Bert Van Manen (Forde, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

To follow on from the kind words by the member for Barker earlier, I too congratulate you, Mr Deputy Speaker Scott, on your elevation to the deputy speakership. I have the pleasure tonight of reflecting on some of the wonderful youth that we have in our electorate. In particular, I acknowledge my special guest at Parliament House this evening and for tomorrow, Miss Selena Lang, from Rivermount College, who was the Young Voice of Forde this year. Her mother, Barbara, is joining us as well. The Young Voice of Forde competition was open to all year 11 and 12 students in the Forde electorate. It was an essay competition asking students to share their long-term aspirations for themselves, our community and the nation. The importance of this essay competition is that it allowed young people the opportunity to share their views and to speak up and be heard.

I was very impressed with Selena's foresight of the future needs of my electorate, and now I have the honour to take this opportunity to share with all what Selena had to say and what her vision for Forde is:

'Desire is the starting point of all achievement, not a hope, not a wish, but a keen pulsating desire which transcends everything.' Napoleon Hill.

Ladies and gentlemen the change must be desired. As social injustice continues to circulate and begins to control even more, it's what we do now that defines us as people in the future. The Electorate of Forde, encompassing many suburbs needs to focus on providing communities with adequate social needs. Forde must do something, which allows society to get back onto its feet.

Within the Forde Electorate there are many opportunities available, which provide beneficial social skills. At times it seems that there is an endless stream of opportunities for people, but that is why it is so important to understand that these activities and opportunities actually have the ability to educate and affect people's lives. Education is key. It is so important to realise the power that community based activities have, it is something that needs to be socially and morally encouraged. In the not so distant future, social education ideally needs to be more prominently embedded in the education system but before then, community based activities need to take the lead and teach the generations now and the generations to come, the art of communicating. Communication has been lost in translation, the youth of today struggle to speak up about issues that are affecting them; they are too afraid of what society might think, but ultimately even if they wanted to say something, they wouldn't know how to say it at all. Facebook and other social networking sites have to some extent crippled the communication boundary, so it seems only fitting to put back in, what society has so selfishly taken out.

Infrastructure is another problem, which weighs heavily on the shoulders of the Forde Electorate. South East Queensland is growing rapidly, and the Forde region is no different. In saying that, it becomes even more important to focus on catering for a steadily increasing population. The roads from Logan, moving down south, towards Coomera need particular focus, because at this current stage they simply do not have the ability to cater for the amount of traffic travelling through the region, everyday. In order to help combat this problem the Parliament Members of the Forde Electorate - the people who ultimately have a voice need to sit down and begin planning for the future; a future which needs to be accounted for and future where political correctness is nonexistent. In order to combat infrastructure problems in the future, something needs to be done in the present.

The future of Forde depends on the people in the present. The terms 'past', 'present' and 'future' are often disjoined from each other, each stage seen as a separate entity. However, it's important to learn from the past, make sure that someone is watching the present and that there are people to create the future, because even though each term appears separate from one another, without one there's none. The future of Forde is bright. A future where education needs to be respected, where equality is sovereign and a future where people are confident in their own skin. Forde needs to be working hard to provide people with jobs, in order to break the cycle of government dependency. Confidence and credibility follow shortly after that, as well as an evident decrease in crime and a future where there is a genuinely happy population. The electorate of Forde needs to create a place, which focuses on the people. A place where they don't have to sit in traffic just to get to get to work in the morning, a place where people are allowed to say what their mind is telling them to say - my vision for Forde.

I thank Selena for that wonderful vision and contribution.

I also take this opportunity to mention the runner up, Mckinley Fiveash, a Year 11 Kimberley College student who prepared a fantastic essay on his concerns with NAPLAN. This is a wonderful example of the talented students and youth that we have in the Forde electorate. As we go into our second Forde Young Voice competition next year, there is opportunity for a greater number of students to be involved. I thank Selena and the other students for taking part this year.

As I have touched on already, it is the youth of our community that are our future. It is worth while to consider that, when we leave this place at some point in the future—I hope long in the future—we will all leave some sort of inheritance. The question is: what inheritance will we leave for future generations? With this government's current direction and path, I am afraid to say that some of that inheritance is being spent today. It is being spent on debt and deficit and a billion dollars a month in interest on $256 billion of gross debt. When this government came to power five years ago it had $70 billion in the bank and a budget surplus of $20 billion. Despite the nation's continuing record terms of trade, this government continues to squander the wealth of the mining boom by profligate spending that provides no long-term benefits.

And that does not include the NBN, which is not even on the government's balance sheet.

So, when I consider the future for the youth in our community, I am concerned for their future and the debt that they will have to repay as a result of this government's inability to manage its economic finances. But I am heartened that we have youth in our community who have a vision for the future and have something positive to say.