Kimberley Kitching’s husband has, during her funeral service, criticised a “cantankerous cabal” over its treatment of the late Victorian senator.
Family, friends, and state and federal politicians from both sides of politics gathered at St Patrick’s Cathedral in Melbourne on Monday to farewell the Labor senator who died suddenly on 10 March of a suspected heart attack. She was 52.
Her husband, Andrew Landeryou, told mourners they married in the same cathedral two decades ago.
“It feels like yesterday looking down on a grey Derby Day that I saw her walking in,” he said. “Her customary 45 minutes late, looking absolutely radiant, and as she did the sun streamed down directly on her as she stepped toward our married life.”
Landeryou said when Kitching died there was, inside her car, a bottle of Veuve Clicquot champagne she bought for a dinner party planned for that evening and a pie from a bakery she knew he liked.
“It’s a poignant reminder to me of her thoughtfulness, that even when she had a lot on her mind, other than call me, I think it was the last thing she did,” he said.
Some supporters have appeared to draw links between Kitching’s sudden death and political issues she was facing, including her preselection ahead of the upcoming federal election and allegations she had been bullied and ostracised by senior Labor members.
Landeryou made reference to the “unpleasantness” she had faced.
“The simple truth of it is that Kimberley’s political and moral judgment was vastly superior to the small number who opposed her internally,” he said.
“And of course, there’s a lot I could say about the unpleasantness of a cantankerous cabal – not all of them in parliament – that was aimed at Kimba, and the intensity of it did baffle and hurt her.
“But I hope it’s sufficient to say she deserved so very much better. The truth is the vast majority of the Labor family were welcoming and supportive and encouraging and admiring of Kimberley and they told her so often.”
He said he did not blame “any one person, or any one meeting, or any campaign of unpleasantness” for her death, describing it as “God’s will”.
“Her friends and ferociously loyal staff are angry about how she was treated, of course they are, and I have no quarrel with them about that. They know what they saw with their own eyes,” he said.
“If I am angry with anyone, I am angry with myself, I am angry I wasn’t driving her around that busy day as I often did, I am angry I didn’t meddle enough in her health, I’m angry I failed and failed again to persuade her to slow down, I’m angry I couldn’t and didn’t protect her from menace and I fear I attracted some.”
Former Labor leader Bill Shorten, one of Kitching’s closest friends and who was instrumental in her securing her Senate position in 2016, urged the party to “channel their grief” into winning the upcoming federal election.
“She understood – in the marrow of her bones – that the people who count on Labor count, above all, on Labor government,” Shorten said.
“So I know if she were here with us still all her energy and activism and enthusiasm and the powerful force of her personality would have been dedicated to a Labor victory in May.”
Shorten said her office put nearly 12,000 questions on notice to the federal government this parliamentary term and ferociously scrutinised its ministers during estimates, which he described as akin to Kitching “running out onto the MCG”.
He said she was instrumental in Australia adopting Magnitsky-style laws and stood up for the people of Ukraine, China’s Muslim Uyghurs, the Tibetans and the pro-democracy activists of Hong Kong.
Shorten said Kitching helped rescue 30 people from Afghanistan after the Taliban took control last August, including a Hazara woman named Roya, who was present at the funeral service.
Kitching’s father, William Kitching, said his daughter was a bright student and a lover of literature and languages – she spoke five including Latin.
He said she made a difference through “respectful, not vengeful, public discourse”.
“Today we honour Kim’s good life and trust that our present sense of almost paralysing grief and deep melancholia will be gradually banished by joyful memories of an engaging woman and daughter whom we knew so well,” Kitching said.
A statement from the Dalai Lama, who Kitching met in 2017, was read at the beginning of the service, as was a statement from the Senate president, Slade Brockman, who described her as “tough, determined and forensic – occasionally fiery”.
“The Senate will be poorer without her,” Brockman’s statement read.
The federal Labor leader, Anthony Albanese, the deputy leader, Richard Marles, the Victorian premier, Daniel Andrews, the former premier Steve Bracks and senior Coalition figures including former prime minister Tony Abbott, the deputy prime minister, Barnaby Joyce, the defence minister, Peter Dutton, the attorney general, Michaelia Cash, the government’s Senate leader, Simon Birmingham, and the Victorian Liberal leader, Matthew Guy, attended the service.
Senators Kristina Keneally, Penny Wong and Katy Gallagher, who were named in media reports as having allegedly “ostracised” Kitching, were also in attendance, as was the Melbourne lord mayor, Sally Capp, the Victorian state secretary of the CFMEU, John Setka, the Health Workers Union secretary, Diana Asmar, and Sky News’ Peta Credlin and Andrew Bolt.
Diplomats from several countries including the US and Israel were also present.
