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Posts tagged as “John Howard”

Kim Beazley snr, Whitlam’s Education Minister, Dies, 90

Kim Beazley, the Minister for Education in the Whitlam Government, has died, aged 90.

Kim BeazleyBeazley served as the Minister for Education from December 19, 1972, until the government was dismissed on November 11, 1975.

He was responsible for the implementation of iconic Whitlam policies, including the abolition of university fees and needs-based funding of schools.

Kim Edward Beazley, born on September 30, 1917, succeeded the former Prime Minister, John Curtin, in the Western Australian seat of Fremantle, at a by-election on August 18, 1945. He held the seat until he retired at the 1977 election. When first elected, he was the youngest member of the House of Representatives, aged 27.

Howard Defends Kerr

On the 30th anniversary of the dismissal of the Whitlam Government, the Prime Minister, John Howard, has again defended the actions of the then Governor-General, Sir John Kerr.

Speaking on ABC radio, Howard said: “It was a product of the clash of political wills between two sides of politics and they knew that at the time and this retrospective attempt to paint John Kerr as the dark evil doer of terrible deeds has just been so unfair and one of the great historical distortions of my life.”