23rd Parliament · 3rd Session
page 5
The House met at 3 p.m., pursuant to the proclamation of His Excellency the Administrator.
The Clerk read the proclamation.
Mr. SPEAKER (Hon. John McLeay) took the chair, and read prayers.
page 5
– I have received from His Excellency the Administrator a commission authorizing me to administer to members of the House the oath or affirmation of allegiance. I now lay the commission on the table.
page 5
page 5
– I have received a return to the writ which I issued on 27th October last for the election of a member to serve for the electoral division of Higinbotham, in the State of Victoria, to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Thomas Frank Timson, Esquire. By the endorsement on the writ it is certified that Donald Leslie Chipp has been elected.
Mr. Donald Leslie Chipp was introduced and made and subscribed the oath of allegiance as member for the division of Higinbotham, Victoria.
page 5
The Usher of the Black Rod, being announced, was admitted, and delivered the message that His Excellency the Administrator desired the attendance of honorable members in the Senate chamber forthwith. [Mr. SPEAKER and honorable members attended accordingly, and having returned] -
page 5
– I wish to advise the House that the Prime Minister and Minister for External Affairs (Mr- Menzies) left Australia on 21st February to attend the meeting of the Commonwealth Prime Ministers in London. On his way there, the Prime Minister had discussions with President Kennedy of the United States and, as Minister for External Affairs. presided at a meeting in Geneva of the heads of Australian diplomatic missions in western Europe and adjacent areas. On his return journey he will lead the Australian delegation to the Seato Conference to be held in Bangkok from 27th to 30th March. During the Prime Minister’s absence overseas I am acting in his stead, and the Attorney-General (Sir Garfield Barwick) is acting as Minister for External Affairs.
I also inform the House of changes in ministerial arrangements consequent upon the resignation of Senator Sir Walter Cooper as Minister for Repatriation on 29th December, 1960. From that date, Mr. Speaker, Senator Wade became Minister for Air and Mr. Osborne relinquished that portfolio and became Minister for Repatriation. The Minister for Repatriation will represent the Minister for Air in this chamber.
page 6
Motion (by Mr. McEwen) agreed to -
That leave be given to bring in a bill for an act to amend the Jury Exemption Act 1905-1950.
Bill presented, and read a first time.
page 6
– I have to report that the House this day attended His Excellency the Administrator in the Senate chamber, when His Excellency was pleased to make a Speech to both Houses of the Parliament. The Speech will be included in “ Hansard “ for record purposes.
The Speech read as follows: -
The Parliament has assembled to proceed with the nation’s business and to work to promote the best interests of the Australian people. My address to honorable senators and members to-day follows closely upon the death of the Viscount Dunrossil I am sure we all recall the genuine and universal sorrow expressed by Australians from all walks of life at the loss to the Crown and to this Commonwealth of a man who brought to his great office a notable dignity, a personal charm and a quality of mind which won our loyalty, our love and our deep respect.
We have just entered the tenth year of the reign of Her Majesty the Queen, a year in which we and all freedom-loving people hope that the great nations will make progress towards establishing more peaceful conditions throughout the world and towards the settlement of now unresolved differences. My Government will continue to try to promote steps towards universal disarmament under proper safeguards and in appropriate stages.
The Prime Ministers of the Commonwealth will meet in London this week. The dramatic movement towards independence for many people in the Commonwealth makes this meeting of the highest importance.
The policies of the new administration in the United States of America will have a profound influence throughout the democratic world, and ray advisers are in close touch with the United States Government. Our Prime Minister has already had the benefit of discussions with the President, Mr. Kennedy, and with the Secretary of State, Mr. Dean Rusk.
The problems of the people of Asia continue to be of great concern to my advisers, and they will maintain their efforts through the Colombo Plan and in other ways to promote friendship and understanding with them. My Government will continue to play its part in the South East Asia Treaty Organization and will support all efforts that promise to bring peace and stability to Laos.
My advisers will maintain the close relations now existing with several African states and in particular with the members of the Commonwealth of Nations, and will readily make a contribution towards the United Nations effort in Africa. They hope that during this year the United Nations will be able to take steps which eventually will lead to the building of a modern state in the Congo. The Government will co-operate with other members of the Commonwealth in a special plan to assist the economic development of Commonwealth countries in Africa. Our contribution will take t he form of bilateral technical assistance, the value of which will rise to £200,000 a year.
My Government will continue to work with the South Pacific Commission in promoting the social and economic advancement of the peoples of that area.
Under the current three-year defence programme, the re-organization and re-equipping of our forces continues in accordance with my Government’s long-standing objective of having highly trained and well-equipped forces available in an emergency. Units of the Australian Navy, Army and Air Force continue to serve in the British Commonwealth Strategic Reserve - an arrangement in which the Government of the Federation of Malaya concurs.
This year we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Royal Australian Navy. During the year two anti-submarine frigates will be completed under the naval construction programme. My Government has approved the acquisition of six coastal minesweepers and the construction of a new specialized survey ship in Australia. It has also decided that H.M.A.S. “Melbourne” will be equipped as a helicopter carrier when fixed wing Naval aviation ceases in mid-1963. Other aspects of the Naval programme are under consideration.
The Minister for Defence has announced the selection of the Mirage III aircraft as the future replacement of the Avon Sabre fighter aircraft of the Royal Australian Air Force. My advisers propose that the airframe and engines will be manufactured to a substantial extent in Australia. la the development of equipment to meet requirements of the Australian services we are receiving valuable co-operation from the United Kingdom and the United States. In spite of abandonment of the development of Blue Streak as a military weapon, the Long Range Weapons Establishment continues to have a heavy programme of weapon trials, and with United States aid is developing facilities for the observation of satellites and space vehicles.
In the economic sphere, it remains the firm aim of the Government to maintain soundly based national expansion, immigration and full employment.
Honorable senators and members will recall thai last year the Government adopted a series of measures designed to restore a better balance between supply and demand in the economy and to give greater stability to costs and prices. My advisers believe that those measures are having their intended effect. There is evidence that the pressures of excessive demand are beginning to abate and my advisers are confident that the action i hey have taken will be successful in setting the economy on a course of steady growth and progress.
My advisers have the state of the economy continuously under review and will take prompt steps to correct any untoward tendencies that might become manifest.
As has already been announced, the Government examined the impact of its economic measures on the motor and allied industries and decided that the sales tax on motor vehicles should be reduced to the rates payable on 15th November, 1960. Parliament will be asked to approve amending legislation with effect from 22nd February, 1961. in pursuance of the policy objectives announced last year, my advisers will introduce legislation to incorporate in the income tax law continuing provisions relating to the deductibility of interest as a business expense. This legislation will replace the interim measure enacted last year which applies only to the present year of income. My advisers will also inform the Parliament of the action they propose in relation to investment by life insurance companies and superannuation and provident funds in public authority securities.
The attainment of our national objective of expansion must go hand in hand with an expansion of our export trade. Positive steps are being taken to improve Australia’s external trading position.
In particular, it will be the aim of the Government during these coming months to obtain the co-operation of the States and of industry in a major effort to develop export capacity. My advisers wish to ensure that, subject to the need to continue the measures now being taken to combat inflation and to arrest the drain on our overseas reserves, important new facilities will be available to assist production for export. It is the intention that the whole programme of national development should be given a marked orientation towards the expansion of export production.
Further measures will also be taken abroad to increase export income, both from our traditional exports of primary commodities and from the sale of manufactured goods. The Government will continue to assist in trade promotion and in the negotiation of trade and commodity arrangements. It will devote attention to both new and existing markets and will strengthen the Trade Commissioner Service, not only in established overseas markets, but also in new areas, such as the Middle East and South America, where trade prospects exist. My advisers will give further encouragement and support to the tourist industry from which important exchange earnings are expected.
My advisers have also been considering taxation measures as a means of increasing exports. Legislation is to be introduced to amend the Export Payments Insurance Corporation Act to empower the Corporation to give cover to certain transactions which are at present outside the scope of its authority, but which the Government may consider should be covered in the national interest.
The Government continues to follow closely the movement towards closer economic integration in Western Europe, including in particular the implications of such a move for Commonwealth trading relations. The attitude of my advisers has been, and will continue to be, based upon Australia’s trade and other interests.
My advisers have taken an early opportunity to arrange with the new New Zealand administration for close and frequent consultation in trade matters. In conformity with its policy of developing close and friendly ties with countries in South East Asia, the Government has, over the past twelve months, renewed its trade understanding with Ceylon, and its trade agreement with Indonesia. The trade agreement with the Federation of Malaya is due for review later this year.
My advisers will continue their efforts to encourage industry to promote greater efficiency, and are pleased at the degree to which productivity groups are being formed in particular areas and branches of industry. Australia continues to have few industrial disputes and the record during 1960, although less satisfactory than during the three preceding years, was nevertheless better than in any other year since the critical early war years.
The development of Australia’s mineral resources is of high importance, both as an earner of foreign exchange and as a stimulus to the development of isolated areas. My advisers are continuing to encourage mineral development, including in particular the search for oil. My Government believes that the modification of the control over the export of iron ore should promote exploration and discovery of new sources and lead to increased reserves of iron ore for future use in the domestic steel industry. It will produce a useful addition to export income.
There is a continuing expansion in the petroleum refining industry and in associated plantsfor the production of petro-chemicals. More than one hundred million pounds is being invested in work in progress or planned for completion in the next few years. f understand that total rural production in 1960-61 is expected to be a record, although wool production at sixteen hundred million pounds will be a little below the record of the previous year. In response to a request from all Australian wool growing organizations, the Government has appointed an independent committee to enquire into our wool marketing methods. A record wheat crop of two hundred and thirty-six million bushels has been delivered and sales of wheat overseas are highly satisfactory. However, adverse seasonal conditions abroad are partly responsible for this and the long-term problem of wheat marketing overseas remains.
There is an attractive market overseas for meat, and for beef in particular, and efforts are being made to stimulate production to take advantage of the marketing opportunities. My advisers have appointed a committee of inquiry which is investigating the sugar and fruit industries and their relationship to each other.
In the Territory of Papua and New Guinea elections will take place shortly to the reconstituted and enlarged Legislative Council. Native Papuans will then for the first time choose representatives on the Council, from their own people. New Departments of Labour, and Trade and Industry have been established in the Papua and New Guinea Administration demonstrating the increasing emphasis being given by my Government to training for employment and to the encouragement of industrial development, marketing and trade promotion.
In the Northern Territory my Government will introduce a scheme to assist pastoralists and agriculturists in the development and improvement of water supplies on their properties. Also within the Northern Territory, research into cattle disease and the most suitable fodders is continuing. In Nauru, particular attention is being paid to the vocational training of Nauruans.
Work on the Snowy Mountains scheme continues to be ahead of schedule and the Upper Tumut development is close to completion. Future activities will be directed primarily to the southern sector in the Snowy-Murray development.
My advisers inform me that the construction programme at the Atomic Energy Commission’s Research Establishment will soon be completed and we look forward to fruitful and beneficial results for the concentration on research work which will then be possible.
As foreshadowed in the Governor-General’s Speech to Parliament in March, 1960, my Attorney-General has been examining the possibility of Commonwealth legislation to protect free enterprise against the development of tendencies to monopolies and restrictive practices in commerce and industry. The AttorneyGeneral has so far progressed in his investigation of this matter, and the Government has developed its thinking to the stage that consultation with the States will now be advantageous. Accordingly, the Government has commenced discussions with the governments of the States, and will continue these discussions in an endeavour to evolve suitable legislation to operate over the whole area of trade and commerce in Australia.
My Attorney-General will re-introduce a bill to replace the law relating to marriage and associated questions on a uniform basis throughout Australia. Considerable progress has been made, in co-operation with the State governments, towards drafting a model uniform companies bill. The Commonwealth and the States are discussing a possible uniform law of adoption. The report of the committee appointed by my Government to consider the law of copyright will be presented to the Parliament and will be made available for public discussion before decisions are taken about legislation. Also, after opportunity has been given for public discussion, my Government will bring down a bill to amend the Patents Act so as to make long-range provision as to the time for publication of complete specifications lodged in support of applications.
A bill to establish the Supreme Court of the Northern Territory by statute rather than by ordinance will be introduced at an early date, and the Parliament will be asked to consider a bill to amend the Electoral Act.
My Government has decided to seek an amendment to the Customs Tariff (Industries Preservation) Act to provide better safeguards against dumping of goods on the Australian market at unfair prices.
My advisers keep the whole structure of social services under review. The revised means test for age, invalid and widows’ pensions is now in operation.
The importance of immigration in Australia’s development is recognized by my Government and it will proceed with its vigorous programme.
My Government has initiated discussions with the States about arrangements to be made when the current housing agreement with the States expires in June next. I am advised that more than 90,000 dwellings were completed in Australia during 1959-60.
The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization continues to make important contributions to the solution of many national problems and a considerable part of the organization’s resources is devoted to problems associated with the development of Northern Australia. The recruitment of scientific man-power presents difficulties.
Acting on the advice of the Australian Universities Commission, my Government is proceeding with a three-year programme of Commonwealth and State aid to universities from 1961 to 1963 involving expenditure of the order of £100,000,000. The Universities Commission is now examining the most desirable pattern of development for tertiary education. My advisers have increased the number of new Commonwealth university scholarships offered each year from 3,000 to 4,000.
My advisers are co-operating in a review of the present state of knowledge of the life, culture and history of the Australian aborigine. A conference sponsored by the Social Sciences Research Council will meet shortly to take the first steps in this direction.
Further recognition of Australia’s standing in international aviation is given by the decision of the International Air Transport Association to hold its annual general meeting in Sydney in October next. Australia’s own international airline, Qantas, has carried an increasing share of the record air traffic to and from Australia.
The building programme in Australian shipbuilding yards is being supported by my Government’s subsidy on the construction of ships and my Government has itself contracted to purchase three lighthouse supply vessels. Within the next twelve months, the conversion to standard gauge on the Melbourne-Albury railway and the erection of a special explosives pier in Corio Bay should be completed.
Australia is co-operating with the United Kingdom, Canada and New Zealand in the construction of a submarine telephone cable to link Canada with Australia and New Zealand. Arrangements are in hand for the extension of national and commercial television services to thirteen provincial and country areas in New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland and Tasmania.
The Post Office is faced with a heavy and continuing demand for its services and is proceeding with a number of major projects designed to increase the efficiency of our postal, telephone and telegraph communications. The telegraph service has now been mechanized to a large extent in all States.
My Government has considered the recommendations of the committee appointed to examine the basis on which the commercial accounts of the Post Office should be prepared. A revised form of Post Office commercial accounts for the year 1959-60 will be presented to the Parliament shortly.
I spoke earlier of the need to develop quickly this country’s capacity to export. National development has always been a major objective, and indeed an achievement of my advisers. As a further contribution to national growth and the development of exports, the Government is considering some important specific development proposals, and will co-operate with the States concerned in detailed planning so that, as circumstances allow, actual construction may proceed without delay. The projects under particular and sympathetic consideration are road development in the north; improved port and loading facilities to assist the coal export trade; standardization of important railways in South Australia and Western Australia; and proposals to stimulate the search for oil and minerals generally.
I now leave you to discharge your high and important duties, in the hope that your deliberations and determinations will enjoy the guidance of Divine Providence.
page 9
Motion (by Mr. McEwen) agreed to -
That a committee, consisting of Mr. Chipp, Mr. England and the mover, be appointed to prepare an Address-in-Reply to the Speech delivered by His Excellency the Administrator to both Houses of the Parliament, and that the committee do report at the next sitting.
page 9
– A little over a month ago, honorable members were all deeply grieved to learn of the sudden death of the Governor-General, Viscount Dunrossil. He had just completed twelve months as Governor-General of the Commonwealth. Lord Dunrossil is the only Governor-General to have died in office. He was a man of great distinction and immense experience, whose qualities and character were always apparent. His passing is all the more regrettable because his term as Governor-General promised to be amongst the most illustrious.
Lord Dunrossil came to Australia with an exceptionally wide background of public service and with a fund of experience and knowledge which made him a happy and successful choice as the chief executive of the Commonwealth. A Scot by birth, he served with distinction in the First World War, was wounded in action and decorated for bravery. He later read for the bar and was called to the Inner Temple in 1923. He took silk in 1934 and became a member of the governing council of the Inns of Court in 1951. He was created a Privy Counsellor in 1936.
William Shepherd Morrison was a member of the House of Commons for some 30 years, including many years of stress and of war. He served in various ministerial offices in United Kingdom governments and played his part in the United Kingdom mobilization for the Second World War. Our late Governor-General served as Speaker of the House of Commons from 1951 until 1959 and many of us in this chamber had the privilege of witnessing his distinguished conduct in that high office. He will certainly be remembered as one of the great Speakers of the House of Commons. He was created Viscount Dunrossil in 1959.
It was with that background that this very able, good and cheerful man came to us as Governor-General, and it is in that capacity as the representative of Her Majesty in Australia that we remember him now. Lord Dunrossil, by his strength of character, his good humour, his kindness, his consideration for others and his wisdom, won the respect and affection of all Australians who met him and of the people at large. However, just as we were getting to know him well, this good man was taken from us. Lord Dunrossil was a delightful person, a thoughtful and cultured man and a sincere and conscientious Christian gentleman. He was a true Scot with a dry humour that will be well remembered by the many friends he made in his long and distinguished career.
As Governor-General, he carried out his duties with dignity and forcefulness of purpose and in the fine tradition of those who had preceded him. During his short term as Governor-General, he and his wife visited all the States, the Northern Territory and the Territory of Papua and New Guinea. Lord Dunrossil was determined to get to know this country and to meet its people. I am sure he succeeded in doing that. It is a tribute to him that during this brief period he became known and respected everywhere - in the big cities, in the country centres and certainly in the outback. Lord Dunrossil gave us a wise leadership and displayed a great understanding of, and sympathy with, this country and its Territories.
To-day I pay tribute to Viscountess Dunrossil also. As wife of the GovernorGeneral, she served this country well and was a source of inspiration and encouragement to her husband. We are grateful to her and we remember, in particular, the readiness with which she assumed her husband’s public duties when he was indisposed. We will never forget her courage and her great dignity at the time of her bereavement. She will always remain deep in our affection.
William Shepherd Morrison had been a close and valued friend of our Prime Minister (Mr. Menzies) for many years. The Prime Minister is not with us to-day, but he has asked me to associate him with my remarks and with the resolution that I shall shortly propose.
Tributes to our late Governor-General have come from every quarter of the Commonwealth and from his former friends and associates in the United Kingdom. This is, however, the first opportunity this Parliament has had to ‘honour his memory, and it is fitting on this opening day of the session that we should record formally the feelings of this House. Our loss is felt personally by all of us. I move -
That this House records its profound regret at the death of His Excellency the Governor-General, the Right Honorable Viscount Dunrossil, P.C., G.C.M.G., M.C., K.St.J., Q.C., and expresses its deep sympathy to Viscountess Dunrossil and family in their sad bereavement.
– Mr. Speaker, T support the motion that has been proposed by the Acting Prime Minister (Mr. McEwen). I support, too, all that he has said in tribute to the memory of Viscount Dunrossil. Like every other honorable member, I regret the circumstances that have obliged us to address ourselves to such a motion. This is, indeed, a very sad occasion. About this time last year, Viscount Dunrossil, recently appointed Governor-General and recently arrived from Great Britain, opened the second session of the Twenty-third Parliament of the Commonwealth. Now, on the very day that the third session of the same Parliament is opened, we proceed to place on record as a House of Representatives our profound regret at his sudden and unexpected passing, and our deepest, heartfelt sympathy for his widow and four sons and his other relatives in their great and irreparable loss.
This is an historic occasion, as the Acting Prime Minister has said, because we lament the departure from this life of the first Governor-General of Australia to die in office. Indeed, I think this is the only time that this House has ever placed on record its sympathy with his relatives when any person who has at one time or another been the Governor-General of the Commonwealth 01’ Australia has died.
Viscount Dunrossil’s qualities of mind and heart and his services to his country in war and peace have been attested to in eloquent and touching eulogies and panegyrics in this country and in Great Britain since his death and burial. In the brief space of one year in which he held his high office, the late Governor-General gave further evidence of all those splendid qualities for which he was so well and so favorably known. He and his devoted wife - to whom the Acting Prime Minister has paid a warm and touching tribute with which I am sure every honorable member will agree - travelled this country and its Territories widely and constantly. They spared no effort to become acquainted with Australia and Australians and the native peoples of the Northern Territory and New Guinea. Lady Dunrossil was certainly a great helpmate to her distinguished husband, and her services, as the Acting Prime Minister has said, are deeply appreciated and greatly admired by all Australians.
Had the late Lord Dunrossil not been so generous in accepting arduous engagements, and had he considered his own physical limitations and conserved his energies more, his death may not have come within but one year of his arrival in this country. We shall always remember him for his great devotion to duty as he saw it, and as we saw him discharge it in this land to which he came in the evening of his days, only to die among us all too soon and to find rest until Judgment Day in the oldest churchyard in the capital of the nation, situated on a sloping hillside within sight of the nation’s Parliament. May peace be to the ashes of the Right Honorable William Shepherd Morrison, first Viscount Dunrossil and fourteenth Governor-General of Australia, and may Australian clay lie lightly on his noble Scottish breast.
– The Prime Minister (Mr. Menzies) has paid his public tribute to the memory of our late Governor-General, Lord Dunrossil, and, as the Acting Prime Minister (Mr. McEwen) has told us, has asked to be associated with this motion of condolence. It is his wish that I should also associate the members of the Liberal Party with the motion, and it is certainly the wish of my colleagues that we do so. We have been touched by the many tributes from all parts of Australia and all sections of our people which flowed in when news of the sudden and tragic death of the Governor-General came to us. This is the occasion on which the Parliament formally pays its tribute. While in a sense the motion is a formal one, it lacks nothing in sincerity from those of us who had learned to respect and admire our late GovernorGeneral. We mourn together the loss of a most able and distinguished representative of the Queen, who died amongst us while still actively performing his duties in her service.
A sense of loss is to be expected when one serving in high office is taken from us before he has had the opportunity to complete his term, but our sadness goes deeper than that. Viscount Dunrossil was not with us long in this country, but he had quickly attracted to himself the respect, the admiration and indeed the affection of the Australian people. He possessed a rare combination of qualities. He had high intellectual capacity yet a warm, easy friendliness of manner. Australians from the outset gave their typical Australian judgment of him - “ He is a good bloke “ - and that was the general verdict. Wherever he went he moved with a natural dignity and distinction of appearance, and his speeches, delivered in a warm, resonant Scottish voice, reflected the man and were admirably suited to their occasion.
We in the Parliament pay our tribute for ourselves and for the people of Australia whom we represent; but to Viscount Dunrossil, we as men and women in this Parliament give a special recognition as a parliament man. He was one of the most distinguished parliament men of his time. He had success as a back-bench member of Parliament and as a Minister in the Mother of Parliaments, but he crowned his work there by presiding as Speaker for more than eight years. When he left, he was acclaimed as one of the most notable in a long line of distinguished House of Commons Speakers, men who have made the Mother of Parliaments a model, moulding democratic processes throughout our Commonwealth and influencing the democratic movements of the world. When he left the Parliament, he could have rested with his honours thick upon him, or he could have continued his public service in some much less exacting post; but with a typical cheerfulness and courage, he took up the task of the Governor-Generalship of this country. He responded again to that strong sense of duty and public service which had characterized his long public life, and accepted a new and demanding assignment in the high office of Governor-General of Australia.
He was no stranger to Australia. Some of us can still remember his visiting here after the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association Conference in New Zealand in 1950. However, despite such earlier visits, it is not easy for a man who has reached the period of his retirement from one high and active office to translate himself into another country, into strange surroundings, meeting new people and accepting the obligation of long aad arduous travel. The task of representation may look easy to the casual bystander; we in this place know something of its stresses.
To-day, we add our tributes to his honoured memory. The Parliament would wish, as the Acting Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition have done, to add its tribute to his lady, Viscountess Dunrossil. We were conscious from the outset of her gentle charm, but as we got to know her more closely in her hours of deepest grief, we discovered a strength of courage and a sensitive, imaginative intelligence. Australians will not forget her thoughtful gesture in the gracious decision that Lord Dunrossil shouldrest in the land he had come to know so well. She has our respect, our admiration and our affection.
We hope that Lady Dunrossil will take comfort from the honour done here and abroad to her late husband and from the companionship of her family of fine young sons. The bearing of those who were with her at the time of the simple but impressive ceremonies here in that glorious Australian setting reflected their splendid parentage and the proud race from which they come. The grace of the best qualities of Viscount Dunrossil is so manifest in the family of
Dunrossil. We hope, too, that Lady Dunrossil will take comfort in the knowledge that in the history of this young country there will be honour and gratitude to Viscount Dunrossil and his lady.
– Before putting the motion, I should like to inform the House that on 3rd February I sent the following telegram to Lady Dunrossil at Government House: -
Respectfully offer to you and your family the sincerest sympathy of myself and the Members of the House of Representatives in the tragic death of your husband. He will be sadly missed by all of us.
I received from Lady Dunrossil the following reply: -
I would like to thank you for the message of sympathy you have sent from the members of the House of Representatives and yourself. Our sons and I are greatly comforted by your thought for us at this sad time.
Question resolved in the affirmative, honorable members standing in their places.
page 12
– Mr. Speaker, as a mark of respect to the memory of the late Governor-General, I move -
That the House do now adjourn.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
House adjourned at 4.2 p.m.
Cite as: Australia, House of Representatives, Debates, 7 March 1961, viewed 22 October 2017, <http://historichansard.net/hofreps/1961/19610307_reps_23_hor30/>.