I am proud to support the “STOP LIVE EXPORT” campaign. It’s leaders exemplify all that is noble in the compassionate Australian heart. This campaign is a moral, courageous and a litmus test of our decency, the North Star of Australia’s moral compass.

60 years ago, I arrived in Australia on my own as a teenage boy. No parents, no money, no education. Nothing.

What I knew about the country I learned from a library book. I instinctively loved the country from afar.

When the wide eyed boy arrived, Australia was in the throes of changing her Fiat currency, the Pound, to the decimal currency, the dollar. The naïve boy believed differently. Australia’s real surrogate currency was not the Dollar – but Decency.

Australia didn’t pretend to be rich, smart, or powerful.

She just presented the open face of Decency.

It was a sweeter time. A time when decent Australian citizens simply asked their governments to do good.

Sadly, today we are forced to publicly demand that politicians stop doing evil.

O tempora. O mores.

“Live Animal Export” is not an “industry”. It is a shameful atrocity.

Terrified innocent Australian animals, born on Australian soil, are dragged onto death ships, and transported across thousands of miles of heavy seas, to the Middle East and elsewhere.

Imprisoned in cramped, claustrophobic, steel racks, they will endure gruelling hardship, nauseating sickness, heat, thirst, filth, and disease. They will watch as thousands of their fellow victims die enroute, their bodies callously chucked overboard into the sea. And they are the lucky ones.

And when our tragic animal survivors finally arrive at these hell holes they WILL be tortured and killed. Each individual sentient Australian animal WILL suffer an agonizing, terrifying death at the bloodstained hands of brutal, knife wielding strangers. And it WILL be another nail in the coffin of Australia’s reputation.

These are the facts. Anyone who defends this hideous atrocity is indescribably cruel, blindingly ignorant or deliberately obtuse.

Isn’t it ironic? Our Australian history books tell touching stories of young Australian soldiers in the Middle East at the End of WW1. They refused to leave their faithful horses behind, choosing instead to take that last sad and lonely walk with their beloved horses out of sight, and end their lives with a bullet in the brain from a service revolver.

And where did all these tragic, sad scenes take place? In the same places that this cruel trade is sending tens of millions of Australian animals to their agonizing deaths. For 30 pieces of silver.

Can you think of a more humiliating betrayal of a nation’s trust? Can you tell me, and tell me the truth, can you think of a more egregious betrayal of trust?

I have invested many millions of dollars in 850+ humanitarian projects in over 58 countries around the world. Every penny I invested in the Bassatine Government Slaughterhouse in Cairo to reduce cruelty on Australian animals was utterly wasted. The cruelty is as vile as ever.

I have seen atrocities that would terrify and disgust the most battle-hardened Australian soldier. I am a prisoner of what I know. And a victim of what I have seen.

I have learned from experience that the “Good” will do the “Best” they can. The “Bad” will do the “Worst” they can. But for Good people to do Evil things, it just needs ignorance and greed. Traits this grubby trade possesses in abundance.

The Australian historian Donald Horne said we are the “Lucky Country”. Prime Minister Bob Hawke said he wanted us to become the “Clever Country”. Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser lamented that “Australia is the “Cruel Country”.

But I say, “Because of our vile Live Export Trade, all around the world we are known as the “Anything for a Buck Country””.

While progressive nations were developing intelligent industries in science, aviation, aerospace, Artificial Intelligence, research, computers, engineering, and clean energy, our grasping, idle, cheaply bought politicians bragged about Australia’s economy riding on the sheep’s back.

Isn’t it time we grew up and learned to walk on our own two feet? To use our brains to create rather than our brawn to kill? We can no longer be a nation of factory farmers and bloody quarrymen.

Every industry in our economic history has undergone rationalization; Mining, Airlines, Banking, Automobiles, Steelmaking, Retailing, Insurance, Transport, Textiles, Clothing, Footwear, and Forestry.

But this grim trade demands they be given preferential treatment, protected like a sacred cow, demanding privileges to which they have never been entitled. It has to go. And go it will.

Sadly, we still have the “Squatter” mentality.

When I listen to the haunting chords of Waltzing Matilda, I wish the swagman had kicked the squatter’s backside, chucked him into the billabong, nicked his thoroughbred and run off with Matilda. Australia would have been a wiser, richer, kinder and sustainable country.

Our first atrocity wasn’t “Live animal Exports”. It was “Live animal Imports”.

Foisted on us with the same thoughtless brutal, and cruel mindset by the same myopic, boorish constituency which contaminated us with us feral cane toads, European carp, rabbits, foxes, pigs, deer, camels, brumbies, donkeys, dogs, cats, and cruelty. And if that is not enough, deforestation, climate change and the world’s worst record of species extinction.

So let us demand that all Political parties, Liberal, Labor and Nationals, simply grow a spine.

And ban this disgusting trade. Once and for all.

Let us remind them. They are not our economic masters. They are our political servants.

I asked one of my colleagues to telephone Mr. Rupert Murdoch to discuss Australia’s Live animal export trade. Rupert graciously invited him to attend the News Corp AGM in Los Angeles. Rupert also permitted him to ask a question on the open floor of this massive meeting and undertook to answer it himself.

What I say now may surprise you. True to his word – and full marks to him – Mr. Murdoch publicly and on camera condemned the live animal export trade. Unequivocally and unconditionally. The trade was cruel, and it did not measure up to the standards of his ethics. Full marks again. We must always give credit where it is due.

Shortly thereafter, one of his leading UK newspapers breached the most fundamental principles of decency, hacking the phone and invading the privacy of the family of a murdered child for commercial gain. Mr Murdoch stated that the newspaper did not measure up to his standards of his ethics. And he surprised the world with his decision.

He shut the newspaper down! The News of the World. Over 100 years of tradition. Gone. Not a moment’s hesitation!

So today, I call on Mr. Murdoch to again show the same strength of character and demand that his newspapers end their slavish endorsement of this vile trade. The very trade that he himself has already condemned. I also ask him to publicly castigate the cowardly politicians who ignore this vile cruelty to Australian animals.

At the Australian of the Year Awards, Dame Elizabeth Murdoch, his wonderful late mother, one of Australia’s greatest human beings, graciously put her name alongside mine on a public notice published by every major newspaper in Australia condemning the ghastly live animal export trade. So I have another question. Quo vadis, Rupert?

I call on every decent Australian citizen to get angry. And get a voice. Get active. And get organized. Tell every politician you elect. We can fire them as easily as we hired them. The game is up. There is no place for them in Parliament.

It is only when this entrenched barbaric cruelty has been confined to the garbage dump of history will we be able to truthfully say with pride our hearts those immortal words:

“Advance Australia, Fair”.

I can’t wait for that beautiful day to dawn.