Keating on Kerr

Sir John Kerr died in Sydney on 7 April 1991. During the Condolence motion in the House of Representatives, the then Treasurer, Paul Keating, made these comments:

I would also like to pass on my condolences to Sir John Kerr's wife and family and lament the fact that he died a controversial figure in what has become generally recognised as a tragic completion of a very promising career. The Leader of the Opposition (Dr Hewson) has just made a very partisan and militant speech, without which I probably would not have spoken on the condolence motion. However, I think a few things need to be said as a result of his remarks. The Leader of the Opposition was not here in those times, and one needed to be here then to understand the ambience and the sequence of the events.

Sir John Kerr was a person of substance. He was very interested in public affairs and public life. He is like a lot of frustrated people of quality: they want to be in public life, but never ever make the jump; they never quite take the chance. He was such a person. For him it was always a dalliance at the edge of public affairs. He became Governor-General on the recommendation of Prime Minister Gough Whitlam because he was known to him and known also for his interest in public life and public affairs. It was with that in mind that I think the government of the day had great expectations of him at least having a role in public life, a role which otherwise had been denied to him over the course of his career. It was not that it had been a public life without distinction, because his service as the Chief Justice of New South Wales and as a barrister of note meant that he was a very well regarded person. As the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) said earlier, he was well regarded legally in all quarters. He had a reasonably close affinity with the labour movement; that is why he was trusted by the Australian Labor Party.

The fact of the matter is that the Labor Party makes the political heroes in this country. When people cross the Labor Party they wear the crosses it puts on them, whether it be Billy Hughes or Joe Lyons-that is the truth of it. Sir John Kerr has worn the admonition of the Labor Party. That is really what the Opposition is talking about now. He does so for one reason-he deceived his Prime Minister. He did not tell him that he was prepared to sack him.

I was at Government House with the then Prime Minister on the last occasion he saw Sir John Kerr, at an Executive Council meeting of three to appoint the Chairman of the Darwin Reconstruction Authority. The meeting was filled with bonhomie, cordiality and the like. As we left and walked down that long corridor at Government House, the Prime Minister was saying complimentary things to the Governor-General. The Prime Minister intimated to me that the Governor-General was a very proper person who would observe the constitutional position and prerogatives, including telling the Prime Minister what he intended for him.

Had the Prime Minister known that he intended to deceive him and dismiss him, another course of action would have been available to him. That is the nub of Sir John Kerr's problem with the Labor movement and those who support it, and it will last forever. It is a sad thing for him, but it is a fact.

Anyone who has made a contribution to this country is to be admired. In a personal sense, Sir John Kerr did not come from privileged circumstances, but he surmounted any difficulties in those circumstances. He was a person of substance. But, in the end, one has to follow that substance with integrity. He lacked the integrity in dealing politically with the Prime Minister and he has suffered history's admonition as a result.

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