Nuclear Spectra
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I think we've had a historic and remarkable achievement
in the period of time where we ran in the election.
At the beginning of the election campaign,
the Prime Minister in Australia and the other government
leaders were not talking about the issues of disarmament or peace.
They were not addressing them at all.
They were ignoring them.
By the time the campaign had finished,
disarmament had become the central issue.
We even had the spectre of the Liberal party leader,
the conservative party leader,
talking about how strong his record on disarmament was.
So, in that sense, I think we've achieved a great deal.
We're very very very happy with it, we've got a long way to go,
but we've certainly upped the anti in Australia,
as far as the nuclear debates are concerned,
and that was the aim of the exercise.
A lot of people out there who had not
heard any politician or any political figure
speak about disarmament,
speak about the arms race,
talk about what government should do
and what government actions should be undertaken,
were surprised and excited to have someone speak in that way.
I think that we did get a lot of votes from young people
who were disillusioned and disenfranchised
and feel like politics doesn't mean anything for them
and were sick of living under the shadow of the bomb,
but at the same time it's very clear to us that we got
a great deal of support right across the board.
Because I was out there, saying my bit,
and people were responding to it.
The important thing about the nuclear disarmament
party in my candidature was this;
we have inherited a nuclear world.
Australia is as much a part of the nuclear world
as west Germany, or the United Kingdom, or America is.
We host American bases here,
we allow the Americans to use our ports and our airfields,
for the landing and service of their nuclear-powered and
nuclear-weaponed ships, and we are part of an alliance
which is involved in and has nuclear war
fighting strategies in with it.
And so consequently, I think many Australians weren't aware of this.
I think that many people in other parts of the world
weren't aware of how heavily nuclearised the Pacific has become,
and what a crucial role Australia plays.
And we found out yesterday that our based called
Pine Gap here provides the central communication
link between the new spy satellites which the
Americans are intending to place over Russia
at the end of next month.
Obviously, this makes it a very very high priority target,
and that's now admitted by the Americans.
But the point of the matter is this:
this nuclear spectre is starting to haunt us wherever we are.
People can no longer think about going to New Zealand,
or Australia or Tasmania to get away from it,
because we're just as much a part of it as the rest of the world is.
I think Australians now recognise this,
and I hope they're going to do something about it.