Dick Hamer: The Liberal Liberal

Dick Hamer was the Australian reformer who made Victoria a leader in social equality, the arts, and the environment. He and his government built the underground rail loop, decriminalized homosexuality, abolished capital punishment, and outlawed sexual discrimination in the workplace. Hamer and his team ended the demolition of the inner suburbs, preserved the best of the state’s buildings and landscapes, and set aside large areas of diverse ecosystems as national parks. Hamer was a different kind of politician. He was intelligent, fair-minded, courteous, and hard-working, and governed with the long-term interests of his people in mind. He never tried to manufacture issues or direct debates for short-term political gain. Victorians recognized this and elected him three times in a row as their premier—the last Liberal premier in Australia to have achieved this feat. He stands as the exemplar of important qualities in the Liberal tradition. Dick Hamer: The Liberal Liberal is the first biography to be written of this remarkable man, who so embodied a quality now lacking in public life: integrity.