Senator HUTCHINS (10:24 PM) —Last Saturday was a great day for the Labor Party in New South Wales. We had significant swings to us at the election and, in fact, it is probably bad news for the coalition in that it may be two or three elections before they will get a chance to sniff power.

It was also a sad day in that, not long before the polling booths opened on Saturday, the Labor member for Londonderry, Jim Anderson, passed away. Jim Anderson was a great local member of parliament, and New South Wales people would have seen Premier Carr dedicate the Labor Party's victory on Saturday to the memory of Jim Anderson. In fact, during the day the New South Wales Leader of the Opposition, John Brogden, also paid a similar tribute to Jim Anderson in a show of magnanimity that is sometimes unexpected in politics.

Jim's death was particularly shocking for people who live in his Western Sydney electorate. Jim passed away just over an hour before the booths opened, so people were going to the booths expecting to vote. I am told that, as people were advised that they could not vote because the member had passed away, men and women, old and young, were literally in tears. That is a mark of Jim's impact and his relationship with his electorate.

I had known Jim for over 20 years. I knew him as a branch activist; I knew him as a councillor on the Blacktown City Council; I knew him as a mayor of Blacktown; and I knew him as the member, first, for St Marys and then for Londonderry. I have had a chance to speak to a number of his colleagues in the west, and Jim was regarded as a man of great principle and courage and one who never lost sight of the roots from which he came. Jim was from Belfast, where he worked at the shipyards. I am advised by some of his colleagues in the state parliament that Jim did not care what religion or background people came from; he treated them similarly. When he was approached on the docks in Belfast by people who said, `Jim, we don't have your lodge number,' he had to advise them that he did not have one because he was a Catholic. As I understand it—and Jim used to tell this tale—that sort of prejudice encouraged him to come a country that did not encourage or indulge in prejudice, and that was Australia.

He came to Australia with his wife, Kathleen, and his children, subsequently, and started work at Commonwealth Engineering as a sheet metal worker. From there, as I have said, he became active in the party. As I said, I had a chance to speak to some of Jim's colleagues this afternoon, particularly his former deputy mayor, Charlie Lowles. Charlie Lowles told me that we will probably never know about the things that Jim did for his electorate, because it is an electorate that has had, and still has, severe unemployment; it is an electorate where there has been, and still is, severe social dislocation. It is in an area of Sydney that has been classified as needing particular assistance, particularly Mount Druitt, Rooty Hill and other suburbs out there, which is being attended to. Jim was always out there doing his bit for everybody. Charlie told me that when people malign politicians they are doing a disservice to Jim Anderson. Jim never forgot where he came from. He always reminded people of an Irish saying: `Always dance with the lady who brought you.' That was the way Jim played his politics and his life. His faith was very important to him, as was his family. I offer my condolences to Jim's wife and lifelong partner, Kathleen, to their two children, Robert and Rhona, and their families, and to his many friends.

Senate adjourned at 10.29 p.m.