STORY - "Trademark thoughts"
By Tracey Edstein

An issue that is raised frequently in conversation today is “work-life balance”. For the moment this elysian ideal is one that Mark Vaile is prepared to relinquish. As the Federal Member for Lyne, leader of the Nationals, Minister for Trade and Deputy Prime Minister, life provides variety, challenge a-plenty and opportunity – but not a lot of balance.

His wife Wendy and daughters Terri, Prue and Sarah accepted this a long time ago, and their support is one of the reasons that he has been able to maintain a punishing schedule with a degree of equilibrium. Balancing the various portfolios is a task in itself, not to mention the rest of life.

Mark and Wendy Vaile

Mark was raised in Wingham and then Taree and he has no desire to implement a ‘reverse tree change’. “Coming home grounds me – once the plane lands, there’s a perspective that can be missing in Canberra and other capitals, here and overseas.”

The position of Trade Minister requires overseas travel about once a month and any delusion of glamour wore off a long time ago. The night before the Aurora interview, Mark had spoken to the Sydney Institute, a conservative think tank dedicated to the principle of policy debate, about the potential of trade liberalisation to end world poverty. This is an issue close to his heart, and a practical reflection of the values that were part of his upbringing. Key aspects of a strategy for which he argues passionately include substantial foreign aid, free trade, debt relief and the necessity for good governance.

The Federal Government has chosen to increase significantly our contribution to overseas aid, with the focus on our nearest neighbours in the Pacific. While not all Australians will be comfortable with this decision, Mark feels that it is both a compassionate and just response to the inequities we see in nations not as blessed as Australia. Charity may begin at home, but it need not finish there.

Another plank of this approach is the freeing up of world trade, especially in agriculture, to allow countries of the majority world, often called the Third World, to take their place in the market. The obstacle to what seems like a just system is the protection that some nations insist on for their primary and secondary producers.

The consequence is that majority world countries with agricultural products to offer are unable to move beyond subsistence because they are limited in their ability to trade in order to improve their national income. “The World Bank has estimated that trade liberalisation would boost the world’s income by $US269 billion. Australian farmers would be huge beneficiaries, but at the same time, it would lift 140 million people out of poverty.”

Most recently in Geneva, Mark has argued for the liberalisation of trade at World Trade Organisation meetings and other forums. Debt relief, as promoted in the Jubilee Year 2000, is another aspect of the struggle to eradicate poverty. Here Australia has been proactive.

While Mark Vaile did not grow up on the land, he spent three ‘gap years’, before they were fashionable, jackerooing in regional NSW. Wendy’s family raised beef cattle so when the couple established their own stock and station agency and real estate business, each had rural experience to draw upon.

Understanding the concerns of men and women on the land and small business has stood Mark in good stead. A perennial concern is reminding the nonrural sector of the importance of the farming community, in good times as well as bad.

The proposed changes to industrial and workplace legislation have consumed a great deal of newsprint and occasioned much critical commentary, especially from Church representatives and groups. While Mark accepts the democratic right of all to have an opinion and express it, he feels that sometimes religious leaders claim to speak for their ‘constituency’ yet do not necessarily represent the views of their people. He is inclined to agree with John Howard that there is no one view that can be ascribed to Catholics, Anglicans and so on.

However, he admits unequivocally that on doctrinal matters like “abortion, stem cell research, euthanasia…” there is clearly expressed Catholic doctrine. In fact, the manifold literature available in his reception area includes a pamphlet titled “Love Them Both” offering pro-life support to pregnant women.

As a member of Our Lady of the Rosary parish, Taree, Mark has at times listened to homilies which addressed social concerns, conscious that fellow parishioners were gauging his reaction! He feels a need to be part of a worshipping community - “the Eucharist is obviously a key part of being a Catholic” – that goes far beyond the issues of the day. He regularly takes the opportunity, at party room level, to promote his views, often influenced by a faith perspective, but accepts that once policy decisions are made, his responsibility as leader of the Nationals and Deputy Prime Minister is to support government policy.

On the issue of proposed workplace reforms, he was quick to cite the reduction in unemployment which has occurred under the coalition government “from 11% to 5%, which in economists’ terms is full employment. However, we’re working to reduce it even more.” Since there is a shortage of skilled labour, he insists that the reforms are being proposed in a climate where labour is valued and has bargaining power, and that greater consistency and regulation will have benefits for employers and employees.

The issue of the fate of asylum seekers and refugees is one on which Mark feels that there is a tendency towards uninformed comment. “The fact that Australia accepts more refugees, proportional to population, than any nation other than Canada is rarely acknowledged.”

While he admits that people who take enormous risks to escape oppressive regimes and seek a better life for their children may have something to offer Australia, he insists that it is better for all concerned if official channels are followed. He reminds me that the time asylum seekers spend in detention centres has been significantly reduced and that the situation continues to improve.

A life in politics means relentless public scrutiny and little time to oneself. While Mark is adamant that no one enters ‘the game’ without knowing this, he takes exception when a Member of Parliament’s family is drawn into the fray. He finds it a great source of satisfaction that his daughters, two of whom are married while one is still at school, seem to have emerged unscathed.

When occasional leisure beckons, family comes first. Mark would rather participate in sport than watch, especially water and snow skiing. Musically he is drawn to the unashamed evangelism of U2. Perhaps his strong stance on eradicating poverty owes something to Bono’s Where you live should not decide Whether you live or whether you die? (“The Crumbs From Your Table” How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb 2004).

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