BY JIM McILROY
BRISBANE —
Former Labor senator George Georges died in Canberra on September 23 after
a long illness. He was 82. Georges was from a rare breed: an ALP politician
who stood up for his principles at the cost of his parliamentary career.
Georges was a fighter for human rights and for socialist ideas. He was jailed several times in the 1970s and '80s during struggles against the attacks on civil liberties and workers' rights by the reactionary regime of Premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen. Jailed during the right-to-march campaign of the 1970s, Georges refused to comply with a prison rule to salute the “sovereign”.
Georges was a founder and stalwart of the Rally for Peace marches, held every Palm Sunday for the past two decades. He was also a supporter of many progressive causes, including animal liberation in the later stages of his political career, before age and illness forced him into political retirement.
Georges opposed the rightward shift of the federal ALP during the government of Prime Minister Bob Hawke in the 1980s. He warned against the deregulation of Australia's financial system, was opposed to the Hawke government's decision to export uranium to France and criticised Hawke for failing to take on Bjelke-Petersen during the electricity workers' strike in the mid-1980s.
In 1986, Georges crossed the floor to vote against the federal Labor government's attempt to introduce a national ID card. He also refused to support the government's deregistration of the militant Builders Labourers Federation.
Georges was forced to resign from the ALP after this, and stood as an independent socialist candidate for the Senate in the 1987 federal election. Although unsuccessful, the campaign was a model in drawing together a wide spectrum of progressive supporters in a united left campaign.
Although he eventually rejoined the ALP in 1994, Georges continued to support left causes.
George Georges was a fighter for socialist principles. He will be missed.
From Â鶹´«Ã½ Weekly, October 2, 2002.
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