It could also have just been me trying to make some sense of the world. And then of course we had already experienced the Labor government reforms of the 1960s. So he was very keen to ensure that the new candidates – and there were a lot of them in '70 for a number of reasons – reflected his view of the world.
And thirdly, with the expansion of the size of the house from thirty-nine to forty-seven, there were a number of new seats. And that of course led to the short-term formation of the Liberal Party within the Liberal Party, and so it went on from there. So what was Don Dunstan's view of the world in the first term of Parliament, for you.
He saw that the reform of the electoral system and the Legislative Council was the most important. Of course we were not able to achieve that until after the 1973 election, but nevertheless there were some of the things he did. He put a lot of support behind Hugh Hudson and the collection of the education system.
I knew Karmel quite well because I was on the Council of Flinders University and he was Vice-Chancellor at the time. Well, now, Mines, of course, it was the Department of Mines, and the big problem there was the development of the gas fields in the northern part of the state. I guess one of the reasons I asked the question was before your time – Yes. was that I've had some people say to me that Don's negotiating skills were not always up to date.
I worked with Ray Taylor and Tony, whatever his name was, who was the general manager on a lot of things. The under-treasurer would show up and meet with the minister who was assisting the prime minister to sign the check for the week. Well, I suppose, yes, I suppose that what Bakewell really represented was the ultimate victory of the Prime Minister's Department over others.
Oh, and besides, he was of course very enthusiastic about improving our design concepts and the quality of the things we built. But we were there and Don was sitting at the table and it was so hard to get a conversation out of the guy. Have you ever witnessed the rise of the media in government yourself, Don, as you watched.
So yes, it is very much in the Dunstan era that the idea of the government of the day having a press corps was developed.
Don, within the executive of the Party, did Don have a great deal of influence within that as well. The merit of the one sitting above them is that he and she can be removed. So Don, as you're describing it there, there's still a lot of personal stuff in there.
I remember when some of the problems of the Whitlam government came to the fore, I remember saying:. Geoff did a lot of the hard work; Hugh was the one who would stand up before the Commission and. The first thing I have to say is that a number of moral issues, which may have been somewhat troubling to me in this sense, have been cleared up.
To the extent that you might have considered fluoridation of water supplies as some kind of moral issue, that was out of the way. Some of the gambling stuff, some of the loosening of the controls on gambling, it had all been done that had been removed. And of course this whole issue of non-party voting, what some people call.
Just thinking about the moratorium and the role of the police and that and the subsequent problems that Don had with Salisbury. Now, of course, one of the conventions – which is largely ignored these days, I must say – but one of the conventions in parliamentary government, of course, is that a minister who deliberately misleads Parliament must resign. or her portfolio when they are discovered. Don, also in relation to the overview of this period, I'm wondering if you have any perspective on the social reform successes of this period.
Some of the work that was done to get more industrial development in the State, especially after the bit of a slump in the 60s, was very important, and of course the education reforms. So, just to reflect, you said that the latter part of the Dunstan era was that time of strife between Virgo. Des, I knew it wasn't going too well when Des said that there was going to be a new emphasis on governance, "That's what we have to get into now, governance, the proper governance of the State," more than reform.
Now John certainly tried to take things up a bit from there, but not to the extent of Dunstan's decade. And if I look at it now as an overview, Don, and hopefully tie it together, it seems as you speak that you remember very clearly the achievements of the government and the way things happened, but not much about the person, is there.
