Download Fragment

Tuesday, 8 May 2012
Page: 2710

Senator SIEWERT (Western Australia—Australian Greens Whip) (13:01): I join with the rest of the Senate in wholeheartedly supporting this condolence motion. I thank my colleagues for allowing me to lead for the Greens in this condolence motion because, out of all of us, I knew Judith the best, both being proud Western Australians. Senator Milne and I came in in the same intake of senators as Judith. I could not calculate the number of hours that I spent with Senator Adams in hearings of the community affairs committee and the rural and regional affairs committee. It is fair to say that many people outside this place do not realise how much cross-party work we do and how much time we spend travelling together on planes, cars and buses, and eating when we are doing committee work. All of those things I shared with Judith.

I had the privilege of attending her funeral service at the Kojonup Memorial Hall. About a decade previous to her service I attended a marriage celebration at the same hall. I am pleased to be able to say that her service was a celebration of Judith's life. I knew a lot about Judith but one of the things many of us learned was that, as a young woman, she also undertook fencing. There was a dramatic photo of Judith fencing and it did remind me of how good Judith was at fencing—verbally was my experience with Judith.

When Judith made her first speech here, she articulated how pleased she was to be here but also that she was, as Senator Joyce just said, over 60 years of age. She shared the point about the need to value experience and for experienced people to mentor younger people in all walks of life. She also talked about a range of issues she was passionate about which she took up in this place. Many of those issues I shared with her and was equally passionate about, so we worked very often across parties. I will go into some of those in a moment.

I want to touch on how strongly committed, dedicated and strong willed Senator Adams was. Her capacity to work was renowned. Her inability to give up was renowned. Her ability to keep working in the face of adversity was, again, renowned. I remember the day that her husband, Gordon, passed away. She was supposed to be attending a community affairs committee hearing. The way that she handled that overwhelming loss was remarkable. They were moving to their new home on that day. For those who do not know, the family had sold their farm in Kojonup, had lived in Perth for a short while and had found a beautiful home in Gidgegannup, just north of Perth. The day that Gordon died was the day that they were moving into their new home. Judith handled that with aplomb. We all sent flowers, and I remember just a couple of days later Judith ringing and talking to me, saying thank you and talking about what had happened. I thought what a brave person she was to be phoning and responding and saying thank you so close to the tragedy of Gordon's passing.

As many people know, Judith had this illness for a while, but people outside would not have known. I have travelled on committee hearings with Judith when she was ill, out of public sight, in 'the ladies', and when she came out nobody would have known that she had just been feeling very unwell. Not one member of the public or any person in that hearing would have known. That was her strength: she kept on going and she was focused on the issues. When she was not able to join us—and I know that Senator Moore will be able to confirm this—she was making sure she was sending through questions and making sure we were following up the right issues. She was very fierce when she was cross. I remember one time when we were having hearings in Central Australia, in Alice Springs. We usually stay in the same hotels and one of my colleagues had said something in the media that Judith was very angry about. We were having breakfast and she stomped into the dining room and told me off. It was about the Army, by the way, and I agree with Senator Evans. I have also joked with Senator Adams about her support for men in uniform, and we shared the joke several times.

I would like to quickly touch on some of the issues I am aware of that Judith so proudly worked on in this place. Her passion and support for rural Australia was well known. She consistently took that up everywhere and she particularly focused a lot on rural health and Aboriginal health. At some stages when we were developing recommendations for the community affairs committee I think there was a bit of a competition as to who could suggest the toughest recommendations.

Wilson Tuckey gave the eulogy, and I join Senator Evans and Senator Abetz in saying that I was deeply touched by Wilson's eulogy. I thought it was beautiful and that he did a fantastic job. He did break down at the beginning but I thought he did a beautiful job. In his speech he touched on Judith's support for getting rid of the single desk and how that was not shared by some of her colleagues on the same side of the chamber. That is one thing that she and I also had in common. She also worked on the Opal fuel issue and was passionate in her support for it. I just remind senators that she was very supportive of the mandatory rollout of Opal fuel. In fact, one of the last conversations we had in this place was about needing to do something about the mandatory rollout of Opal fuel.

As we know, Judith also worked on breast cancer and bowel cancer. I remember her and me leading a rally around Perth's central business district yelling out, 'Get behind bowel cancer!' because at the time we thought that was a really good slogan. She did a lot of work on the community affairs committee on bowel cancer as well as breast cancer. She was passionate in this place in RU486 and stem cell debates and was passionate about regional health as well. She was a fearsome advocate for the issues that she cared very deeply about. She was an extremely compassionate person on those issues. As an aside, most people I think will be aware that she was very passionate about horses and racing. However, again it was not until the service celebrating her life that just how much she was involved in the racing scene came out. What she did not know about horses was not worth knowing. She combined those passions with her other civic duty work. She was a JP in Kojonup and I do not think there is a single person in Kojonup who did not know Judith. Not to prove that WA is so inbred, but I have very close family friends also in Kojonup who know Judith's family and it was the same situation: you could be very passionate about issues but when it came down to family and personal staff that was a whole other area of life that you did not cross over into in terms of getting those political arguments going.

Judith will be sorely missed in this place and sorely missed on the community affairs committee. Until very recently, she never missed estimates or a community affairs hearing. You could always rely on Judith being there. As Wilson Tuckey also said, she would go to Senate committee hearings from across the country if she was needed and if somebody else could not make it. You could always rely on Judith to come and participate and ask hard questions. I suspect FaHCSIA and DoHA will be breathing just a little bit easier on certain issues because they know Senator Adams will not be there to ask them some hard questions. Senator Smith, I do not think you will be up to speed enough to be able to ask those piercing questions in estimates this time around.

I would like to join in offering our deep condolences on Judith's passing to her family, to Stuart and Robbie and to Judith's granddaughters, whom I know she was very proud of. She travelled to Canada to spend time with them. She was thrilled at the birth of her granddaughters, and I was so happy that she was able to spend some time with them. At a personal level, I will miss working with Judith on so many of the issues that we shared and were passionate about. I will miss her presence in this chamber and her presence as deputy whip. She has left an indelible mark on this place and on the issues that she worked on. I will finish by giving my support to this condolence motion and wishing her family all the best.