Download Fragment

Tuesday, 8 May 2012
Page: 2737

Senator EGGLESTON (Western Australia) (14:57): Judith Adams. The images that spring to my mind when I think of Judith are a hard worker, a person who was enthusiastic about all she did, a good colleague and friend and a very determined person who would see things through to the end no matter what adversities or difficulties she faced.

Judith had some north-west connections, which I learnt about only recently. She had worked as an emergency nursing service nurse in the north-west of WA. In fact she met her husband, who was an RFDS pilot at Meekatharra, in the north-west. Meekatharra is in the mid-west and was an RFDS patient transfer point for patients coming down from places like Broome, Port Hedland and Karratha. A crew would come up to Perth and swap aircraft and take the patient on to Perth while the north-west crews went back to their home bases.

Her husband, Gordon, was a farmer from Kojonup. He had leased out his farm while he spent some time as an RFDS pilot in the north-west. After they were married they went back to the Great Southern wheat belt town of Kojonup, where, as we all know, Judith became very heavily involved in community affairs. As we heard at her funeral, her many interests—I thought rather surprisingly—included horseracing, which is one that I would not have picked for Judith. But nevertheless, she was a horse breeder and spent a lot of time in that endeavour. Health services were a very important focus of Judith's life. She was for several years on the Perth metropolitan hospitals board and she quite frequently came to my office to discuss health issues, especially regional health services as well as women's health issues. As has been said by others today, it was an important interest to her.

Judith was active in the Liberal Party and was president of the O'Connor division. In due course she became a senator for Western Australia, fulfilling two roles: that of a farming senator on our Senate team and also representing women's interests. Her bravery in facing up to difficult issues was demonstrated when as divisional president of O'Connor she suggested to Wilson Tuckey that perhaps he should consider a succession plan. I am not sure that Wilson was very amenable to that but nevertheless Judith had the courage to raise it with him. One would have hoped it made him think that perhaps it was time for him to look at a successor, but as we all know he soldiered on to the end and in fact lost his seat, which was probably the best way for Wilson to end his term in parliament, dying in the trenches fighting for his beliefs.

As has been said, Judith was a tireless worker on the many committees she was involved in, travelling all over Australia. Her connection with and respect for the military surprised me. It has been said already that she had served in the New Zealand territorial army in Vietnam and she retained the greatest respect for the military, not only the Army but also the Navy, in her years since she was in Vietnam.

Her strength in the great debate over the single-desk issue very much contributed to the changes which occurred and which were alluded to by Wilson Tuckey in his funeral eulogy. Changing from a single desk for wheat marketing was a major issue in rural politics, farming politics, in Western Austra­lia and Judith was one of the leaders of the push to change from that system. Now with a different system I think most wheat farmers would agree that it was a good thing to have done.

I believe Judith showed great strength and fortitude in facing the challenges of her illness and I greatly admired her for this. I visited her in Royal Perth Hospital and I was deeply touched by her great determination to fight on and overcome her illness even though as a medical professional and sometime horseracer she must have known that the odds were not good. Judith rang me a week before she died, which I thought was a privileged call. At that time I think she knew that her time was short, and she faced her last week with the stoicism and bravery with which she had faced her whole illness.

Judith was an extraordinary person and she will be remembered not only in Western Australia but, as we have heard today, across Australia for the great work she has done in the committee system in the Senate. For her sons, Stuart and Robbie, her passing must leave a big space in their lives. And it is not only in their lives that a great space has been left, because she leaves a great space in the life of the Senate as well. May she rest in peace.