her the award for Best Actress at the becomes a father fi gure 1997 Cannes Film Festival. She is the to Nina. Throw into this brunt of his bullying, a woman without romantic soup pot a hope, who somehow always gravitates back handsome black police­ to him. man, a powerful sleazy Oldman claims to have drawn on his literary agent, a pushy own personal experi ences in writing and rich half sister and a hall directing his first feature film. If that is so, full of sweet singing then it is a pity that the inspiration of his children, and there's own personal achievem ents did n o t your New York comedy/ influence him to leave a vestige of realistic sitcom. hope in the script. With its libe ral Oldman's script must surely represent politics clearly and the ultimate in repetitive obscenities. Even cutely emblazoned on a decade ago the brutal language would its sleeve, this film has have led to this film being banned or having all the right opinions on 20 minutes exci ed. family and unconven­ The action takes place in a stark, gaunt tional parental combi­ environment full of physical and emotional nations and the proper tension, where love is seen as a sign of place of money and weakness to be exploited. No m ore could status in a just and have been asked of a splendid cast with the healthy life. But of performances uniformly excellent, but course every character Oldman's direction, like his script, is has a good job, multiple undisciplined and self-indulgent. The drug opportunities and a lovely bright, airy house. fixes are unnecessarily repetitive, the Well-heeled The well-meaning liberal politics have little obscene inve ctive soon becomes bite in these comfortable surroundings. wearisome and the con stant brutality While one should not expect the world numbs the senses. blues from a light romantic comedy, just a Oldman' creation of a bullying, drunken The Obiect of My Affection, dir. Nicholas modicum of grit would have given this film psychopath who wallows in self pity after Hytner (general release). If we're not careful, a welcome lift, and I suspect made it a good his most vicious assault, is convincing. cinema is going to become pay TV. It seems deal funnier. What isn' t, however, is the low point of the these days you're either buying a ticket for There is nothing in this film you couldn't film when Raymond delivers a monologu e a two-hour episode of Lost in Space or see on the box, and remember, bigger is not in which h e bewails at length the lack of you're paying to see a sitcom star being cute always better. affection shown to him by his late fa ther. a hundred times bigger than usual. Where is -Siobhan Jackson This diversion is a glib attempt to the art in that? As visiting the movie house manipulate, but ultimately is unconvincing. becomes m ore and more like sitting in your The problem is that the m on strou s loungeroom, I vote we all stand up and Blacl< and Raymond is such a vicious creation that he shout Tm mad as hell and I'm not going to is beyond sympathy. take it any more'- blue The high point of the film is as brilliant The Obiect of My Affection is a classic Nil By Mouth, dir. Gary Oldman (independ­ as it is unexpected. There is a fl eeting show case in point. Nina (Jennifer Aniston, star ent cinemas). It is unlikely that Nil By of a little boy, perhaps five or six, holding of Friends), a bouncy but tough Brooklyn Mouth will ever be made into a musical. It his father's hand. The boy turns and we social worker, is dating Vince (John Pankow, ranks with The Boys as the most depressing glimpse his face which wears an expression Ira in Mad About You). an irritating but film I have seen in the past 12 months. that is ugly, brutal and threatening. That decent civil liberties lawyer. NYPD Blue Written and directed by Gary Oldman, this one glimpse vanquishes any hope for the meets Seinfeld? But enough already of the chronicle of booze, domestic brutality and future. N ew York TV talk. drugs is set in and around a public -Gordon Lewis

44 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 The blue eyes Brothers' have it blues Twilight, dir. Robert Benton (limited general The Boys, dir. Rowan Woods (general release). Start with the music: Elmer release). When the credits rolled for this Bernstein's silky jazz score, which makes film, I was holding my breath. And so was you believe in Los Angeles again. This is the rest of the cinema. There was a collective the minor key territory of The Big Sleep­ sigh when we were released back into the allure, wit and threat, echoed by Piotr mundane realities of finding purses and Sobocinski's cinematography, which tracks putting on coats. Be warned. This film is down dark halls of seedy rooming houses or very demanding, very confronting and very along the sharp line of Dolores Del Rio's upsetting. But having said that, it is not high moderne home in Santa Monica, or a actually very bloody or violent. It is, instead, Frank Lloyd Wright ranch at Malibu (where menacing. Violence is always ready to the body is buried). There is an ensemble happen, implicit in every act, every cast to glory in: Paul Newman, Gene movement of the film. Hackman, Susan Sarandon, James Garner The Boys moves in and out of one day in and Stockard Channing. the lives of three brothers, Glenn (John And yet the film doesn't quite work. Polson), Brett (David Wenham) and Steven The pitch is wrong. (Anthony Hayes). Brett has just been Robert Benton (who wrote the script released from jail and has some score­ and directed) is at his best in the intimacy settling to do. His stash of drugs has of dialogue and emotional intersection. disappeared, he suspects his girlfriend of (Kramer vs Kramer and Places in the Heart infidelity and he wants to get even with a won him Oscars). But this is a detective bottle shop attendant. His brothers are at yarn, with blood in the bathroom and scenes once implicated in the first two events and shot ina working LA police station. It needs portrayed as warriors on Brett's behalf. The more than intelligent, or even wry, situation is ready to blow. sympathy-it needs the ruthless stylishness Woods heightens the sense of of a Hitchcock or the savvy of Curtis foreboding-time is disjointed, conseq­ Hanson's LA Confidential. uences are known before events. The Paul Newman plays Harry Ross, an disturbing effect is that viewers don't know ex-cop, ex-drunk, turned private detective, what they are watching. Very early on in declined into live-in security person for thefilm you watch Brett burning his clothes. Jack and Catherine Ames (Hackman and Not until very late do you understand why, Sarandon). The Ameses are rich, glamorous and the knowledge is difficult to digest. and plausible. You half want to forgive What perhaps is most disturbing about them everything, or at least release them the film, and is one of its real strengths, is from the normal rules of culpability. Harry the way it constructs the act of watching as Ross certainly wants to. highly complicit. We know, although we But Robert Benton is no Scott Fitzgerald. don't know why, that the three brothers are And Paul Newman, at 73, is still the most dangerous and that someone will pay dearly. invincibly beautiful person on the set-it The audience is offered possible victims of stretches credibility to see him play a sap. E UREKA STREET this violence, and certainly I did much The film works when the exchanges work imagining the demise of the (predom­ (particularly between Jack and Harry) are FILM COMPETITION inantly) female possibilities. We are then part witty depth psychologising between two In a farewell tribute of a waiting game and at every twist you ageing men who love one another more to Frank Sinatra, one could feel a current of mental oh no, not intelligently than do most buddies. Or when of entertainment's hers running through the cinema. Woods Catherine is teasing them both. But when all-time greats, Eureka plays with this, offering us reprieves, or the killing starts there are just too many Street send a copy of The Oxford possible reprieves, for the victims. The sim­ genres running. History of World Cinema to the first ple acts of getting into a car, leaving a house, Still-go anyway. Hackman always person who correctly names the first picking up a telephone, or watching a taxi repays the price of admission and James husband of the woman who became drive past serve to tempt our fear or relief. Garner (whose chin has gone but whose the ever-hopeful ol' blue eyes' fourth The Boys is one of the most powerful charm has not) walks through his role as wife. Send entries to: films I have ever seen. The performances villain with all the skilled nonchalance of are all strong, and the direction sure-footed. Eureka Street fune Film Competition, an Olivier doing holiday pantomime. See it. PO Box 553, Richmond VIC 3121. -Morag Fraser -Annelise Balsamo

VOLUME 8 NUMBER 5 • EUREKA STREET 45 WATCHING BRIEF Hats off to Diclzens

SEEING the ABC's (It will probably shave years off your Purgatory debt.) Their recent screening of Sandy Welch's vegetable loves grow, if not vaster than empires, then certainly adaptation of Charles Dickens' more slow: pauses, closeups, flashbacks, a willingness to build Our Mutual Friend, I have come up up labyrinthine plots that assume a viewer's previous knowledge with two wish lists for prospective for up to 20 years. By comparison, Dickens' plots have no more novel-to-film/TV adaptations. One weight than a politician's conscience. is a Please Don't Do It At ALL List 2. For God's sake let the clwracters wear hats. Everyone and the other is a Please Consider who wasn't actually a street mendicant wore hats outside all This Method List, because by now I'm fed up with seeing the the time, up to about World War II. What's more, before the experience of a book hacked down into comic book form. late nineteenth century, most women over 20 wore indoor caps. The best you can say about some adaptations is that people 3. Dress them appropriately. I don't just mean getting the who would otherwise never have read the book might do so. period right-the time of the 1940s' finger-wave seen above a Those who pick up Our Mutual Friend have a treat in store: it shoulder-padded New Look crinoline is gone, (remember Greer is maturely comic, with tantalising prefigurings of other authors' Garson in Pride and Prejudice?) but despite the barrage of styles: Wodehouse, Kipling, Hemingway had obviously read it. fashion research, wardrobe designers still seem to dress It was obviously very difficult to adapt, and the Sandy characters in ballgowns for morning shopping, complete with Welch version got over the problem of conveying the richness low necks and No Bloody Hats. OMFOTV sent Bella Wilfer to and complexity of its form by applying rational economic theory visit her family on a cool grey English morning wearing an old­ to the book's comic element. Faced with having to account for gold brocade ballgown with a 1990s' boat themselves in a competitive market, the Podsnaps couldn't offer neckline, and an elaborate evening ribbon-and­ enough productivity gains and were retrenched. The Veneerings lace headdress. And no coat, mantle cloak or accepted heavy cuts and were retained in a casual capacity. The whatever. She would have been wearing a shawl result is more like the tone of Bleak House than anything else, with that dress even inside the house. They were but there's an almost Russian gloom left when you remove the worried about the cold in those days because there vivid humour and geniality. was no penicillin and the graveyards were full of Dickens was never afraid of a bit of grue, but he mostly young people who had 'taken cold'. And Dickens often talks balanced things with fun. The early scene in the jail/morgue, about bonnets in OMFthenovel. You don't see any real bonnets, when the supposed corpse of John Hannon is to be identified, the staple of the female headgear of the time, in OMFOTV. is made grimly funny in the book, as a drunken woman in a 4. Let the actors bear at least some superficial msemblance nearby cell bellows for the liver of another woman. The TV to the author's description. Jenny Wren, in the book, is like a adaptation has her making plaintive moans instead. Similar 12-year-old girl, with an astounding mane of golden hair. The examples abound. The BBC's Martin Chuzzlewi.t adaptation had waspish dark 30-something of the adaptation seems a capricious something of this fault, although it had a better sense of the casting choice. Similarly, Lizzie Hexam, who should be a unique Dickensian flavour of the characters. What was lost in tanned, dark-haired Juno, is cast as a delicate pre-Raphaelite OMF on TV was the tone, the feel of the novel. who'd have trouble doing the heavy rowing and hauling she is The best adaptation of a novel, and I'm brooking not a word supposed to do. of opposition concerning this, is Robert Mulligan's 1962 film THE PLEASE DoN'T Do IT AT ALL LisT: version of To Kill A Mockingbird. This little masterpiece 1. Lolita (But they have.) 2. Ulysses (Ditto.) 3. War And showed it can be done-one can so treat words that their essence Peace (Ditto, sundry awful times.) 4. The Lord of The Rings is conveyed through the tricky shorthand of audio-visual. Elmer (Ditto. Unfinished, sent them broke and serves them right.) Bernstein's music had something to do with it, as did Horton 5. Anything of D.H. Lawrence's, and will someone please do Foote's marvellously judged script with its use of judicious something about Ken Russell because the recent Foxtel voice-overs, and the casting was perfect. Sometimes when I'm screening of his Lady Chatterley's Lover was a dangerous anti­ feeling particularly curmudgeonly, I'm tempted to think it the aphrodisiac and has probably caused the recent worldwide run only novel-to-visual-medium attempt that ever got it right. One on Viagra. The final shot-and I'm not making this up-had might then mutter about directors' lunatic arrogance or the Connie (Joely Richardson) demurring about their imminent elaborate constructs of sheer ignorance or doctrinaire departure for Canada because of the cold, and Mellors (Sean postmodern vandalism, and make wish lists. Bean) replying that ay oop loov, 'e reckoned as 'ow they'd find THE PLEASE CoNSIDER TH1s METHOD LrsT summat ter dew ter keep theirselves warm. I'm not sure he 1. Make a real serial instead of a miniseries. Our Mutual didn't say 'ecky thoomp as well but I'm not responsible for any Friend was first published in 19 parts during 1864 and 1865 for more recollections of that because I think I was saying Aaaargh a magazine readership that was willing to let the plot work its at the time. 6. Anything more of Austen. There may still be way through. The 1998 BBC version consists of four meaty some obscure fragments of hers they haven't put period chunks of one-and-a-half hours each, and is much, much too costumes on. Leave them. • short. One might argue that there are strictures of time, money and viewer acceptance, but look at a soap opera once in a while. Juliette Hughes is a freelance writer and critic.

46 EUREKA STREET • JuNE 1998 Eureka Street Cryptic Crossword no. 64, June 1998

D evised by Joan Nowotny IBVM ACROSS 1. Pledge offered for home, given previous consideration. (7) 5. Divert oneself with girl's wine! (7) 9. Discovered again the will to return the money, though there's nothing in it. (7) 10. A light for the Northern Territory you can learn about. (7) 11. In Helvetia, rank is recognised by the headdress. (5) 12. About to tease young Gregory? You will only isolate him. (9) 13. Hundred to one on about rumour heard in France. What a state! (9) 15. Bet about £25 on English flower. (5) 16. Grave inscription, possibly, with directions to bring about fruition. (5) 18. Creep about on crater, thus setting an example for future reference. (9) 21. Strangely, praised journalist who had lost heart. (9) 24. On the lookout to change round. (5) 25. Can English hen somehow boost production? (7) 26. Yobbos say that youse, mixing with the Poles and Capone, were queer! (7) 27. Liquid in the black. (7) 28. Because of that, her byte implicated the other computer data. (7) Solution to Crossword no. 63, May 1998 DOWN 1. Mistake a spasm that comes and goes. (7) 2. Hold back the chorus. (7) 3. The insertion of a Greek letter turned euphoria into competitiveness. (9) 4. Time and time again for Caesar to beware in the current changes. (5) 5. Give careful attention to the old coach. (9) 6. German town rearranged could become sight for sore eyes, for instance? Or the flavour of the month? (5) 7. Wild ass returns to circle the herb. (7) 8. Numbers by the English cathedral were working under emotional strain. (7) 14. It's not ideal to be so tense? (9) 15. Become more docile, back in chaste surroundings-such pursuit of virtue is untimely. (9) 16. State of a Communist, or a ripe apple? (7) 17. Father's ceremonial cup taken without ice at this liturgical season. (7) 19. Carry out the former European truck. (7) 20. Child and friend cohere completely. (7) 22. Little girl who got her gun? (5) 23. I may be confused, but do I mistrust1 (5)

------~ ----- ~ ------JSL. D one year (10 issues for $54 or D two years (20 issues for D New subscription [ r I~Il $49 concession for pensioners, $99, or $95 concession) OR custo111 er code if students and unemployed) Overseas rates on application. D Renewal avnilab(e Name ...... Address ...... To subscribe, please return this form to: State ...... Postcode ...... Tel ...... Date ...... 'Eureka Street' D Cheque/ money order payable to Jesuit Publications Reply Paid 553 PO Box 553 D Visa D Bankcard D Mastercard Expiry date ...... RICHMOND VIC 3121 AUSTRALIA Card No: (no posta$e stamp required if posted in Australia) Name on credit card ...... Signature ...... EUREKA SJREET Exhibition Offer National Gallery of Victoria

BEYOND BELIEF: MODERN ART AND THE RELIGIOUS IMAGINATION

Nine years in the planning, Beyond Belief is a gathering of the great religious images of the troubled twentieth century. Curated by Rosemary Crumlin, it is one of the most challenging, stimulating and inspiring exhibitions staged at the National Gallery of Victoria. The exhibition is open until late July. Thanks to the National Gallery, Eureka Street has three special packages to give away to readers. Each package includes Rosemary Crumlin's exhibition catalogue, which stands alone as an extraordinary guide to contemporary religious art, as well as a double pass to the exhibition and an exhibition poster. The package is worth about $70.

Just put your name and address on the back of an envelope and send it to: National Gallery of Victoria Eureka Street June Offer, PO Box 553, Richmond, Vic, 3121.

Denis Freney Memorial Scholarships Up to $10,000 Applicati ons are invited from people currentl y engaged in (or about to commence) a research, writing or cultural project which is judged to make a contribution to the in june: labour and progressive movements in Australi a.

Peter Craven on Murray Bail's Eucalyptus The SEARCH Foundation w ill award scholarships to assist with th e costs of such a project. Priority w ill be given to projects which have good prospects of Andrew Riemer on publication or oth er public use of the results. but Veronica Brady's biography of Judith Wright whi ch do not have access to oth er funding.

Cassandra Pybus on SEARCH is an independent. non-profit foundation Henry Reynolds' This Whispering in our Hearts establi shed to assist acti vi ties which promote social justice and th e development of a more democrati c and David Marr on egalitari an society. Deta il s of its aims and objectives are Geoffrey Robertson's autobiography, This justice Game avail abl e on req uest. Suitably qualified appli cants should contact SEARCH Chris Wallace-Crabbe on John Forbes' poetry for detailed appli cation guidelines. Applications must be received by July 27, 1998 Peter Nicholls on Social Education and Research John Marsden's Secret Men's Business Concerning Humanity (SEARCH) Foundation Rm 610, 3 Smail Street, BROADWAY NSW 2007 an essay by Gillian Bouras Ph: (02) 921 I 4164; Fax: (02) 921 I 1407

FOUNDATION ACN 050 096 976

ISSN 1036-1758 05

9 771036 175017