Kevin Rudd discusses Simon Crean’s legacy on ABC Radio

Transcript of interview on 774 ABC Radio Melbourne

Sammy J: Let's take a breath now because there's a different event happening this morning in Melbourne. It's a state funeral, for former leader of the Labor Party and Cabinet Minister Simon Crean, who died in Berlin last month. There'll be a whole host of people returning here to Melbourne to pay tribute to Simon and one of them is our freshly installed Ambassador to the United States and former prime minister, Kevin Rudd, who joins us now. Good morning, Kevin. And what a sombre reason for you to return to Australia.

Kevin Rudd: I came back to Australia just last night from the United States and I see here, in Melbourne, it's a sad and rainy day. And for those of us who have come from the Labor movement, it's indeed a deeply sad day when Simon Crean has been taken from us just far too early in his early 70s. And so we will be gathering at St. Paul's Cathedral to farewell, a courageous son of the Labor movement, a great servant of the Australian Parliament, and someone who also spent more than a decade of his life as an Australian government minister as well. So it is for us a genuinely sad day.

Sammy J: Politics, as we know, can be a hotbed of allegiances, ambitions, supporters, enemies. Does that for dissipate on a day like today? Is it something of a reunion for your fellow colleagues?

Kevin Rudd: Well, the thing about the Australian Labor Movement and its history is that we respect, deeply, people who give their lives to it. Because, in Simon's case, to have thrown your lot in for more than 20 years, as a leading official of the Storemen and Packers' Union, the Australian Council of Trade Unions, on the board of the International Labour Organization in Geneva, before going into the parliament itself, everyone takes deep breath, whatever agreements or disagreements have happened in the past and we come together to celebrate and commemorate a life which has been well lived and Simon could have gone on as a law and economics graduate from Monash University here in Melbourne and earned a motza out there and the business community, he chose not to - he chose to serve working people. So we come together to honour that fact. And I think all disagreements on a day like this are well and truly put to one side.

Sammy J: Kevin, we know, we've heard the stories of former leader Kim Beasley and Simon Crean both playing an old Parliament House as kids. How far back does your relationship go? What are your earliest memories of Simon?

Kevin Rudd: I certainly remember Simon from the 80s when he was president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions. In those days, I was Chief of Staff to the state parliamentary Labor Party and later Premier Wayne Goss. And so that's where my first associations with Simon came about. But then subsequently, when I was elected to the Parliament, he was always there as a source of counsel, of an open door, encouraging, concerned about the big policy debates at the time. And then, when I became leader of the Labor Party myself, there was Simon always with friendly advice, friendly suggestions. And then when we formed government as, I've got to say, an extraordinarily productive Minister for Trade. What I remember most about Simon was simply always a positive attitude, not just to critique of what was going on, but always an alternative voice on a better way forward. And that is much rarer in political life. Often you find people who can tell you ten things about what's going wrong. Ask them how to do it differently, and they slink quietly into the corner. That was not Simon's approach. He always had an alternative idea.

Sammy J: Well, the state funeral happening at St. Paul's Cathedral this morning here on, yes, an appropriately rainy and cloudy day here in Melbourne. Kevin Rudd, I'm sure you've got much business to attend to as well both here and when you return back to Washington so very much appreciate your time paying tribute this morning. Thank you and take care.

Kevin Rudd: Thanks for having me on your program.

Sammy J: Kevin Rudd, former prime minister and our current ambassador to the United States ahead of Simon Crean's state funeral there.