 Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, scholars, it is my great pleasure to welcome you here to Parliament House and not just to Parliament House but to camera. I understand that for many of you this is the first occasion on which you come to camera and I think you came and saw this wonderful building for the first time yesterday and it's a real pleasure to have you here. As I've been talked to about the program that you've got over the next couple of days you're meeting a fantastic selection of Australian leaders who I'm sure will be really informative about where this country is going and the various challenges that we all face with this within this region. I'm also told that tomorrow night you've got your dinner at the National Museum of Australia which again is a very iconic building within Canberra and within Australia to be honest and as I understand a really important aspect of this trip is all this conference over the next two days is about making sure that you maintain a network which you can keep going throughout your time here in Australia and there is no more important and better way of doing that than what I understand you'll be doing later this evening at the REL and that's participating in karaoke so that will no doubt be an event to watch and I'm very sure of the pressure to make sure that we get finished here as quickly as possible so that you can get in front of the microphone as quickly as possible as well. It's not often you have the chance to meet so many scholars from so many different countries representing so many different fields of study all at the one time and to look over this scene is a wondrous view indeed particularly as you're all wearing your national costumes and I want to congratulate all of you here tonight first on receiving an Australia award and secondly on receiving the prestigious Australian leadership award scholarship there are 184 of you from 32 different countries some of which I've visited in my role as the Parliamentary Secretary for Pacific Island Affairs and others I look forward to getting to one day and I'd especially like to welcome scholars from countries in the Latin American and Caribbean regions and also from Bernard because you are the first Australian leadership awards scholars to come from these countries and I'm pleased that your countries are now part of the Australia awards and we look forward to greater collaboration with your countries in the future in the broader scheme of things the Australia awards contribute to the long-term development stability and security of our countries and to mutually beneficial links at any one time we now have between two and a half and three and a half thousand people studying in Australia on Ozade funded scholarships our scholarships are well regarded and highly coveted in the region and I realized just how much they meant to people when I was in French Polynesia recently and met four students who will be coming to Australia on our scholarships it was great to see how enthusiastic they were and how they saw the scholarships being able to help them help their own countries all countries developing and developed need good leaders females as well as males and I'm really pleased to see so many women scholars here in fact I think there are more women than me 94 women and 90 men in the current coping that does deserve a round of applause because it's a really important fact indeed we're here in the mural hall just a bit further along there's a very big picture by the famous Australian artist Tom Roberts of the opening of the first parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia back in 1901 if you look at this picture and it's on the internet if you don't have time to see while you're here in Canberra but if you look at it you can see how very male dominated that picture is today our parliament is nothing like that not in terms of the numbers of women and the attitudes that exist now have certainly changed a lot and of course you come to Australia at one time when we have our first female Prime Minister I'm sure that if women hadn't been given the right to education the right to vote and the opportunities to shape their own lives we would still have a parliament made up only a bit and we would be all the poorer for it because women have played such a vital role in the development of Australia and indeed I think it's fair to say now that no nation can afford to deny itself of half its human capital when attempting to meet the challenges of our modern world you'll not all be political leaders but you are already likely to become leaders in your fields and if we want good leaders who are able to deal with complex regional and global challenges then we need educated leaders education gives us the chance to use our talents including taking on representational and leadership roles and you were selected for the leadership award because you are seen as having the potential to influence social economic and governance reforms within your countries this is a high expectation and it demands a lot of people both professionally and personally but there is enormous satisfaction in leading people or being part of an elite group or coalition that leads people to a greater collective good and I'm pleased that through this leadership award and the leadership for development program Australia has a hand in helping you achieve your goals both individually and collectively no doubt you'll be hearing a lot more during the conference over the next couple of days and the rest of your leadership for development program about how collective problems particularly those around allocating and using resources are best dealt with by coalitions of well educated and like-minded people and one obvious example of that is climate change a global problem that affects us all but without education and without collective action it is one we could do little about as our aid program expands to meet the government's commitment of 0.5% of GNI our contribution to education will also increase without education just about every aspect of our lives would be poorer I just don't mean materially I'm talking also about the intellectual wealth that comes with being able to satisfy our curiosity about the world we live in to think creatively independently and critically about our world education gives us the means to make sense of our world and all within it and that is something that can never be taken from us we in this room are among the lucky ones and I'm sure all of us know there are many millions of people who have never been to school and children today who still don't have a chance to finish primary school as we approach 2015 Australia will be working harder than ever with partner developing countries to get kids into school and to do what no other generation has ever done and that is to achieve the millennium development goal number two universal primary education the Australian government believes that every girl and every boy including those with a disability has the right to an education regardless of where they live and the circumstances in which they live we have many people in our government and our aid program who are advocates for education but one of our strongest was the mate Allison suger at Allison was the head of Aussie in Indonesia when she and 20 others died in a plane crash at the object harder in 2007 she knew without a shadow of a doubt the power that education had to people out of poverty and allow them to grow as individuals do I know her life was a established leadership awards in her name for promising leaders in Indonesia and in Papua New Guinea these were two countries that Alison worked in and they were indeed very dear to her seven recipients of the Allison suger at award are here tonight including three who took up their scholarship the year or so ago and four of this year's awardees so it gives me great pleasure to be able to present the Danians and certificates to each of these seven people and I'm about to call out your names and when I'm done really appreciate it if you're able to come and join me on the stage at the first of those recipients of the war of the award is Mrs. Matia Alpanea Mayan before commencing her PhD at Griffith University in 2009 focusing on climate change adaptation Mrs. Mayan worked with the Ministry of Environment of the Republic of Indonesia she was recommended for this award for her passion and commitment demonstrated leadership of professional and community levels and the clear outcomes that will arise from their studies which she returns home. The second recipient is Dr. Tartary Rulini. Rulini is a dentist and was a lecturer at the University of I hope I get this right. Hadja Joram in Indonesia before commencing her PhD in dentistry at the University of Sydney last year. As a dentist in Indonesia she was involved in a program that identified and treated HIV positive individuals through dental programs to increase the quality of their life and to lower the likelihood of conversion to AIDS. The third recipient is Mr. Fartrian Diancha. Fartrian commenced a PhD at ANU last year he was program director of climate and energy with the World Wildlife Fund in Indonesia he directed a nationwide program on climate and energy which included reducing emission from deforestation and forest degradation renewable energy development and energy efficiency and climate adaptation. Our fourth recipient is Miss T Nubati Harimajah. Harimajah is studying a master of Asia Pacific studies at ANU here in Canberra. He is a senior well-respected journalist in Indonesia who throughout her career has been an independent thinker and is showing the courage to take on issues such as anti-corruption, gender and human rights. Our fifth recipient is Mrs. Rita Pranawati. Before taking up her scholarship Rita was a researcher at the Centre for the Study of Religion and Culture at Jakarta State Islamic University and managed the University's social justice program. Rita is now studying a master of arts at Monash University. Our sixth recipient is Miss Martha Yahimbu Moong Kajay. She was a lecturer in science at the University of Papua New Guinea's Ogun College before commencing her PhD in pharmacy at Curtin University under this scholarship. Miss Moong Kajay is committed to sharing her knowledge and research skills to train people and contribute to pharmaceutical areas of molecular biology in PNG universities. Our final recipient is Mr. Alexander Reedy. He is taking a master of cross-cultural communications at the University of Sydney. He was a journalist for a number of years during which time he saw a role in influencing policy and writing roles. He is now focusing his attention on using communication to develop PNG with the aim to overcome challenges of dealing with 820 languages and to assist Papua New Guinea and speak out on issues which affect them. So can I just congratulate Alex and indeed all the awardees perhaps another round of applause. I told Alex you're giving a speech tomorrow night so everybody will be here awaiting that with voted breath. I'm sure that were Alison still here she would wholeheartedly approve of all of your work and the contribution you're all making to your country's development. Do you want to do a photo of me? Okay, I'll finish up. So once again can I just say how privileged I feel to be hosting this reception tonight to welcome you to Australia and to our fine higher education institutions. Do enjoy them. Make the most of your time here in Australia both professionally and personally and please please stay connected with us. With that I'm going to end the formal part of the evening here. I would really hope to be able to mingle a bit after this is done and get to meet a number of you. Again thank you so much for taking up this scholarship for coming to Australia and please enjoy your time here. Enjoy the next couple of days and most importantly enjoy carry out. Thank you.