Bruce Goodluck, who served at federal and state level, is remembered as a fighter for the people

One of Tasmania’s best-known political figures, Bruce Goodluck died this week aged 83. WAYNE CRAWFORD looks at a man known both for his stunts and his devotion to helping those he served.

The late Bruce Goodluck will be remembered as a fighter for the people. Picture: LUKE BOWDEN.

HE refused to use his party’s name or colours in his election material, crossed the floor to vote against the Liberals 10 times, and publicly opposed some of their central policies.

But Bruce Goodluck took a supposedly safe Labor seat in a landslide and held it for more than 17 years for the Liberal Party — and never lost an election.

In between, he attacked a television reporter with a rolled-up newspaper because he didn’t like the line of questioning, posed for TV cameras with a vacuum cleaner in a flat he shared with a fellow MP during parliamentary sittings, took part in a dummy-spitting contest, and became famous for entering the House of Representatives dressed as a chicken.

The late Bruce Goodluck in a chicken suit.

Yet he still had time for serious, relentless advocacy on behalf of thousands of Tasmanians (not only those who lived in his electorate) with problems as diverse as public housing, pensions, taxation, health care, immigration and neighbourhood feuds.

It earned him a national reputation as the “little Aussie battler”.

Although he had been ill for many years, Bruce John Goodluck’s death this week, at age 83, still came as a shock.

Harry Quick, the former Labor member who succeeded him in Franklin, said he had “an aura of invincibility” about him.

The product of a broken home (his mother left when he was only seven) he was raised by his dad, a boiler attendant at Boyer, but was orphaned at 15.

Bruce’s appearance and manner belied a toughness — at age 13 he got a Royal Humane Society Award for bravery for diving into the freezing Derwent to save a life; at school he boxed and captained football and cricket teams; and as a teenager he was recruited by the Melbourne Football Club (he was a contemporary of Ron Barassi).

BRUCE GOODLUCK PHOTO GALLERY

For 15 years he had a service station at Lindisfarne and he started his own tyre company. He was state and federal president of the Australian Automobile Chamber of Commerce.

But it was his activity in local government which brought him to community prominence.

As Warden (Mayor) of Clarence when the Tasman Bridge was knocked down by an ore carrier in January, 1975, he was active in agitating on behalf of the Eastern Shore community which had been isolated by the disaster.

His background in small business and local government attracted the Liberal Party to him — rather than vice versa — and he was invited to stand for the party in the electorate of Franklin against the sitting member, a golden-voiced former professional Shakespearean actor and television newsreader Ray Sherry, who held the seat with a 13 per cent buffer.

Franklin was considered safe Labor, but the subdued mood in the electorate caused by the bridge disaster, as well as the Whitlam Government’s disarray nationally, were in the Liberals’ favour.

Goodluck was carried into Franklin on the wave which swept the Fraser government to power in December 1975. In Tasmania it was a wipe-out for Labor, with new Liberal MPs winning all five seats, including Michael Hodgman in the adjoining Denison.

Goodluck would boast that the majority of his electorate supporters probably didn’t know if he was Liberal or Labor.

He never mentioned the Liberal Party on his posters and other campaign material and the black and yellow he used (rather than the Liberals’ blue and white) were old Labor colours.

The late Bruce Goodluck with his pet pomeranian named Ambrose.

The decision by Goodluck and Hodgman to share a flat during parliamentary sessions in Canberra, and the antics of the unlikely couple — the suave, debonair barrister and the impish, service station operator — and their passionate advocacy for Tasmania, earned them the title The Hodglucks.

Their cramped flat was a source of national fascination, and they invited TV cameras in while Bruce posed with a vacuum cleaner, claiming he did all the housework.

Many of their stunts — such as entering a dummy spitting contest — were cringe-worthy but nonetheless got publicity for the “Odd Couple”.

Bruce had a chaotic relationship with the media. He once started his own newspaper (albeit briefly) in protest against what he claimed was the “bad run” he was getting in the media.

Tasweekend columnist and 60 Minutes reporter Charles Wooley recalls Bruce beating him around the ears with a rolled-up copy of the Mercury when he objected to the line of questioning.

But they remained on good terms, and Bruce caused a major stir in the Canberra Press Gallery (and raised the ire of then Treasurer Paul Keating) when he insisted on accompanying Charles into a Budget lockup reserved for the media.

But it was Bruce’s stunt in which, for a dare, he dressed in a chicken suit and went into the House of Representatives chamber during a sitting for which he is best remembered.

Indeed, he lamented that it may be he would be remembered more for that than for the thousands of people he had helped.

His political career spanned more than just the 17 years in Federal Parliament. He retired, undefeated, from national politics after strokes left him barely able to sign his name.

But within three years Bruce was at it again — this time as an independent member for Franklin in State Parliament.

Never one to play by the rules, Bruce had his own code which had more to do with fighting for the rights of battlers, like his late beloved father, than with the rules of any party, or even any parliament.

Wayne Crawford is a former Associate Editor of the Mercury and a Walkley Award-winning political journalist.

Originally published as Bruce Goodluck, who served at federal and state level, is remembered as a fighter for the people