Prime Minister Kevin Rudd
Election NIght
7 September 2013
TRANSCRIPT

Geez, I thought we'd lost.

My fellow Australians, my fellow Queenslanders. And fellow members of the great Australian Labor Party. Today we have fought the good fight as the great Australian Labor Party. Tonight is the time to unite as the great Australian nation. Because whatever our politics may be we are all first and foremost Australian. And the things that unite us are more powerful than the things that divide us, which is why the world marvels at Australia. This country which can manage its political differences peacefully and conduct the most vigorous of debates peacefully and resolve our politics peacefully and with civility, that is why this country is such a great country.

And that in this marvellous tapestry of modern Australia, the mosaic of our multicultural nation that we fashion such unity out of diversity, therein lies the great Australian miracle.  Which is why we are all proud to be Australian.

A short time ago I telephoned Tony Abbott to concede defeat at these national elections.

As prime minister of Australia I wish him well now in the high office of prime minister of this country. Therese and I wish he, Margie and their family well in coping with the stresses and strains of high office that lie ahead. We know a little bit of what that is like.

And Therese and I look forward to greeting them at the Lodge early next week in the same gracious manner with which Mr and Mrs Howard welcomed us six years ago. I also wish his government well for the great and difficult challenges that now lie ahead for Australia.

Now I want to speak to Labor people and Labor supporters everywhere across Australia.

Geez, a couple more days we might have got there.

I know that Labor hearts are heavy across the nation tonight and as your prime minister and as your parliamentary leader of the great Australian Labor Party I accept responsibility. I gave it my all but it was not enough for us to win. I'm proud that despite all the prophets of doom that we have preserved our federal parliamentary Labor Party as a viable fighting force for the future.

And I'm also proud of the fact that, despite the pundits, we appear to have held every seat in Queensland.

I saw Sky News just before saying we're all gone, including me. Anyway.  I'm proud of the fact that we've held each of our seats in Queensland; I'm proud of the fact that every cabinet minister has been returned at this election.

And I'm proud that practically all other members of our executive have been returned as well.

But tonight, but tonight we have lost many fine Labor men and women from our parliament, and I would like to thank them personally for their courage and their unswerving commitment to our cause, to our party and to our nation.

Just as I would like to thank each and every one of you, the true believers of Australia, who have worked so hard this campaign for your unswerving commitment and to our cause and to our nation.

For our party and for our movement we have known defeat before, but I say this to you. Throughout our 122-year history we have always, always risen from defeat to renew our party with fresh vigour and with new ideas for the future. And we'll do it again.

Ben Chifley's light on the hill still burns bright across Australia. It is a flame that cannot be extinguished and while there's still breath in Labor bodies, strength in Labor sinews and hope in Labor hearts Ben Chifley's light on the hill will continue forever.

So in the time of rebuilding that lies ahead we must never lose sight of that clear and guiding light. For it remains the beacon of progressive politics for us all. It is what others have called the audacity of hope. Or, put more simply, our simple audacious belief that we can make our community and our country and world a better place for all, not just for some; for all, not just for some. And a progressive view of politics that says that we can believe that we can make this community a nation world of ours a better place than the one we inherited from our forebears. That's the progressive vision of the future.

Once again tonight I thank the good burghers of Griffith for their support.

It would be un-prime-ministerial of me to say Bill Glasson [LNP candidate for Griffith] eat your heart out, so I won't. The good people of Griffith, the good people of Brisbane southside, it is such a fantastic community and I thank them for their support. It is a truly marvellous part of Australia, and I thank them for again returning me as their local member.

For the rest of my parliamentary and ministerial team let me say a few words. I'd like to thank directly our deputy prime minister, Anthony Albanese.

Albo, for a Rabbitohs [South Sydney rugby team] supporter you've got a lot of support up here in Broncos land. I thank you, Albo, for your courage, your loyalty, your remarkable humour and your determination always to fight, fight and fight.

I'd also like to thank tonight our Senate leader, Penny Wong, for her strength. Rarely, Penny, do South Australians get that welcome up here. Mind you I'm married to one. I thank you, Penny, for your strength, your common sense and your friendship just as I thank your deputy, Jacinta Collins, for hers.

To the cabinet, the ministers and the parliamentary secretaries, I value your energy, your fighting spirit and your dedication and that of all your staff who have been out there supporting us all the way through.

To our branch members, our campaign workers and our volunteers, I thank you, the army of true believers.

I thank, too, our affiliated unions across the nation. For your solidarity with Labor's cause and for your formidable work in the field, you too are the heart and soul of our Labor movement, you too are part of the army of true believers.

To my prime ministerial staff, what a fantastic team. Bruce Hawker is here somewhere, a person who has worked on 40 Labor campaigns over the years, is a campaign veteran. Give him a round of applause.

Patrick Gorman who has been with me -.  And for a sandgroper from Western Australia has settled into Queensland remarkably well. Patrick, you've been with me for so long, I thank you for your loyalty, and sense of humour.

Jessica Bucovsky for managing my world. She's a Queenslander, by the way.

Fiona Sugden, my press secretary, who came back from her previous work with me as prime minister to join this cause of the last couple of months. Fiona, we love you. Three kids under three or four, how does she do it with a baby of six or seven months? Wonderwoman, that's what I say.

And also, of course, Corrie McKenzie who is here as my deputy chief of staff; Jim Murphy my chief of staff; the rest of my immediate team, Matthew Franklin, Eamonn Fitzpatrick and Maggie Lloyd, all all the other fantastic members of my staff, I love you all.

And for putting up with me, I really do thank you for that.

Finally, I'd like to thank also our national secretary, George Wright, and his incredible staff of 150 workers at campaign headquarters down there in Melbourne for all the work you have done, thank you, team.

My wonderful electoral staff led by Katrina Hicks, put your hand up, Katrina. And the whole electoral team, including my longest serving staff member Fleur Foster, out there in force today, you are a team of champions. Malcolm McMillan, the president of our FEC, Les Henning, its treasurer, all of our branch members in the Griffith FEC, you are marvels.

And finally, to each and every member of my family here, they are my life, my hope, my encouragement, my support and without them I could have done none of this. With them it has been possible. Therese and Marcus, to Nicholas and Zara, I love you all. Jessica and Albert were with us until only half an hour ago. Our bub, our granddaughter Josie, has come down with a fever. They're now off at the local hospital. That's life on the campaign. She would be here in spirit as 14 months old, the youngest young Labor member ever.

Friends, you have had a hard day, so let's bring this to a close when I say that throughout our history, we the Labor Party have been a party of hard heads and soft hearts. That is the genius of Labor, always attending to the tough questions of the economy and national security through war and through peace, through depression and recession, but never allowing our hearts to harden to those of our Australian family who are the most vulnerable. It is this combination which is the unique legacy of Labor. This is a great movement, and I salute the movement for its strength, its vitality and its future.

I have been honoured to serve as your prime minister and as your party's leader, but there comes a time when you know you've given it your all, and a time for the party to further renew its leadership for the future. For me, that time is now. So I will not be recontesting the leadership of the parliamentary Labor Party. The Australian people, I believe, deserve a fresh start with our leadership. I know this will not be welcome news to some of you, but my responsibility has been to maintain Labor as a fighting force for the future so that we can unite behind the next leader of our party.

I have taken this decision with a heavy heart, because I love this party, I love the movement, I love the values for which we stand, I love the vision we have for Australia's future, and I love the hard work of translating that into policies that make our future - disability care, medicare, denticare, the future, better schools, better hospitals. That's us; we do those things.

But the time has come for renewal. We've begun the process of party reform, including the process [inaud.] for the election of the leader so that in the future our leaders will be elected by a combination of 50 percent of you, the entire branch membership of our party, and 50 percent from the parliamentary members. This is the beginning of the democratisation of our party.

And I say this to party members right across this vast land of ours, Australia. In the future we must continue our party's reform, modernisation and democratisation to be the broad church we need to be to fully embrace our future.

Let me put it in these terms. We at our best are the party of the little guy.

By which I mean this. If you're a person out there who has a disability and you cannot work, then we support you  If you're a person out there who can't find a job, we support you; we support you to find a new job. If you're a person out there and work, we support you having decent work with decent pay and decent conditions. And if you're a little person out there, a young person, someone starting out, the little guy, who decides to branch out and form their own small business and turn it into a medium business and a big business, we're for you as well. We are the party of the little guy. Because it's from the little guys, the forgotten people of Australia, sometimes, that our nation's strength is built for the future.

So friends, you won't hear my voice in public affairs of the nation for some time. That is as it should be.

So to you, the Australian people, I thank you one and all for this opportunity to serve as your 26th prime minister of this nation Australia, one of the greatest countries in the world. I thank you all.