Civil liberties

The purpose of defence is to preserve the nation and its

freedom. It is just as much a part of a government's duty to
preserve and widen the freedom we defend. It is one of the
sure signs of the Liberal decline that there has been an erosion
of personal freedom, particularly in the last 2 years. In the
Liberal decline into illiberalism, they have become not only a
force for division but a force for repression. There has been
invasion of privacy, suppression of freedom of speech in public
streets, attempts to deprive citizens of the right of trial by jury,
denial of freedom of conscience against military service.
We will introduce laws providing for protection of human rights
and civil liberties especially to prevent discrimination on the
grounds of colour, race, sex, religion or political opinion. We
will press for world-wide and regional implementation of
International Labour Organisation and human rights
conventions. The right to privacy will be protected by special
laws and vigilant administration to prevent interference with
postal, telephone and other communications.
The censorship laws will be altered to conform with the general
principles that adults be entitled to read, hear and view what
they wish in private or public and that persons and those in
their care be protected from exposure to unsolicited material
offensive to them. For the purposes of implementing these
principles a judicial tribunal will be established to hold public
hearings and give published reasons. The Commonwealth
laws for censorship of imported books, records and lms will be
altered to conform with these principles.
Public servants, who are now one in four of the work-force, will
be given the maximum possible freedom to exercise the civil
and political rights enjoyed by other citizens. Restrictions on
the freedom of expression of public servants and former public
servants will be reduced to the minimum necessary for the
conduct of affairs of state.
Trial by jury will be preserved and extended as far as can be in
all serious civil and criminal cases. We shall adopt from the
United States a Federal system of legal aid to ensure equal
access to the courts and benet of the laws.
Edward Gough Whitlam was
born 11 July, 1916. Whitlam
was Prime Minister of
Australia 5 December, 1972
to 11 November, 1975. He
was Leader of the Australian
Labor Party. Whitlam
represented the electorate of
Werriwa, NSW 1952 to 1978.
Extract from speech delivered at Sydney, NSW, on October 1st,
1969
by Gough Whitlam
Leader of the Opposition and the
Australian Labour Party