Olive Zakharov
Encyclopedia
Alice Olive Zakharov was an Australia
n politician. Zakharov was elected as an Australian Labor Party
member of the Australian Senate
relatively late in life, in 1983.
Former Senator Graham Richardson
, a leader of the party's right faction, once stated that Zakharov "[worked] hard on social issues in the chamber, but [hid] her light under a bushel far too successfully". She was re-elected in 1984, 1987, and 1993, and was in the midst of her final term in the Senate when she was killed in an automobile accident in early 1995.
, Melbourne
. She studied psychology as part of an arts degree at Melbourne University, where she joined the local branch of the Communist Party of Australia
, something which she later discovered had brought her to the attention of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation
. She briefly married while at university, but the couple separated in 1949, and she soon moved to Yallourn
to live with a new partner, unionist John Zakharov, who she later married and began a family with. As a young woman, she juggled her family commitments with a number of jobs, working as a market research interviewer, clerk, waitress, mail officer, psychiatric nurse, and pathology
assistant. She also continued to be politically active, being involved in the local branch of the Australian Labor Party
.
In 1968, after the last of her children had reached primary school, Zakharov separated from her husband, and later divorced him, though she retained his surname. She proceeded to raise her children alone, and in 1969 began as a student welfare co-ordinator at Montmorency Secondary College in Melbourne. She served as president of her local party branch, and was a delegate to the party's state conference. She was offered a safe Labor seat in the Parliament of Victoria
in the 1970s, but declined for family reasons.
to run as a Labor Senate candidate in Victoria at the double dissolution
1983 federal election
. She received the fifth position on the Labor ticket, and easily swept into parliament in the landslide Labor victory, taking the final position well ahead of her nearest rival, Democrat
John Siddons
. She soon established herself as a loyal member of the Socialist Left faction and as an advocate for equal rights for women and the rights of the disadvantaged. This early advocacy for progressive causes brought her the second ever Australian Humanist of the Year award in 1984. Due to having won the tenth spot in 1983, Zakharov was forced to face election against the following year, but was once again comfortably returned. Once asked why she had begun a political career so late in life, Zakharov compared herself to marathon runner Cliff Young
and stated, "Late runs can be very successful."
Throughout the 1980s, Zakharov remained a loyal member of the party, but made her voice heard on a number of issues. She was the lone voice of dissent when the other five members of the Senate Select Committee on Video Material urged the banning of X-rated videos in 1984. Two years later, Zakharov and Senator Rosemary Crowley
opposed legislation against scientific experimentation on human embryos that had been proposed by conservative independent Brian Harradine
. The remainder of the select committee set up to evaluate the proposal supported a compromise majority report that severely limited scientific experimentation; in a high-profile dissenting report, Zakharov and Crowley urged that the parents of the embryos have the final say as to how they were used, and were highly critical of the absolute pro-life arguments employed by the majority. While the report was overlooked by the government at the time, it was later largely adopted by the New South Wales Law Reform Commission. Zakharov also remained involved in her local community; she used her political connections to help save her historic neighbourhood in Port Melbourne
from demolition, and at one point painted "NOT FOR SALE" on her roof in order to promote the message.
In 1988, Zakharov was the only Western politician invited to witness the first destruction of nuclear weapons at a ceremony in the Soviet Union
after the signing of a disarmament agreement. Upon returning from Russia, she described the occasion as "the chance of a thousand lifetimes". Four years later, she joined a crossbench group (along with Labor's Chris Schacht
, Bruce Childs
and Margaret Reynolds
and the Liberal Party
's Baden Teague
) to become involved in the international campaign to free jailed Israel
i scientist Mordechai Vanunu
.
While Zakharov did speak out on several key issues, she remained bound by the principles of party discipline. In 1988, she was critical of the proposals that became the Higher Education Contribution Scheme while they were in caucus
, although she promptly dropped the matter when the majority supported the changes. This again occurred with planned price increases to various Medicare
services in 1992, when Zakharov used her position as chair of the Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs to cut committee hearings short, to the chagrin of the opposition parties. She did, however, manage to win some small concessions through the committee's final report, and somewhat embarrassed Deputy Prime Minister
Brian Howe
in the process.
One of the strangest moments in Zakharov's career occurred in late 1990, when, as a member of the parliamentary Australian Security Intelligence Organisation
committee, she was given access to her own intelligence file. She was not surprised to discover that ASIO had shown interest in her membership of the Communist Party while at university; what she was not prepared for was a detailed investigation the organisation had made in 1963, after becoming concerned that John Zakharov was a bigamist. A less-than-impressed Zakharov speculated at the time that the contents of her file may have cost her at least one public service position during the 1970s.
In June 1992, the Labor Party proposed legalising the entry of gay and lesbian people into the armed forces. Zakharov had always been a strong supporter of gay rights, and successfully nominated for the investigating committee. The proposed changes were strongly opposed by then-Defence Minister Robert Ray
and later Opposition Leader Kim Beazley
. Zakharov helped push the proposals through caucus, to see them become law not long afterwards. She also publicly opposed discrimination against gay parents.
In the leadup to the 1993 federal election, there was some speculation that Zakharov would be dropped from the Labor ticket due to her mild manner and low media profile. She lost the second position on the ticket to factional powerbroker Kim Carr
, but secured the third position against several challengers, including former lower house MP David McKenzie. Labor was not expected to do well at the election, and it was thought that Zakharov was likely to lose, just as Carr had done from the same position at the 1990 election. However, she retained her seat, fending off challenges from Democrat
-turned-independent Janet Powell
and Nuclear Disarmament Party
-turned-Democrat
Robert Wood
in the general election.
In November 1993, Zakharov publicly revealed that she had been a victim of domestic violence at the hands of her deceased husband for ten years prior to their separation. She launched the government's Campaign to Stop Violence Against Women, and urged other victims and their neighbours to speak up. She said at the time that she had kept silent because "There were no alternatives. There were no refuges for women, no supporting parent's benefit and almost no child care. I made the break when my youngest was old enough to go to school so I could work."
road after leaving the Midsumma
gay and lesbian festival. She lay in a coma for more than a month, but did not regain consciousness. While she was in hospital, the Coalition arranged a pair, so as not to take advantage of Zakharov's injuries in a closely divided Senate. Having never regained consciousness, Zakharov died on 6 March. No charges were laid regarding the accident.
Upon her death, the Senate adjourned early and several red roses, the symbol of the international socialist movement, were placed upon her desk as a mark of respect. More than two hours of condolence speeches were delivered in parliament, and after her funeral on 30 March, a memorial plaque was unveiled in the courtyard at Parliament House
. Deputy Prime Minister Brian Howe attempted to convince the state Kennett
government to save the historic Missions to Seamen building in Port Melbourne, which Zakharov had been fighting to save, as a memorial to her, but was unsuccessful. A memorial to her in a park in Bay Street, Port Melbourne was unveiled in March 2002.
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n politician. Zakharov was elected as an Australian Labor Party
Australian Labor Party
The Australian Labor Party is an Australian political party. It has been the governing party of the Commonwealth of Australia since the 2007 federal election. Julia Gillard is the party's federal parliamentary leader and Prime Minister of Australia...
member of the Australian Senate
Australian Senate
The Senate is the upper house of the bicameral Parliament of Australia, the lower house being the House of Representatives. Senators are popularly elected under a system of proportional representation. Senators are elected for a term that is usually six years; after a double dissolution, however,...
relatively late in life, in 1983.
Former Senator Graham Richardson
Graham Richardson
Graham Frederick Richardson , a former Australian politician, was a Senator for New South Wales from 1983–94 for the Australian Labor Party, a senior minister in Hawke and Keating governments, and is now a political lobbyist, public speaker, and media commentator. During his time in politics,...
, a leader of the party's right faction, once stated that Zakharov "[worked] hard on social issues in the chamber, but [hid] her light under a bushel far too successfully". She was re-elected in 1984, 1987, and 1993, and was in the midst of her final term in the Senate when she was killed in an automobile accident in early 1995.
Before politics
Zakharov was born in KewKew, Victoria
Kew is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 6 km east from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Boroondara. At the 2006 Census, Kew had a population of 22,516....
, Melbourne
Melbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
. She studied psychology as part of an arts degree at Melbourne University, where she joined the local branch of the Communist Party of Australia
Communist Party of Australia
The Communist Party of Australia was founded in 1920 and dissolved in 1991; it was succeeded by the Socialist Party of Australia, which then renamed itself, becoming the current Communist Party of Australia. The CPA achieved its greatest political strength in the 1940s and faced an attempted...
, something which she later discovered had brought her to the attention of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation
Australian Security Intelligence Organisation
The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation is Australia's national security service, which is responsible for the protection of the country and its citizens from espionage, sabotage, acts of foreign interference, politically-motivated violence, attacks on the Australian defence system, and...
. She briefly married while at university, but the couple separated in 1949, and she soon moved to Yallourn
Yallourn, Victoria
Yallourn, Victoria was a company town in Victoria, Australia built between the 1920s and 1950s to house employees of the State Electricity Commission of Victoria, who operated the nearby Yallourn Power Station complex. However, expansion of the adjacent open-cut brown coal mine led to the closure...
to live with a new partner, unionist John Zakharov, who she later married and began a family with. As a young woman, she juggled her family commitments with a number of jobs, working as a market research interviewer, clerk, waitress, mail officer, psychiatric nurse, and pathology
Pathology
Pathology is the precise study and diagnosis of disease. The word pathology is from Ancient Greek , pathos, "feeling, suffering"; and , -logia, "the study of". Pathologization, to pathologize, refers to the process of defining a condition or behavior as pathological, e.g. pathological gambling....
assistant. She also continued to be politically active, being involved in the local branch of the Australian Labor Party
Australian Labor Party
The Australian Labor Party is an Australian political party. It has been the governing party of the Commonwealth of Australia since the 2007 federal election. Julia Gillard is the party's federal parliamentary leader and Prime Minister of Australia...
.
In 1968, after the last of her children had reached primary school, Zakharov separated from her husband, and later divorced him, though she retained his surname. She proceeded to raise her children alone, and in 1969 began as a student welfare co-ordinator at Montmorency Secondary College in Melbourne. She served as president of her local party branch, and was a delegate to the party's state conference. She was offered a safe Labor seat in the Parliament of Victoria
Parliament of Victoria
The Parliament of Victoria is the bicameral legislature of the Australian state of Victoria. It follows a Westminster-derived parliamentary system and consists of The Queen, represented by the Governor of Victoria; the Legislative Council ; and the Legislative Assembly...
in the 1970s, but declined for family reasons.
Senate career
Zakharov subsequently sought preselectionPreselection
Preselection is the process by which a candidate is selected, usually by a political party, to contest an election for political office. It is also referred to as candidate selection. It is a fundamental function of political parties...
to run as a Labor Senate candidate in Victoria at the double dissolution
Double dissolution
A double dissolution is a procedure permitted under the Australian Constitution to resolve deadlocks between the House of Representatives and the Senate....
1983 federal election
Australian federal election, 1983
Federal elections were held in Australia on 5 March 1983. All 125 seats in the House of Representatives, and all 64 seats in the Senate, were up for election, following a double dissolution...
. She received the fifth position on the Labor ticket, and easily swept into parliament in the landslide Labor victory, taking the final position well ahead of her nearest rival, Democrat
Australian Democrats
The Australian Democrats is an Australian political party espousing a socially liberal ideology. It was formed in 1977, by a merger of the Australia Party and the New LM, after principals of those minor parties secured the commitment of former Liberal minister Don Chipp, as a high profile leader...
John Siddons
John Siddons
John Royston Siddons was an Australian politician. He was a businessman and the executive chairman of Siddons Industries Ltd. before entering politics. In 1980, he was elected to the Australian Senate as a Democrats senator for Victoria...
. She soon established herself as a loyal member of the Socialist Left faction and as an advocate for equal rights for women and the rights of the disadvantaged. This early advocacy for progressive causes brought her the second ever Australian Humanist of the Year award in 1984. Due to having won the tenth spot in 1983, Zakharov was forced to face election against the following year, but was once again comfortably returned. Once asked why she had begun a political career so late in life, Zakharov compared herself to marathon runner Cliff Young
Cliff Young (athlete)
Albert Ernest Clifford "Cliff" Young was an Australian potato farmer and athlete from Beech Forest, Victoria, best noted for his unexpected Westfield Sydney to Melbourne Ultra Marathon win at 61 years of age.-Early life:...
and stated, "Late runs can be very successful."
Throughout the 1980s, Zakharov remained a loyal member of the party, but made her voice heard on a number of issues. She was the lone voice of dissent when the other five members of the Senate Select Committee on Video Material urged the banning of X-rated videos in 1984. Two years later, Zakharov and Senator Rosemary Crowley
Rosemary Crowley
Rosemary Anne Crowley was a Labor Senator for South Australia from 1983 to 2002.Before entering politics Crowley was a medical practitioner and tutor at Flinders University...
opposed legislation against scientific experimentation on human embryos that had been proposed by conservative independent Brian Harradine
Brian Harradine
Richard William Brian Harradine , Australian politician, was an independent member of the Australian Senate from 1975 to 2005, representing the state of Tasmania. He was the longest-serving independent federal politician in Australian history, and a Father of the Senate.He was born in Quorn, South...
. The remainder of the select committee set up to evaluate the proposal supported a compromise majority report that severely limited scientific experimentation; in a high-profile dissenting report, Zakharov and Crowley urged that the parents of the embryos have the final say as to how they were used, and were highly critical of the absolute pro-life arguments employed by the majority. While the report was overlooked by the government at the time, it was later largely adopted by the New South Wales Law Reform Commission. Zakharov also remained involved in her local community; she used her political connections to help save her historic neighbourhood in Port Melbourne
Port Melbourne, Victoria
Port Melbourne is a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 5 km southwest of Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government areas are the cities of Port Phillip and Melbourne. At the 2006 Census, Port Melbourne had a population of 13,293....
from demolition, and at one point painted "NOT FOR SALE" on her roof in order to promote the message.
In 1988, Zakharov was the only Western politician invited to witness the first destruction of nuclear weapons at a ceremony in the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
after the signing of a disarmament agreement. Upon returning from Russia, she described the occasion as "the chance of a thousand lifetimes". Four years later, she joined a crossbench group (along with Labor's Chris Schacht
Chris Schacht
Christopher Cleland Schacht is a former Australian politician and member of the South Australian branch of the Australian Labor Party . He was born in Melbourne and educated at the University of Adelaide and Wattle Park Teachers College.Schacht's political career started as a state party official...
, Bruce Childs
Bruce Childs
Bruce Kenneth Childs is a former Australian politician. Born in Sydney, he was a tradesman in photo engraving and a secretary of the Printers' Union before becoming Assistant General Secretary of the New South Wales Labor Party 1971-1980. In 1980, he was elected to the Australian Senate as a Labor...
and Margaret Reynolds
Margaret Reynolds
Margaret Reynolds served as an Australian Labor Party Senator for Queensland from 1983 to 1999.Reynolds had two ministerial appointments during her time in the Senate, serving as Minister for Local Government from September 1987 to April 1990 and as Minister assisting the Prime Minister for the...
and the Liberal Party
Liberal Party of Australia
The Liberal Party of Australia is an Australian political party.Founded a year after the 1943 federal election to replace the United Australia Party, the centre-right Liberal Party typically competes with the centre-left Australian Labor Party for political office...
's Baden Teague
Baden Teague
Baden Chapman Teague served as a Liberal Senator for South Australia from 1977 until his retirement in 1996.Born in Adelaide, Teague was educated at the University of Adelaide and Cambridge University, where he gained a Ph.D.. He was employed as a university lecturer until he entered the Senate...
) to become involved in the international campaign to free jailed Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
i scientist Mordechai Vanunu
Mordechai Vanunu
Mordechai Vanunu ; is a former Israeli nuclear technician who, citing his opposition to weapons of mass destruction, revealed details of Israel's nuclear weapons program to the British press in 1986. He was subsequently lured to Italy by a Mossad agent, where he was drugged and kidnapped by...
.
While Zakharov did speak out on several key issues, she remained bound by the principles of party discipline. In 1988, she was critical of the proposals that became the Higher Education Contribution Scheme while they were in caucus
Caucus
A caucus is a meeting of supporters or members of a political party or movement, especially in the United States and Canada. As the use of the term has been expanded the exact definition has come to vary among political cultures.-Origin of the term:...
, although she promptly dropped the matter when the majority supported the changes. This again occurred with planned price increases to various Medicare
Medicare (Australia)
Medicare is Australia's publicly funded universal health care system, operated by the government authority Medicare Australia. Medicare is intended to provide affordable treatment by doctors and in public hospitals for all resident citizens and permanent residents except for those on Norfolk Island...
services in 1992, when Zakharov used her position as chair of the Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs to cut committee hearings short, to the chagrin of the opposition parties. She did, however, manage to win some small concessions through the committee's final report, and somewhat embarrassed Deputy Prime Minister
Deputy Prime Minister of Australia
The Deputy Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Australia is the second-most senior officer in the Government of Australia. The Deputy Prime Ministership has been a ministerial portfolio since 1968, and the Deputy Prime Minister is appointed by the Governor-General on the advice of the Prime...
Brian Howe
Brian Howe (politician)
Brian Leslie Howe, AO , Australian politician, was Deputy Prime Minister in the Labor government of Paul Keating from 1991 to 1995....
in the process.
One of the strangest moments in Zakharov's career occurred in late 1990, when, as a member of the parliamentary Australian Security Intelligence Organisation
Australian Security Intelligence Organisation
The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation is Australia's national security service, which is responsible for the protection of the country and its citizens from espionage, sabotage, acts of foreign interference, politically-motivated violence, attacks on the Australian defence system, and...
committee, she was given access to her own intelligence file. She was not surprised to discover that ASIO had shown interest in her membership of the Communist Party while at university; what she was not prepared for was a detailed investigation the organisation had made in 1963, after becoming concerned that John Zakharov was a bigamist. A less-than-impressed Zakharov speculated at the time that the contents of her file may have cost her at least one public service position during the 1970s.
In June 1992, the Labor Party proposed legalising the entry of gay and lesbian people into the armed forces. Zakharov had always been a strong supporter of gay rights, and successfully nominated for the investigating committee. The proposed changes were strongly opposed by then-Defence Minister Robert Ray
Robert Ray (Australian politician)
Robert Francis Ray , Australian politician, was an Australian Labor Party member of the Senate from July 1981 to May 2008, representing the state of Victoria....
and later Opposition Leader Kim Beazley
Kim Beazley
In the October 1998 election, Labor polled a majority of the two-party vote and received the largest swing to a first-term opposition since 1934. However, due to the uneven nature of the swing, Labor came up eight seats short of making Beazley Prime Minister....
. Zakharov helped push the proposals through caucus, to see them become law not long afterwards. She also publicly opposed discrimination against gay parents.
In the leadup to the 1993 federal election, there was some speculation that Zakharov would be dropped from the Labor ticket due to her mild manner and low media profile. She lost the second position on the ticket to factional powerbroker Kim Carr
Kim Carr
Kim John Carr is an Australian politician. He has been an Australian Labor Party member of the Australian Senate since April 1993, representing the state of Victoria. He was elected to the Senate at the March 1993 election, and was due to take his seat on 1 July...
, but secured the third position against several challengers, including former lower house MP David McKenzie. Labor was not expected to do well at the election, and it was thought that Zakharov was likely to lose, just as Carr had done from the same position at the 1990 election. However, she retained her seat, fending off challenges from Democrat
Australian Democrats
The Australian Democrats is an Australian political party espousing a socially liberal ideology. It was formed in 1977, by a merger of the Australia Party and the New LM, after principals of those minor parties secured the commitment of former Liberal minister Don Chipp, as a high profile leader...
-turned-independent Janet Powell
Janet Powell
Janet Frances Powell in Nhill, Victoria, is an Australian politician.She was appointed a senator for Victoria, representing the Australian Democrats, upon the resignation of the party's founder, Don Chipp, in 1986. She was elected the following year. She became the third leader of the party, from...
and Nuclear Disarmament Party
Nuclear Disarmament Party
The Nuclear Disarmament Party was a political party in Australia. The party was formed in 1984 and enjoyed considerable initial success.-Foundation, the 1984 election, and the split:...
-turned-Democrat
Australian Democrats
The Australian Democrats is an Australian political party espousing a socially liberal ideology. It was formed in 1977, by a merger of the Australia Party and the New LM, after principals of those minor parties secured the commitment of former Liberal minister Don Chipp, as a high profile leader...
Robert Wood
Robert Wood (Australian politician)
Robert Wood is a UK-born Australian who was elected to the Australian Parliament in the 1987 elections as Senator for New South Wales.-Background:...
in the general election.
In November 1993, Zakharov publicly revealed that she had been a victim of domestic violence at the hands of her deceased husband for ten years prior to their separation. She launched the government's Campaign to Stop Violence Against Women, and urged other victims and their neighbours to speak up. She said at the time that she had kept silent because "There were no alternatives. There were no refuges for women, no supporting parent's benefit and almost no child care. I made the break when my youngest was old enough to go to school so I could work."
Death
Zakharov was struck by a car on the afternoon of 12 February 1995, while crossing St KildaSt Kilda Road, Melbourne
St Kilda Road is a street in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. It is part of the locality of Melbourne which has the postcode of 3004 and along with Swanston Street forms a major spine of the city....
road after leaving the Midsumma
Midsumma
Midsumma is an annual lesbian and gay festival held during January and February in Melbourne, Australia.Each year over 80,000 individuals across Melbourne and Australia participate in and attend Midsumma Festival events....
gay and lesbian festival. She lay in a coma for more than a month, but did not regain consciousness. While she was in hospital, the Coalition arranged a pair, so as not to take advantage of Zakharov's injuries in a closely divided Senate. Having never regained consciousness, Zakharov died on 6 March. No charges were laid regarding the accident.
Upon her death, the Senate adjourned early and several red roses, the symbol of the international socialist movement, were placed upon her desk as a mark of respect. More than two hours of condolence speeches were delivered in parliament, and after her funeral on 30 March, a memorial plaque was unveiled in the courtyard at Parliament House
Parliament House, Canberra
Parliament House is the meeting facility of the Parliament of Australia located in Canberra, the capital of Australia. The building was designed by Mitchell/Giurgola Architects and opened on 1988 by Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia...
. Deputy Prime Minister Brian Howe attempted to convince the state Kennett
Jeff Kennett
Jeffrey Gibb Kennett AC , a former Australian politician, was the Premier of Victoria between 1992 and 1999. He is currently the President of Hawthorn Football Club. He is the founding Chairman of beyondblue, a national depression initiative.- Early life :Kennett was born in Melbourne on 2 March...
government to save the historic Missions to Seamen building in Port Melbourne, which Zakharov had been fighting to save, as a memorial to her, but was unsuccessful. A memorial to her in a park in Bay Street, Port Melbourne was unveiled in March 2002.