Speeches
Youth 2020 Summit Concluding Speech
Minister for Youth Kate Ellis , Youth delegates - Ladies and Gentlemen.
May I begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of this land – the Nunawal people.
From across our nation, 100 young people came to Canberra this weekend - charged with the responsibility of laying the foundation for Australia’s future.
Happily I can report – we have prevailed.
We came to the 2020 Youth Summit to develop ideas for Australia’s future.
The result is a future for all Australians.
Together we have taken the first steps to laying claim to helping build a better Australia - and better future - by 2020.
We came here determined to be part of building a better future; a future that embraces all Australians. This is our future.
Building a better future is a common goal - deep desire and ideal we share with the international youth of the world.
This weekend we have embraced the possibility of new solutions both to enduring problems and to emerging ones.
We have stirred our imaginations into life with new possibilities, new options and new directions.
From first coming together on Friday night and until now, our time together has been intense, productive - sometimes funny - and above all …important – because together we have come up with some creative new ideas that have the potential to make a sizeable difference to tackling critical moral issues.
We know from history the power and impact of an idea.
Staging the youth 2020 summit was the idea and initiative of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.
Everyone – on your behalf – as well as my own – I thank you Kevin Rudd – most sincerely for believing in young people, for listening to us, for giving us a voice in helping shape government policy.
Let’s give him an enormous round of Applause.
Staging the youth and major summit is crucial because it forces us as a nation to hold up a mirror to ourselves and ask
Where are we now?
Where do we want to go?
And what challenges do we have to overcome to get there?
In providing the answers to those questions from the perspective of young Australians, we trust you will factor them into the major summit’s thinking and actions.
To the Minister for Youth, Kate Ellis, I thank you on behalf of the delegates for your enthusiasm and support.
Personally, I owe you an enormous debt of gratitude. It has been a great privilege to co-chair this summit with you and I thank you for your encouragement. I salute your dedication, commitment and the generosity of time you have given to making this weekend such a success.
You are our Minister. And this weekend you have demonstrated that you are our friend. You share our passion for the future of our country.
Thank you
It occurs to me that we find ourselves in a powerful, possibly unique situation. Australian youth has a strong and committed voice.
And Australia’s leadership has an unprecedented appetite to listen to that voice.
This gives us an opportunity, and a responsibility.
An opportunity to influence and to lead change.
A responsibility to hold on, to hang in, to see it through.
For everyone. For every Australian.
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And finally to my fellow delegates.
Each of your contributions this weekend has played an important part in making this Youth Summit so special, and mean so much.
We leave this place; this place that is so integral to our lives as Australians. Though we may not meet again together as a group, my hope - my passion - is that we will stay together in spirit as a group that cares, that persists, that achieves and that builds.
That builds Australia, and Australia’s place in the world.
Beyond this weekend may all of you keep on imagining, believing, trusting, hoping, and working for the possibility of change – change for the good of this great country.
Thank you.
*PLEASE NOTE THIS SPEECH IS AN EDIT OF THE ORIGINAL SPEECH*
