Wayne Swan
ALP National President
Friends,
We are here today to raise funds for the Australian labour movement’s most important and consequential monument. And there really are precious few monuments with greater historic significance to the building of this nation than the Australian Workers Heritage Centre and the Tree of Knowledge at Barcaldine.
But it also feels like budget week in Canberra.
I recognize all the pushing, shoving and screeching that comes from a genuine invitation for constructive measures to future proof our economy.
For me there is too much gloominess in the air. I don’t share it, and I think we’re looking at some good years ahead.
As John Edwards recently observed, Australia is emerging from disinflation, and has achieved that without a recession, without a big increase in unemployment and with a big increase in business investment. That, and not a looming investment catastrophe, is the foreground to this week’s summit.
Australia has done well, but it can certainly do better, particularly when it comes to sensible initiatives to increase our productivity and engage in lasting budget repair.
The Australian economy has never been more prosperous than it is today, participation in employment is at record highs, unemployment close to record lows
By contrast, when Bob Hawke convened his first economic summit in April 1983, unemployment was heading towards 10.3 percent, and we were still struggling out of the deep recessions of 1981 and 1982.
Nevertheless, we still hear some of the same characters of old putting forward the same proposals for scorched-earth trickle-down economic agendas. The type who believe human misery is a precursor to economic prosperity. Exhibit A would be Tony Abbott’s 2014 budget.
The facts are Australia has done much better matching strong growth with social equity than almost every other developed country in the last century, particularly in the aftermath of the GFC, now almost two decades on.
The Labor view of the world has in large part driven this outcome.
Economic policy for Labor has always been about the sort of society we want to be and what economic settings we need to spread opportunity broadly across our society.
I’m an optimist about the future of our economy at home, but I’m also a pessimist about the future of democratic participation across the developed world. There is a desperate need for parties of the centre and centre left to re-engage with their communities or risk a disturbing trend towards autocracy.
In an era of mistrust of government and institutions more generally it gets harder and harder to convince people of the power of public policy to change lives in an enduring way for the better.
History tells us we can do big things. Enduring structural long-term reforms, like our unique arbitration and bargaining system, underpinned by a decent minimum wage, national superannuation and Medicare are powerful and lasting individual examples.
Here in Australia the resounding re-election of Albanese Labor Government gives us the chance to strengthen our democratic institutions. In the last election we reaffirmed our commitment to decency. To fairness, to kindness, to inclusiveness, to helping each other along. To Australian values and to Labor values. The Government has a mandate to make this an even better place for ordinary Australians.
Australian Labor has always been distinctly different, because of its roots in the trade union movement and our determination to advance economic equality of opportunity first and foremost.
That’s why understanding the historic importance of Barcaldine is so critical.
Those 3000 shearers, their bravery and foresight, inspired generations of trade union and ALP activists that made Australia one of the most successful social democratic countries in the world.
The shearers who stood together at Barcaldine were asserting a revolutionary principle: that economic progress without economic justice is a hollow victory.
These men understood something profound about power and purpose. They knew that creating wealth was meaningless unless it opened doors for working families. They grasped that individual success rings hollow when your neighbours struggle. They believed that government must be more than a bystander to inequality – it must be an active force for fairness.
Yet here's the lesson we must carry forward: democratic progress is never inevitable. Each generation faces the choice between complacency and renewal. Today, we face that choice once more.
--
So here we are, 134 years on from Barcaldine, Labor is in office federally and in five state and territory governments.
And this year, at the federal level, we achieved something remarkable. Ninety-four parliamentary seats – Labor's strongest result in more than 80 years. Anthony Albanese secured consecutive terms as Prime Minister, a feat not seen in decades. We delivered Peter Dutton a defeat so comprehensive he lost his own electorate.
By every measure, a stunning achievement.
Yet electoral success carries obligations beyond celebration. Victory creates responsibility. These 94 seats represent more than parliamentary arithmetic – they embody a mandate to continue building an Australia where everyone has genuine opportunity to thrive.
These seats are instruments of change, not symbols of triumph. We have three years to demonstrate we deserve to keep them – three years to prove that Labor governments deliver for the people who elected us.
So, here's what keeps me awake at night: the precise moment you believe you've mastered politics is when politics masters you.
History offers sobering reminders. In March 1993, every commentator declared Paul Keating finished. Ten years of Labor rule, economic recession, widespread unpopularity. John Hewson was measuring the Lodge curtains. Instead, we stunned the nation with an increased majority.
Three years later? Complete devastation. Government to opposition in a single electoral cycle.
Consider Campbell Newman's trajectory. The largest state victory in Queensland's history in 2012. Political obituaries written for Labor. Newman appeared invincible, untouchable.
By 2015, he was packing boxes in the Premier's office, having lost not just government but his own seat.
This pattern repeats across democracies and decades.
Internationally, we've witnessed once-mighty progressive parties crumble through overconfidence. America's Democrats assumed demographic destiny would guarantee permanent majorities. Yet in two elections they comprehensively lost the votes of blue-collar, working-class Americans.
Delivering for Trump. Not once, but twice.
They forgot politics' cardinal rule: entitlement to votes doesn't exist. Democracy demands you earn support daily, not assume it permanently.
The moment we take any voter for granted – renters, young people, factory worker, union member anyone – we forfeit our right to represent them.
Australians backed us because we offered better solutions when they needed them. Cost-of-living pressures demanded action – we provided plans.
To continue to be successful we must build our movement and make our party much more vibrant, larger and imaginative. Contemporary democracy requires more, in terms of our membership.
For too long we have been in denial about low membership in the Labor Party. And for some time, our support among working people in outer suburban and regional areas has been fragile.
Our 2022 electoral review identified concerning trends: declining Labor support among working Australians, particularly in outer suburbs and regional communities. We saw encouraging trends in our recent victory, but it has not resolved the underlying structural challenge.
Notwithstanding a recent surge in applications, party membership has stagnated since 2014 despite substantial population growth, while our average member age continues rising. It’s disturbing that our single largest membership group are people like me who joined in the Whitlam era.
We have a golden opportunity to build a stronger and more active party, one that is more reflective of the people we want to support us now and into the future.
This year’s victory should be a clarion call to all members to go out and recruit additional members.
This becomes all the more important as our preferential voting system continues to encourage a fracturing of the primary vote.
The National Executive's target of 65,000 members cannot be aspiration. We must deliver.
As Paul Bongiorno recently observed about our recent victory, we achieved something that was "wide but shallow." And so, our success creates even greater obligations. It is a building block, not an end point. We must turn electoral breadth into genuine depth of support among working families. Although we achieved a record Two Party Preferred vote, we should be humble and diligent and recognise that a national primary vote in the mid-thirties demands more work.
International experience offers stark warnings. American progressives discovered what happens when parties lose grassroots connection. As a recently defeated long-serving Senator reflected after Trump's victory: "Working families will return if we focus on economic realities they face."
But economic focus means nothing without community connection. Policy relevance requires genuine engagement with affected families, not internal conversations among political professionals.
Too often politics is a conversation about people rather than with them.
We must loudly and unapologetically fight for what people value and get back to good old-fashioned movement building, both union and party.
We must be a party that young people want to join and one that reflects the diversity of Labor voters.
Our conservative opponents may appear weakened now, but they will regroup and return, likely embracing even more divisive tactics than we witnessed recently. They will exploit identity politics and cultural resentment to distract from Labor's economic agenda for ordinary families.
Our triumph has restored hope for millions of Australians. For many young people, this may represent their first encounter with effective progressive politics after a decade of conservative failure.
We must not squander this moment.
Lasting social change requires broad-based support. A society built from grassroots participation, not elite direction, can only survive with a party that grows larger, more dynamic, and more representative.
The workers who gathered at Barcaldine taught us never to surrender to the notion that public challenges are insurmountable or that progressive victories are impossible.
The choice belongs to us. Not merely winning elections but constructing a movement. Not simply holding office, but wielding power purposefully. Not just generating wealth, but ensuring it creates opportunity for every Australian who needs it.
To win the battle of ideas we must have an organisation that looks like the country we expect to support and vote for us. Anything less lets down those audacious shearers in Barcaldine who risked everything to create the prosperity in which we all share.
Thank you.
