Extract from ABC News
Former governor-general and one-time Labor Party leader Bill Hayden has died at the age of 90.
Once described as the greatest man never to become prime minister, Mr Hayden surrendered a shot at the top job for the sake of Labor Party unity.
While perhaps it was his time in vice-regal office for which he would be best remembered, his passion was for politics.
In 2014, Mr Hayden said: "Government was more fun than governor-general — cutting ribbons has its limit on excitement."
Early life
Born in 1933, William George Hayden was brought up in working class Brisbane.
He left school at 16 and worked as a public servant, then a police officer, while completing an economics degree part-time.
He entered federal parliament in 1961, defying the odds to take the Queensland seat of Oxley for Labor.
The late Liberal MP and former minister Sir James Killen had high praise for his adversary.
"Bill was to me a formidable, a stern, a competent, but beyond that, a very honourable, opponent, " he said in 1987.
Whitlam years
Mr Hayden served as social security minister and then treasurer in the Whitlam government, introducing the single mother's pension and what became Medicare.
"He [Gough Whitlam] gave me the job of health and welfare, and I said: 'Awh, is there anything else?' I asked for economic portfolios, and he said: 'Grab it lad, it'll be the making of you'," Mr Hayden said in 2014.
After Mr Whitlam's dismissal and subsequent election defeat, Mr Hayden took over as opposition leader.
Years later, former Labor senator Graham Richardson reflected on Mr Hayden's time in the position.
"I think there was a lot of introspection," he said.
"A lot of people were worried — have we got a future?
"Well, Bill gave us back a future and for that we've all got to be grateful."
But Mr Hayden narrowly lost the 1980 election to Malcolm Fraser, and newcomer Bob Hawke soon began rallying support.
Hawke years
Under the threat of a leadership challenge, Mr Hayden fell on his sword, resigning to make way for Mr Hawke.
"This created a great deal of heartburn for me. It's not a decision that I would have preferred," Mr Hayden said at the time.
It was then Mr Hayden delivered the bitter phrase that has since entered Australian political legend.
"I believe that a drover's dog could lead the Labor Party to victory, the way the country is."
When Mr Hawke won the 1983 election, Mr Hayden served as his foreign minister.
"To survive you've got to have a pretty thick hide and I reckon I've got one made of asbestos," Mr Hayden said in 1988.
"If you'd like to give it a searing blast with a blow torch, you'd be lucky to singe it."
Governor-general
In 1989, Mr Hawke appointed him governor-general as a late consolation prize, a position Mr Hayden held for seven years.
"I think essentially I like dealing with people, I like dealing with people in this country — I am an unabashed nationalist," Mr Hayden said.
He was highly regarded in the role, although at the time the then-opposition leader John Howard was scathing of his appointment.
"To appoint him governor-general, the Queen's representative, is a bit like appointing an atheist as Archbishop of Canterbury," Mr Howard said in 1988.
Mr Hayden abandoned his staunch atheism in his later years, and in his early 80s a stroke further fuelled his Christianity.
Four years later, he stunned many by being baptised as a Catholic.
At the time, he told the Catholic Leader that the pivotal moment to revive his religious beliefs came during a hospital visit to see Sister Angela Mary Doyle, a prominent Brisbane nun whom he had admired for years.
"The next morning I woke with the strong sense that I had been in the presence of a holy woman, so after dwelling on those things I found my way back to the core of those beliefs — the church," Mr Hayden said.
In 2014, on the day Mr Whitlam had died, Mr Hayden reflected on his career, nominating two events as the greatest moments of his time in office.
"Finally getting the AMA [Australian Medical Association] to capitulate on Medibank — gosh, that was a hard, long, exhausting fight; and the 1975 budget, getting it back in the traces," he said.
Speaking about the death of his friend and leader in 2014, he said: "I owe it all to Whitlam — he made me — the great man in my life has gone."
And now another has gone.
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