"The first thing to say is that the accounts do show that Australia is in a recession. The most important thing about that is that this is a recessio… - Paul Keating

"The first thing to say is that the accounts do show that Australia is in a recession. The most important thing about that is that this is a recession that Australia had to have." Press conference, 29 November 1990.

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About Paul Keating

Paul John Keating (born 18 January 1944) is an Australian politician who was the 24th Prime Minister of Australia from 1991 to 1996. As member of the Australian Labor Party (ALP), he previously served as treasurer of Australia from 1983 to 1991 and as deputy prime minister of Australia from 1990 to 1991. As Prime Minister, he won an "unwinnable" election in 1993. He left school at the age of 14, joined the Labor Party at the same age, served a term as State President of Young Labor and worked as a research assistant for a trade union. Elected to the Australian House of Representatives at the age of 25, he came to be seen as the leader of the Labor Right faction, and developed a reputation as a talented and fierce parliamentary performer.

Also Known As

Alternative Names: Paul John Keating The Honourable Paul Keating
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Additional quotes by Paul Keating

We have heard often since the last election the mantra that Australia doesn’t have to choose between our history and our geography. It appears again in the Howard government’s recently released White Paper on foreign policy. But just think about that assertion for a minute. What could it possibly mean? No choice we can make as a nation lies between our history and our geography. We can hardly change either of them. They are immutable. The only choice we can make as a nation is the choice about our future.

China is simply too big and too central to be ostracised. My point is that China is now so big and it is going to grow so large, it will have no precedents in modern social economic history.... we haven’t come to a point of accommodation where it acknowledges China’s pre-eminence in east Asia and the Asian mainland, in which case we can start to move towards a sensible relationship again with China.
The key point is – is the rise of China legitimate? Is taking 20 per cent of humanity – 1.4 billion people – from abject poverty something the world should welcome? And in our terms, it has completely remodelled the Australian economy. If we give China the recognition I believe it is due in terms of its legitimacy … then I think a lot of these issues, the so-called 14 points, sort of fall off the table.... We have no relationship with Beijing, so why would the Prime Minister of Malaysia or Singapore or Thailand talk to us about east Asia when we are non-speakers with the biggest power, the Chinese?

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