It was the South African Government that has introduced politics into sport by decreeing politically that no non-white person will represent their country. They introduced politics into sport." And Don [Bradman] was a very shrewd old bloke, and he looked at me for about thirty seconds and then he said, "Bob, I've got no answer to that." And that was it.
Bob HawkeI don't know who described Mahathir [bin Mohamad] as a pillar of the Commonwealth, but they don't know what they're talking about.
Bob HawkeWhen George Bush Senior [George HW Bush] was getting his alliance together to go into Iraq - to kick the Iraqis out of Kuwait - he rang me up. I was very close to George Bush Senior; I got to know him well as Vice President to Ronald Reagan. And George rang me up and said, "Oh, Bob," he said, "I'm having trouble with Brian [Mulroney]." He said, "He's got a big wheat trade with Iraq, and he doesn't want to upset that." I said, "You leave it with me."
Bob HawkeYou've got to remember the Cold War was a very real thing then, so the relationship with the United States was very, very important. As was the relationship that I was developing with China: that was something I did very much. And they weren't conflicting things.
Bob HawkeIn sum, the truth is that we luxuriate in the comfortable assertion that women enjoy equality. We have salved our consciences by eliminating the more obvious discriminations like unequal rates of pay for work of equal value. But, in fact, we have not eliminated the inheritance of the millennia that women are lesser beings, an inheritance which still manifests itself in a whole range of prejudice and other forms of discrimination.
Bob Hawke