SENATOR KATE LUNDY
TRANSCRIPT: POLITICAL PANEL 666 ABC CANBERRA BREAKFAST WITH ROSS SOLLY
FRIDAY 23 OCTOBER 2009
Speakers: Ross Solly (presenter), Senator Kate Lundy and Senator Gary Humphries.
Subjects: Paul Keating and Malcolm Fraser’s comments regarding Parliament House and Canberra.
ROSS SOLLY: Our political panel is here Liberal Senator Gary Humphries, Good morning to you Senator Humphries
SEN HUMPHRIES: Good morning Ross
ROSS SOLLY: And Labor Senator Kate Lundy, good morning to you Senator Lundy
SEN LUNDY: Good morning
ROSS SOLLY: Is there anything worse than a prime minister scorned?
SEN LUNDY: Oh look how disgraceful
ROSS SOLLY: It is disgraceful we are talking here about
SEN LUNDY: I don’t think your going to get to much debate between us this morning Ross. But I am absolutely appalled at these comments.
ROSS SOLLY: This is Paul Keating suggesting that Canberra is one of Australia’s biggest mistakes and Malcolm Fraser suggesting the new parliament house was a big mistake.
SEN LUNDY: It’s unbelievable that these two people who ought to have more respect for our democratic institution Parliament House and Parliament but I think the Insult to Canberra, I think they are chasing a headline perhaps, Senator Humphries what do you think? It is Inexplicable and so ignorant, people will be genuinely offended right around the country because of this.
SEN HUMPHRIES: I suppose as a line that might appeal to somebody who lives in Sydney we should have been the capital city but
ROSS SOLLY: Can you imagine it
SEN HUMPHRIES: Well that’s right imagine trying to sort of plough through Sydney’s traffic to get to Parliament or Garden Island and go back again try to cross the city to do your business. I’m sorry but Canberra works and it was created as the showcase city where all the best things of Australian can kind of be put in and come to the city and be proud about how it shows off Australia’s ambitions and so forth. But you couldn’t have done that In Sydney it wouldn’t have worked in Sydney the same way.
ROSS SOLLY: What about what Malcolm Fraser said which I think is more interesting than what Paul Keating says and that is that it turned out to be far bigger than anybody expected, cost more than anybody expected and really cuts the politicians off from the public. Now you’re up there everyday and your colleagues are up there everyday
SEN LUNDY: Well look I think far from it one of the great benefits that we have I think as ACT Senators and Members is we do get to live and work in parliament house as well and that’s a really special advantage because we are in our electorate all the time.
SEN LUNDY: I think it’s one of the most accessible parliamentary buildings in the world and I haven’t been to too many but that’s certainly the feedback I get. And there is this wonderful principal that the architect built into the design of the building that relates to the grass over the roof of the building and being able to be accessible all around, that the people are a part of it and I think any visitor will tell you who comes to parliament house, how enthralled they are by it, how it dignifies the institution of the parliament, the parliament of the people of this country and all of the architectural features in the building are laden with that wonderful symbolism of accessible, democratic, representative democracy.
SEN HUMPHRIES: But it really is the people’s palace, it is a very accessible building really and very sort of democratic in it’s spirit, but also too I’ve been to lots of parliament houses here and other places and if you’re going to build a modern parliament house, you’ve got to acknowledge that lots of those ones in older ones in other places are grossly inadequate. I mean I’ve been to the Victorian Parliament and some of the Ministers you visit there have offices in the basement with no windows and they are grossly unsatisfactory. We built a contemporary parliament and if you built one for that number of members, it will look like and it will cost about the same amount that parliament house did. The other point is what was Malcolm Fraser doing signing off on this building back in 1982
ROSS SOLLY: Apparently he was driving the bulldozer
SEN HUMPHRIES: Well he must have been, you can’t sign of on a billion dollar project and not sort of look at the details of what you’re going to build, its just unbelievable.
SEN LUNDY: I’m sure he was very happy to do it at the time and all with the associated publicity, so it think its very ungracious to come back now and sling this criticism on one of Australia’s most extraordinary buildings. And Ross can I just say, one of the things I love about it, was the care with which the architects took to integrate it into the original vision for Canberra by Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony. It fits the city perfectly, it fits the democratic hierarchies, that were built into their design, it fits the landscape geometry here, its kind of perfect. For people who don’t know about that relationship it does bring a whole new dimension and I’m sure Gary will agree, a whole new dimension to understanding that building and its relationship with the capital.
