Gary Ware was a CAFCA member from 2014 until his death in 2018. He joined as a result of attending my Tauranga public meeting during my 2014 national speaking tour. That was the only time we ever met. During his years of membership, he was a generous donor to CAFCA and he also donated several hundred dollars to the CAFCA/ABC Organiser Account, which provides my income. MH.

Pharmacist & NGO Volunteer

Gary was what you might call a casual and non-active member of CAFCA, however, his reading of Watchdog often led him to take action on the issues raised, be it through writing Letters to the Editor of the local Bay of Plenty Times, challenging acquaintances, or financially supporting different actions that were far from Tauranga but dear to his heart. Gary was born in Te Kuiti on 28th May 1938 and shifted to Tauranga two years later. In 1959 he qualified as a pharmacist, having been apprenticed to his father Es Ware. In 1966 he established his own pharmacy, Brookfield Pharmacy, where he worked until he retired in 2013.

Initially working on his own, staff gradually increased and when he sold his business there were over 20 full and/or part-time staff. He had a flexible staffing policy, being an early adapter of job-sharing. Some of the women employed in this manner remained with him for 20 years. Three of the adjacent shops at Brookfield had also been incorporated into the business, including PostShop. The latter was seen to be a service to the area, which included Tauranga City Council pensioner flats, rather than a viable business. With two others, Gary established Pharmacy Wholesalers Limited, a drug-buying cooperative servicing Bay of Plenty pharmacies.

In 1970 he joined Lions International, a membership he retained for about 15 years. During that time, he held every executive position. In 1971, he became President of the Tauranga College Old Pupils Association, a position he retained until 2017. During this time, he led the organisation of the 25th, 50th, 60th, 65th and 70th college reunions with over 300 attendees at each weekend celebrations.

In 1994 Gary was appointed a Justice of Peace. As well as regular Justice of the Peace duties he was rostered for JP clinics at the courthouse and responding to call-outs for people admitted to Tauranga Hospital under the Mental Health Act. He was Treasurer of the local Forest and Bird Society, to which he had been a long-term member and was rostered on to pest eradication lines at both Aongatete and Mauao. In 2012 he became a foundation member of Tauranga Closing the Gap, an organisation based on the research by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett concerning the effects of inequality on the wellbeing of society as a whole. With this group, he managed to persuade the Tauranga City Council to pay a Living Wage to all their employees, a six-year battle.

In 2002, he and wife Marlene, embarked on the first of six assignments for Earthwatch, a scientific organisation that involves volunteers collecting data for their research programmes. The assignments were in Costa Rica, Kenya, Peru, the French Alps, Hudson Bay (Canada), and Waterton National Park (also in Canada). In 2016 he joined Food Rescue, a part of Good Neighbours, collecting excess food from supermarkets, sorting and redistributing to some 55 local charities, assisting struggling families whilst reducing such produce going to landfills.

For recreation, Gary enjoyed the outdoors. He introduced his children, grandchildren and a great grandchild to the pleasures of skiing, joining with them annually, usually at the Tauranga Ski Hut. He and Marlene, keen back country trampers, hiked most of the Great Walks as well as many rather more challenging routes, both in Aotearoa and overseas. Kayaking was given away when the combination of old shoulders, wind and tide conspired against this activity.

Amnesty International Fundraiser Extraordinaire

But his most enduring passion was for human rights. In 1981 Reverend David Taylor, a long-time member of Amnesty International, retired to Tauranga. He became a customer at Gary's Brookfield Pharmacy. In typical activist style, David soon alerted Gary to his membership of Amnesty International. Gary was at a stage in his life where he had established his business, and there was this urge to do something compassionate to make the world a better place. He had observed the activist involvements of his family in the environment, feminist, anti-racist and peace movements, none of which really appealed to him. They probably appeared to be a trifle too radical for this fairly conservative family man. Amnesty International was the answer and Reverend David Taylor was the conduit.

For a compassionate person who believes in social justice and human rights, the persistent onslaught of the violence and torture, the degrading treatment of prisoners of conscience and the indifference to this, can be debilitating, depressing and make taking action seem just too hard. A way to bring balance into, and maintain a commitment to action, for human rights, is to have some fun. Gary was pretty good at this.

In 1986, about five years into his membership, he decided to initiate a one-off Sunday afternoon of music which combined two of the passions in his life, human rights and jazz. This first concert raised $300, with the cost of the tickets being $8. Concert goers were able to have mulled wine and hot soup and buns. The comparative success gave the small Tauranga Moana Amnesty International group the incentive to try again.

Now this was prior to fundraising concerts becoming part of the charity fundraising scene that is so apparent today. Very soon, though, the musos were lining up to be part of what became an annual event, responding to the friendly persuasion of one of the local musicians, Chris Gunn. From out of town there was Suzanne Lynch (one of the Chicks), Larry Morris, Shane, Ritchie Pickett, and Ray Columbus in the line-up, along with local bands such as Kokomo Brilleaux and the Trevor Braunias Trio.

In 2003, after a visit to St Mary's School by Gary's Co-Chair, the indomitable Dolores Edge, the School choir composed an anti-war song, "Stop the War in Iraq" and performed alongside the notable musicians. Another time, in 1994, Lady Linda Young from New Orleans had the Bureta Trust pub really rocking and Ritchie Pickett wore a dress, endeavouring to win the trophy for the most outrageous performance.

About 20 years after the first concert, tickets cost $25 and $6,500 was forwarded to head office. Eventually concert-organising fatigue set in, other charities/NGOs' concerts became competition and the time for such an event for the Tauranga Moana Amnesty International group was over. But in the words of Lou Reed, rock star: "Rock and roll to me, is a statement about energy and freedom. Therefore, it has a direct relationship to Amnesty International - the most astonishing group I've ever been involved with". Through rock and roll and these jazz concerts, many Tauranga people became aware of Amnesty International's commitment to freedom and human rights. I think Gary, and maybe all of us, would concur with Lou's expressed sentiment.

AI National Treasurer

On the national scene, Gary very soon became a member of Amnesty International New Zealand executive, followed by a stint of, if I remember correctly, ten years as volunteer Treasurer. In this role he very carefully kept on eye on the finances, a quality that the executive knew, maybe too well. This might be exemplified in the annual hui, held in this particular instance, in Christchurch.

Brian Edwards, who at that time fronted the Saturday morning programme on RadioNZ, was the after-dinner guest speaker. AI was the only NGO that he supported. He waived his speaking fee for Amnesty International but requested that he had a comfortable bed (this was at the YMCA) and a quality dinner. At the pre-dinner socialising, he was in a stimulating conversation with a small group, including members of the executive, Gary and yours truly.

We were the last to approach the buffet table. The local group, maybe conscious of Gary's tight rein on finances, had in their wisdom, organised a simple dinner which comprised, for each person; one chicken drumstick, one stuffed potato, a couple of club sandwiches, a piece of cake and some fruit. Unfortunately, this was not conveyed to the AI members who had been working very hard at the hui, and had very healthy appetites.

By the time we approached the buffet, all that was remaining was a couple of stuffed potatoes, a few club sandwiches and some fruit. Brian was very gracious, and took his seat. A newly appointed staff member, who had been part of the tardy group, walked around behind Brian on the way to his seat. As he did so, he caught his foot on the leg of Brian's chair, and his glass of wine emptied over the guest speaker. I wonder if Brian retained his AI membership.

On the international scene his frugality as kaitiaki (guardian) for Amnesty International members, was apparent. In this role, he was required, with the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and three other staff, to attend international meetings every two years. On this occasion, the ten-day meeting was to be held in Ljubljana, Slovenia. Being responsible for making the travel arrangements, and being a very careful holder of the purse strings, after much research he found the best deal to fly NZ to Slovenia.

The route, with a few hours' stopover at each place, went from Auckland to Sydney, Sydney to Singapore, Singapore to Bangkok., back to Kuala Lumpur, Kuala Lumpur to Dubai, Dubai to Munich, and eventually across to Ljubljana. This took about 48 hours. The usually bright and vivacious CEO suffered from jet lag and she was unable to surface for several days into this very important meeting. Gary's popularity with the AI staff declined markedly and maybe this is why Amnesty International soon after decided to hire professional staff.

These anecdotes might give you a bit of a feel for some of the lighter moments that, Gary believed, kept Amnesty International members committed when dealing with the injustices, the lack of freedom, the torture and the degrading treatment of prisoners of conscience. It is important to celebrate any successes Amnesty does hear of and build some fun into the important work done for human rights

AI Tribute

This is an excerpt from the address by Margaret Taylor at the Amnesty International New Zealand Hui, May 2019 when the Gary Ware Legacy Award For Human Rights was announced. Today I would like to pay tribute to a man who shared a birthday with Amnesty International - May 28. Every day of the decades of service Gary Ware gave to Amnesty and human rights as a member of the Tauranga Moana group, within multiple terms as the Treasurer on our Governance Team and in representing us at national and international meetings he was Amnesty's best friend, the most generous of colleagues and the kindest of men. Gary was the man who

• As our Treasurer invested a bequest Amnesty received into our first paid fundraiser which stabilised our then shaky finances, saw us successfully trial an annual street collection and our direct mail programme which continues to generate hundreds of thousands of dollars;
• He was the man who came to every meeting with his trusty folder that allowed him to effortlessly present on issues, detail complex spreadsheets and keep colleagues on task;
• He was the man who resolutely urged Amnesty NZ to spend money on our important campaigns, on the resources and people we needed to bring those campaigns home and to make sure we were investing in our youth members;
• And he was the man who at the end of an annual hui or governance team meeting would be the one to shout you a drink, share a joke or provide a non-judgmental ear;
• With the Tauranga Moana team he co-led with Dolores Flynn Edge he hosted annual concerts that also generated funds and fun; stood on streets rattling a bucket for Amnesty; hosted stalls, was the local media spokesperson and outreached and fostered any number of school groups;
• It sounds like Gary was all about the money but actually for Gary it was never about the money. It was always about the human rights impact he wanted us to have and his skills ensured he was the best money man an NGO could wish for to deliver on our campaigning promises.

Last year (2018) Gary Ware died - doing what he loved - attending to trees on Mauao, Mt Maunganui. I asked how could we honour and remember a man who had done so much for Amnesty International so that he would be remembered by and inspire future generations. The family, in accordance with Gary's values, gifted a legacy to fund human rights Innovation for young activists. This programme will focus on fostering creativity and backing young people to test out campaign and action taking ideas that could change the human rights landscape for the better, not just in Aotearoa/NZ but globally.

This established the Gary Ware Legacy Award For Human Rights in perpetuity. Gary felt it was a privilege to belong to the Amnesty International whanau. A final thought to keeping activists committed; in the words of Elie Wiesel, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate: "The greatest evil today is indifference. To know and not to act is a way of consenting to these injustices. The planet has become a very small place. What happens in other countries affects us".

DARCE CASSIDY

- Murray Horton

This is from my 2015 Organiser's Report: "In 2014, I was contacted out of the blue by an Australian expatriate filmmaker in the US regarding a never finished film of the 1974 Long March (by bus, I might add) across Australia to a former US military base (North West Cape, Western Australia). A number of New Zealanders, including me, took part in this and it provided the inspiration for the 1975 South Island Resistance Ride, the event which led to the creation of what was first called CAFCINZ (now CAFCA)".

"We put a small sum of $US into the film and screened it at CAFCA's 40th anniversary celebration, in 2015. Dealing with the Aussie expat also led me to getting back in touch with an old Australian friend (a veteran of both the Long March and the Resistance Ride), with whom I'd lost all contact since the 80s". That old Australian friend was Darce Cassidy, who died in May 2019, aged 77.

Long March & Resistance Ride

The Long March was a truly epic event. When I went on it, I was Editor of Canta, the University of Canterbury student paper, and I wrote several lengthy articles about it. But none of those are online. The best place to learn about it is on the Website that Jan Smith, Darce's widow, has set up in his memory. You can watch the film there. Darce was the narrator.

That film, a fascinating time capsule of the 1970s' Australian radical Left, really was a rediscovered treasure. Jan Smith e-mailed me: "I thought you would be interested to know we played a shortened version of the Long March film at Darce's celebration of life. People clapped; many had never seen this footage before". I was touched to discover on Darce's Website that Jan has thanked me for my help and included links to the sites of CAFCA, Watchdog and the Anti-Bases Campaign (which wasn't founded until more than a decade after the Long March). Darce was one of the Aussies who came on the Resistance Ride.

Here's an extract from my article "SIS Spied On CAFCA For Quarter Of A Century" ( Watchdog 120, May 2009): "So, we had at least one spy in our membership from the 1970s to the late 90s, inclusive. Indeed, the very earliest batch of reports in the file, relating to the period leading up to and including our foundation activity, the 1975 South Island Resistance Ride, indicates that there may have been more than one, as those earliest reports include features such as complete reproduction of minutes of our meetings (held at the former Resistance Bookshop and Action Centre) and the full two page list of names, addresses and phone numbers of all Resistance Ride participants ( including Australians". Emphasis added).

"At the bottom it reads: 'Please note: This list has been compiled from the original addresses given to CAFCINZ for the Resistance Ride...'. The Resistance Ride was the subject of extensive State surveillance. The most recent material we have received from the SIS (NZ Security Intelligence Service) is a collection of Police surveillance photos taken during it and supplied to the SIS for identification purposes".

When in Christchurch for the Resistance Ride, Darce stayed with me and my then partner, fellow CAFCINZ founder Christine Bird. Before going home, he became quite unwell and we were concerned that he had contracted something in our rather downmarket flat. It turned out to be hepatitis (I don't know of what particular strain) and we were relieved when he told us that it would have already been in his system before he came to NZ.

We stayed with Darce in Melbourne on at least two occasions in the 70s and 80s that I can remember, plus I made solo visits. In those days I was a Railways worker and one of the international perks of the job was free interstate rail travel around Aussie (not only free but it was also first class, meaning a sleeper), and I travelled the length and breadth of that huge country several times by train, with bus travel filling the gaps, quite often on political business.

Darce was a great host. He had a lovely Melbourne home (he had a well-paid job with the State radio network), he loved entertaining, he was a great cook, he dressed well, and he was fond of a cigar (which I've also been known to enjoy in years gone past). It was on one of those trips that he told me how Jon Cassidy came to be called Darce Cassidy. "I was a bit of a larrikin, so people started calling me Darce after Darcy Dugan" (Dugan was "an Australian bank robber and New South Wales' most notorious prison escape artist". Wikipedia).

It's that Aussie fascination with the outlaw and the bushranger, arising from its convict history. Speaking as a quarter Australian, with a convict in my family tree, I get it. But New Zealand has a different white settler history and respectable middle-class people tend not to rename themselves after notorious criminals as a badge of honour. It's definitely an Aussie thing.

Freedom Ride

My last memory of him was when he dropped Bird and I off at Melbourne's interstate railway station in his white Mercedes. That was in the 80s and we had no further contact until 2014, when the film of the 1974 Long March put us back in touch again. We made up for lost time and had a flurry of correspondence. Most fascinatingly, he sent me his audio documentary of the 1965 Freedom Ride through western New South Wales, on which he was both a participant and radio journalist.

This is an extract from an obituary co-written by his widow Jan Smith: "He was a participant in the Freedom Ride, a bus tour which exposed endemic racism towards indigenous people in rural Australia. During the journey through western NSW there were several heated confrontations, including a life-threatening incident when the bus was run off the road. Cassidy took along a recorder, documenting the discrimination of local whites towards their indigenous neighbours".

"The ultra-conservative ABC (Australian Broadcasting Commission, now Corporation) management censored these tapes, but he kept them until they were broadcast on Radio National many years later. He often revisited the towns along the Freedom Ride's itinerary to support indigenous peoples' fight for equal rights" (Sydney Morning Herald, 12/7/19, "Jon Cassidy: Journalist And Leader Of Radical Organisations"). A very detailed account, written by Darce himself, is on his Website.

I've listened to the audio documentary and it's a bloodcurdling confirmation of the vicious racism towards Aborigines that I've seen for myself in my travels through rural Australia. It ends abruptly, because one of the white racists got Darce in a headlock and cut the cord between his tape recorder and microphone. ABC broadcast it in 2015, to mark the 50th anniversary.

I went to Melbourne in 2017, for the first time since 1988, to speak at an Australian peace movement national conference. But I was saddened not to be able to see or contact Darce whilst there. It was only after he died that I learnt why - he'd been suffering from Alzheimer's since 2011. As I've said, it was the contact with the expat Aussie filmmaker in the US about the long-lost Long March film that put me back in touch with Darce.

Equally, it was Darce's death that put me back in touch with Ken Mansell, a former leading Australian anti-bases activist, who wrote the below obituary of Darce. Ken came on the Anti-Bases Campaign's very first Waihopai spy base protest, in 1988, and stayed with me in Christchurch. Later that same year, I stayed with Ken and Dora in Melbourne, on my way back from my second protest trip to North West Cape, and we had some political adventures in Melbourne. 2019 marked my first contact with Ken since then. Every cloud has a silver lining.

DARCE CASSIDY (1941- 2019)

Journalist, Agitator, Organiser

- Ken Mansell

Republished, with permission, from Labour History Melbourne. The full obituary, with endnotes, can be read here Ed.

Jon (Darce) Cassidy was probably not meant to become one of the foremost Leftwing agitators of his generation. Jon's upbringing was privileged. His father Ralph Cassidy, tragically killed on Royal Australian Air Force service in 1942, was a barrister from a poor Irish background tinged with "Orange" sectarianism. His mother Audrey Cassidy scrimped and saved to send Jon to the elitist (and anti-Catholic) Sydney Church of England Grammar School ("Shore").

As a student Jon would drive his uncle, Sir Jack Cassidy (the Rightwing Vice-President of the Liberal Party), and media magnate Sir Frank Packer to play tennis at the Royal Sydney Golf Club. Nevertheless, living in Cammeray in the fifties, in a by now downwardly-mobile middle-class family, Jon began to reject the narrow-minded ethos of both his home life and school. Symbolically perhaps, he embraced a new name - Darce.

Rapid Evolution To Political Left

Darce experienced his entry to Sydney University (as a Law student on a Repatriation Department Scholarship in 1960) as a liberation from a restricted background, and particularly enjoyed mingling with Catholics. His service (1960-63) in the Sydney University (Citizen Military Forces) Regiment belied his rapid evolution to the political Left. He attended his first-ever political demonstration (the Martin Place rally against the 1960 Sharpeville massacre in apartheid South Africa), and joined the New South Wales Association for Immigration Reform, becoming a speaker against the White Australia Policy.

He read the magazines Dissent, Outlook, and Nation; and listened enthralled to Bertrand Russell and other likeminded speakers on television. From late 1961 to 66 Darce set the standard for committed activism as a member of the Sydney University Australian Labor Party (ALP) Club. It was Darce who made (from his parents' wooden clothes line) and lit the petrol-doused fiery cross that turned a 1964 Commem Day prank in central Sydney into a sensational protest against US racial segregation (50 people were arrested).

Long Career In Respectable Journalism

Darce had joined the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC; Commission is now Corporation) as a trainee journalist on 10 March 1964, the start of a long career in respectable journalism. In the ALP Club, he began his long parallel career in disreputable "guerrilla journalism", a term he coined to describe the cheeky and irreverent style he learned from Pat Mackie, whose underground "roneo" machine had evaded the police at Mount Isa*. Assuming the editorship of the ALP Club's scurrilous weekly news sheet Wednesday Commentary, Darce would type the stencil in ABCTV's Four Corners office and rush to a fellow activist's home to use the Sydney Left's only gestetner machine (Watchdog began life in the 70s being printed on a gestetner. Ed.).

NSW Premier Sir Robert Askin opined: "It's the filthiest thing I've ever seen on paper - it makes 'Lady Chatterley's Lover' look like a very modest publication indeed". In February 1965, while employed on Four Corners, Darce and his tape recorder joined the Freedom Ride to Walgett and Moree (western NSW), organised by Student Action for Aborigines. He soon found the ABC only wanted to bury his tapes, meaning his now famous Freedom Ride documentary was not aired until 1978. Darce later returned to Walgett, conducting organising work at great personal risk. *Pat Mackie was a New Zealand miner and unionist, who gained national attention as the leader of the Mount Isa Mines strike of 1964. Wikipedia.

Darce was transferred to Melbourne by the ABC in September 1966 and worked on This Day Tonight (TV current affairs show). A chance meeting with the Monash Labor Club President, who Darce had first met at an Australian Student Labor Federation Conference (Adelaide, May 1966), prompted the establishment of Jasmine Street, an off-campus political and social centre for the Labor Club in Caulfield, with Darce as front man with the landlord, and genial host at Friday night parties and Sunday night dinners.

Darce enrolled part-time at Monash and his influence was soon apparent. The outrageous style that had marked Wednesday Commentary began intruding into Print, the Labor Club's re-named news sheet with Darce's phrase "political power grows out of the barrel of a gestetner" emblazoned on its masthead. The Labor Club President and Cassidy (the Editor) were soon called before the Vice-Chancellor.

When the Labor Club satirised the award of a Monash doctorate to Victorian Premier Sir Henry Bolte, the students, with Darce officiating as MC, conferred the degree on a pig. The ABC transferred Darce temporarily to Canberra in mid-1967. He completed his Politics unit at Australian National University and joined its Labor Club, then engaged in collecting aid to the National Liberation Front (routinely referred to as the Viet Cong by Western media during the 1960s and 70s' Vietnam War. Ed.).

Leading Melbourne Activist

Darce returned to Melbourne in February 1968 and bought No. 1 Shirley Grove, East St Kilda, which doubled as the de facto headquarters of the Monash Labor Club throughout the heady year of 1968, the gestetner in the laundry being used for both Print and the high school "underground" leaflets of Students in Dissent. Darce was instrumental in establishing The Bakery, a political centre in Greville Street, Prahran, catering for the Monash Labor Club and the Revolutionary Socialists organisation, and thereafter (1969-71) held the show together, collecting the rent, fronting the landlord, organising the meetings, editing Half-Baked.

He was active in the Vietnam Moratorium of 1970-71, an organiser of the Worker-Student Alliance (WSA) formed at The Bakery in 1970, Production Manager of WSA's organ Struggle, a member of the clandestine Young Communist League (YCL), a member of Red Eureka Movement, a pioneer of Community Radio (3CR), and one of the principal organisers of the six busloads that undertook the 1974 Long March to North West Cape. Darce received death threats when his name and address appeared on a leaflet celebrating the throwing of Nazis into the Yarra River, and WSA members guarded the house.

In 1971 Darce was the subject of a sustained Rightwing media attack accusing him (and WSA) of "terrorism". A Democratic Labor Party question in the Senate led to an in-house ABC investigation and his eventual exoneration (ironically by the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation. ASIO's taps on Darce's phone revealed that he was "not a terrorist but a revolutionary Marxist").

Darce led the 1977-1982 campaign to wrest control of the ABC Staff Association from the Rightwing. In 1989 he was appointed South Australian State Manager (Radio). After retiring, he acted as spokesperson for both Save Our SBS (Special Broadcasting Service) and Friends of ABC, and was on the board of Ethnic Radio 3ZZZ. In his last years, before succumbing to Alzheimer's, Darce Cassidy joined the Australian Greens and fought for the rights of refugees. He was the man with the silver pen and the heart of gold. He is survived by his wife of 35 years Jan Smith, their son Michael, and his daughter Anna (from an earlier relationship). RIP Darce.

BOB HAWKE

Faithful Servant Of US Empire

- Murray Horton

Bob Hawke, Australia's 1983-91 Labor Prime Minister, who died in May 2019, aged 89, was lionised in the mainstream media obituaries as a dinkum Aussie bloke, with a dash of loveable rogue. In fact, he was as authentic as Crocodile Dundee or a three dollar note. He certainly had charisma and the gift of the gab. I only ever saw him in action once, addressing a big open-air central Sydney rally in 1975 during the political crisis that accompanied the bloodless constitutional coup that overthrew Gough Whitlam's Labor government.

Hawke drew roars from the crowd when he told a ribald story involving Queensland's then Premier, the revolting Joh Bjelke-Petersen. Hawke was the then President of the Australian Labor Party (having risen there from being head of the Australian Council of Trade Unions). My obituaries of both Gough Whitlam and his Tory usurper, Malcolm Fraser, can be read in Watchdog 138, April 2015.

This is not an obituary of Bob Hawke, that is best left to the Aussies to write. Although I did receive one obituary that was remarkably concise and damning. It reads, in its entirety: "Yellowcake Bob - Dead At Last. Leave Him In The Ground: High Priest of Uranium Mining; Long-time friend of Australian Capitalism; Servant of the Bourgeoisie; Associate of the CIA; Appeaser of the 1975 Canberra Coup; Obscurantist agent of US military bases; Fake ocker extraordinaire; Wrecker of the Australian Trade Union Movement; Deregulator without equal; Advocate of the corporate state". I can't do better than that.

I'll stick to the bits of Hawke's Prime Ministership that are relevant to New Zealand and the concerns of CAFCA. Whitlam was overthrown in 1975 because he was starting to assert an independent foreign policy and act "contrary to the interests of the US", Australia's imperial master. Hawke, Labor's next Prime Minister (he defeated Malcolm Fraser) made no such mistake.

There was no more devoted servant of US imperialism than "dinkum Aussie" Bob. He came to power promising an inquiry into ANZUS (the Australia, New Zealand, US military treaty that was the foundation of all New Zealand's defence and foreign policy from its inception in 1951 until the US, under President Ronald Reagan, kicked us out in 1986. It remains in force today, but only between the US and Australia). The inquiry was duly held and pronounced ANZUS to be the best thing for Australia since they started putting beer into cans. End of discussion. He renewed the leases on the vital US bases at Pine Gap and Nurrungar (the latter has gone but Pine Gap is still one of the most important US spying and warfighting bases in the world).

Here's a quote from Counterspy, June-August 1984 ("Rightwing Subverts Australian Labor", Joan Coxsedge): "A recently leaked secret defence strategy policy document is causing acute embarrassment to the Hawke Labor government because it shows just how close Hawke's thinking is to Reagan's. This secret policy, acknowledged to be far more Cold War than that of Hawke's conservative predecessors, totally accepts Pentagon-CIA strategy for the Pacific region".

"Ignoring poverty and all the other problems in the region, it sees the entire world in terms of super-power rivalry. It repeats the US Rightwing myth about Soviet superiority in nuclear weapons, and urges that Australia should move more closely towards having nuclear weapons of its own. The policy offers unlimited support for the US war machine to the extent of harbouring US nuclear-armed and nuclear-armed aircraft... ".

"The document states that, in some naval exercises in the Indian Ocean, Australian naval ships are under direct US command. The entire document not only ignores Australian Labor Party policy but goes in a totally opposite direction. It expressly opposes our policy for a nuclear free Pacific... It is best summed up in the way it describes Australian participation in the US alliance as the 'status to comment in Washington on any moves that we consider detrimental to our security'".

Trans-Tasman Bully

Hawke, in partnership with Reagan, went to great lengths to try and bully the 1984-90 NZ Labour government out of going nuclear free. It can be argued that what made New Zealand nuclear free and out of ANZUS was much more the blundering heavy-handedness of the American and Australian bullies than any visionary leadership by David Lange, the Prime Minister who gets the credit.

I can attest that this foreign bullying backfired, from the experience of my own family. My late father was no supporter of either Labour or David Lange. He voted National at every election from 1960 until 1996 inclusive and routinely referred to Lange as "that fat bastard". But he was outraged by the attempts by Reagan and Hawke to bully NZ back into line. The old man's view was summed up as: "I didn't vote for this Government or this nuclear free policy, but it is the democratically expressed wish of the New Zealand people, so outsiders must accept that and respect our decision".

Hawke may have failed to stop NZ going nuclear free but he, and his Minister of Defence bully boy, Kim Beazley, did succeed in pressuring Lange's government to commit New Zealand to the cripplingly expensive Anzac frigates, despite overwhelming public opposition. They were painfully keen not to be seen as soft on defence. And, of course, it was that same "nuclear free" Lange government that approved the Waihopai spy base which, to this day, constitutes NZ's single most important contribution to the US military/intelligence alliance. Bob Hawke epitomised the bullying Aussie bullshit artist, doing the dirty work of the biggest bully, the US. He was no friend of the New Zealand people, let alone the Australian people.

My obituary of David Lange is in Watchdog 110, December 2005. And see "Fuck Ronald Reagan", by Bill Weinberg, in Watchdog 106, August 2004.