John Hogg (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Pursuant to order, I now call Senator Urquhart to make her first speech. I ask honourable senators that the usual courtesies be extended to her.

Anne Urquhart (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr President. I wish to acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which we meet and pay my respects to their elders. I am proud and humbled to be a representative in the Australian Senate for the people of Tasmania—an idyllic island state where I was born and raised. This great country, Australia, provides opportunities for people from all walks of life, regardless of their educational qualifications, to work hard and make a better life. My working life began on the afternoon shift at the potato factory in Ulverstone, and who would have imagined that beginning would have led me to be standing here today delivering my first speech.

Australians can achieve anything with desire, hard work and opportunity. From those first few months on that factory floor I have spent my life representing workers, those who felt they did not have the capacity or the opportunity to speak up for themselves. It is my goal in this place to represent all Tasmanians and, in particular, those Tasmanians who struggle to be heard. I stand here today as one of six Tasmanian Labor senators, one of three Labor women elected on the 2010 Senate ticket. Congratulations to Helen and Lisa, I look forward to working with you both, along with Carol, Catryna and Nick.

I was born in Latrobe, Tasmania, the second child of Tom and Betty Polden. My older sister Jan, younger brother Adrian and I had a happy childhood. I have fond memories of the time spent with our grandparents, Nanny and Granddad Blazely, who worked a dairy farm at Meander—a beautiful farming community nestled under the Great Western Tiers. Granddad worked hard all his life. When he was young, he worked in the bush splitting shingles and squaring sleepers.

I recall mum telling us that when she was a toddler, she lived with Nanny and Granddad in a bush tent outside Eden, in New South Wales, so Granddad was able to work in the bush. This would have been an extremely hard place for Nanny to be raising a child; something we would not entertain today!

Sunday lunches were nearly always held at Nanny and Granddad Polden’s home at Quoiba near Devonport. The family feasted on the traditional roast meal, and we would never get out the door without a basket full of food for our school lunches. My favourites were Nanny’s chocolate brownies and raspberry slice, and even with the exact recipe I can never get them to taste the same as when she made them. How lucky I am that I was able to grow up having such great times with my grandparents.

It is great to look back and know that our children also grew up to experience love from all four of their great-grandparents as well. My mum is the eldest of 11 children, while my dad was an only child. Mum was determined that we would have all the chances in life that she was never able to. I was able to learn ballet and piano and enjoy many other experiences my mother could not have. I always dreamed of being in the Australian Ballet, but unfortunately by the time I was old enough they did not make tutus in my size!

Dad was extremely proud and excited when I was elected to the Senate last year, as he was with all of his children’s achievements. He was looking forward to being here tonight, but sadly he passed away on 16 May following a short illness. Although Dad isn’t here today, he was able to enjoy the knowledge that I had been elected, and we did get to celebrate both this and the achievement of my sister obtaining her advanced diploma in nursing last year, with Dad insisting on taking us all out to dinner. Dad, you are greatly missed by us all, but we are richer for having such a wonderful man as our father.

In July 1980, I commenced work at the Edgell-Birds Eye factory at Ulverstone, now Simplot. I worked afternoon shifts so my husband, Graham, could care for our four-year-old twins, Jason and Belinda, after his day at work. It was here that a work colleague and friend, Jenny Clarke, encouraged me to become a union delegate for the Food Preservers Union. Ten years later, in August 1990, I became an organiser with the Food Preservers Union, which later amalgamated to become the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union, the AMWU. Following this amalgamation I had the pleasure of representing not only food workers but also metal workers, print workers, vehicle workers and technical workers—quite a diverse group. This provided me with the opportunity to meet people from right across our great island state. In doing this I regularly clocked up over 50,000 kilometres each year. After six years as the AMWU’s Tasmanian President and with the support of Senator Doug Cameron, who was then the National Secretary of the AMWU, I became the first female state secretary of the AMWU in 2004, and held that position until May this year.

My union has a strong history of representing the rights of its members and of setting the progressive agenda for all workers. The AMWU seeks to create opportunities for jobs growth and is not about turning a blind eye to progress. The AMWU is the driver of innovation, which is demonstrated in the AMWU plan for low-emissions industry and technology development in Australia—a plan that was released in May this year. I would like to pay tribute to the current national leadership of Dave Oliver and Paul Bastian, two great union leaders who I have had the pleasure of working with over many years.

There is much commentary about these roles. The term 'union boss' is flung around by parts of the media and those on the opposite benches as some sort of a negative. Well, I am proud to have been a union boss. It is a job that is hard work, but it is also extremely satisfying. I have spent many bitterly cold Tasmanian mornings and late nights at work sites, providing information to members, listening to their concerns and then bargaining on their behalf. I have held positions on both the ACTU and Unions Tasmania executives, as well as on Tasmanian industry councils. In these roles my focus was always on protecting and strengthening workers’ rights and long-term jobs growth for our future. I am and will always remain a proud member of the AMWU.

The years I spent in the trade union movement also led me to take an interest in politics and I joined the Australian Labor Party in 1995. I have represented the AMWU at every Tasmanian state conference since 1995, putting forward motions dealing with workers compensation, training opportunities and improving conditions not just for AMWU members but for all workers. Although none of our motions were opposed, progress in getting these improvements to legislation has been slow. For many years the same motions would be proposed, and I am heartened to say that some progress has been made in some of these areas. My work as a union official would not have been possible without the hard work of AMWU delegates representing union members in their workplaces. The delegate's role is one of the hardest jobs in the union. Rarely is the delegate rewarded with even a thank you, and when times in a workplace are difficult delegates are usually the first person workers will go to. To all the delegates I have worked with, I say: 'Thank you for the role you have played and continue to play. Thank you, for ensuring union members are represented in their workplaces. And, thank you for the support you provided me as an official.'

My time with the AMWU provided me with many long-lasting friendships and great comrades. I have worked with many loyal and committed people, in particular, my dear friend Jennifer Dowell. We carry with us always our days with the 'foodies'. We forged not only a great working relationship, but a friendship for life, and I am pleased that she is able to be here tonight. The list is long but I would also like to mention, Shane Littler, Donna Sargent, Peter 'Secret' Cozens, John Short and my friend Bryan Green, the Deputy Premier of Tasmania. These people were great to work with and we have some unforgettable memories.

During my years in the trade union movement, there has been a change of workplace culture in many areas of the Australian manufacturing industry, particularly in the treatment of women in the industry, although there is still more to do. Gone are the days where women could not drive forklifts, because it was a 'man’s job'. Gone are the days when women were given the lower paid jobs and the men were given the higher paid jobs. Now the jobs are awarded on skills not gender. Unfortunately, this struggle has not been won across all sectors. We still have a way to go in the community, retail and childcare sectors.

I welcome the historic decision by Fair Work Australia in May this year that recognises that social and community services workers in the not-for-profit sector are underpaid and that part of the reason is that this sector is female dominated. I also recognise the support that the Australian and state Labor governments have provided in their submissions to this case. I await with interest Fair Work Australia’s decision on the level of the pay increase. It is imperative that all governments, state and federal, work together to meet their responsibilities and provide funding increases that the independent umpire decides are appropriate.

One of the most significant campaigns organised by the trade union movement, that I have been involved in, was the Your Rights at Work campaign. This campaign saw the end of WorkChoices, legislation in which many workers’ conditions were put back decades. Workers no longer felt they could speak up for fear of reprisal, something no human being should feel. Australians should have the right to go to work, participate in their workplace, be shown respect, receive a decent wage and get home safely to their family. This was one of the most well-known and effective campaigns during my years in the trade union movement. I am honoured and proud to have played a role in it and in the abolition of WorkChoices. As Martin Luther King Jr said:

History is a great teacher. Now everyone knows that the labor movement did not diminish the strength of the nation but enlarged it. By raising the living standards of millions, labor miraculously created a market for industry and lifted the whole nation to undreamed of levels of production. Those who attack labor forget these simple truths, but history remembers them.

I say: may we never see anything like Work Choices before this place again.

As I outlined earlier, I worked at the Simplot factory in jobs which are labelled by many as unskilled. Well, I stand here today to dispute this. Having been one of those 'unskilled' workers, I know just how many skills are needed to run the machines within the factory, how many skills are needed to conduct tests in the laboratory, how many skills are needed to pack the product ready for distribution and how many skills are needed to inspect the product to ensure food safety is paramount, and I know that all these jobs require a high skill level. The AMWU food division has sought to ensure that food workers, these so-called unskilled workers, have their skills recognised within the structure of the Australian Qualifications Framework. This has been an extremely long road, with resistance from many employers. There was a fear that providing workers with recognition of their skills would cost them more, with no benefits. Through the hard work of my union, its delegates and its members, food workers in many food and confectionery factories are now recognised for their on-the-job and other training. This competency based training counts towards a trade qualification, providing evidence to employers of the skills a worker possesses. Some employers now recognise the benefits of competency based training results in improved information for management on the skills a worker holds and any future training requirements that are needed. Productivity levels have increased and, also importantly, morale in these factories has improved.

I recall when the Simplot Scottsdale factory closed in 2003. It was important to ensure the workers were given recognition of the skills they had learnt on the job over the years of their employment. Many of these workers had joined the workforce directly from high school and some had even left school early to work at the factory. A number of them had low levels of literacy and numeracy. For most workers, the skills learnt on the job had never been linked to a qualification. People did not think they would need to worry about it—management or workers. But all workers had skills that could be transferable to a new workplace.

On one occasion at the factory, I was having a conversation with Wally, who had worked there for over 35 years. I asked him what he thought he might do after the closure and whether or not he had obtained any certificates through recognition of prior learning. Wally told me that he was not sure that he would have any qualifications, other than his BA. I was taken aback. I thought, 'How did Wally have the time to complete a Bachelor of Arts while working shift work for so many years?' And Wally did not strike me as being someone who would be interested in this type of qualification. I said to him: 'I didn’t know you had a BA! When and where did you do that?' He replied, 'I did it couple of years ago when it was offered across the factory.' He and some others had done it together. This made me more inquisitive. After more questioning of him, I learnt that Wally’s BA was a certificate for his breathing apparatus training. It was the acronym that he and his workmates had used for the course. Wally was extremely proud of his competency and that it had been recognised with a vocational certificate. For many of these workers, like Wally, who left school at an early age, obtaining a certificate to recognise their skills gave them a sense of accomplishment they were rarely able to experience.

Competency based training has given food workers the opportunity to obtain a qualification that is equal to that of trades­people. The recognition of prior learning importantly also gives workers a sense of achievement that they have never experienced before. Men and women like Wally, whose years of toil and years of being told that they are 'unskilled', are provided with a certificate that says, 'We recognise what you’re capable of.' All workers, regardless of their previous education, should be able to achieve a qualification that has portability for them to take wherever their life takes them.

I would like to thank my friend Les Cameron for the support, knowledge and assistance he has given to me and those workers over the many years of the implementation of the food processing certificate qualification. Les’s manner and the way in which he goes about his role makes people with all levels of education feel comfortable about having their skills recognised within the structure of the Australian Qualifications Framework.

The path my life has taken would not have been possible without the love and support of my parents, Tom and Betty. Mum is here tonight. Thanks, Mum, for always being there and giving us all those opportunities. To my husband of 35 years, Graham, you have always been there to support me, always been there to accompany me and always been prepared to offer advice, even when I thought I did not need it. I thank you for your unconditional love.

My thanks also goes to my sister Jan, who could not be here tonight. She is busy preparing to donate a kidney to her husband, Max. The achievements you have made in your life have been an inspiration to me. And thanks to my brother, Adrian, and his wife, Kim, who have come from Karratha to be here tonight. Your constant interest and encouragement in the choices I have made have always meant a great deal to me. Thank you also to all my extended family. To our two children, Jason and Belinda, you have grown into adults that we are extremely proud of. You are providing a safe, loving environment for our four grandchildren. Thank you both. Belinda and her husband have recently moved back to Tasmania from Western Australia. It is great to have them back home and to have them here tonight. Our eldest grandson, Shaun, is in his third year of a boilermaker-welder apprentice­ship—something he dreamed of doing for several years. When he was in grade 10 he was even more positive that an apprenticeship was what he wanted to do. His mother said to him, 'If that's what you want to do, then go for it.' Although quietly spoken and reasonably shy, he went out and did just that and he is now excelling at his trade and loving it. Aydan, our second eldest, is in grade 8. Since returning home he is enjoying the lifestyle that rural Tasmania offers. It is great to have one of our grandchildren so close. We hope Shaun will return from Western Australia when his apprenticeship is completed.

Our two youngest, Charlize and Cody, are also in Western Australia, with their parents, Jason and Hayley. They could not be here tonight because of work commitments, but I know they are here in spirit. As a grandparent, I hope they are able to have every opportunity to achieve whatever they want from life. I know their parents will assist them in achieving their goals.

I see it as my role in this place to ensure that we leave to our grandchildren an Australia that is better than it is today. My party, the ALP, is the party to do that. It is a party that has a long-term vision for this nation. It is all well and good for the Premier of Western Australia, Mr Colin Barnett, to take cheap shots at the Tasmanian economy. What Premier Barnett conveniently forgets is that Tasmania is in fact the second-fastest growing state economy in Australia. We are growing faster than Queensland, Victoria, New South Wales and South Australia. Tasmania has come a long way under a state Labor government. Our unemployment rate has gone from double digits to around 5½ per cent. Our population has grown, and we have the second-lowest taxation severity of all states. We do make a fair contribution to the national economy, and in many areas we lead the nation. Tasmania continues to be a state of opportunity.

And some credit for the resilience and strength of the Tasmanian economy must be given to the track record of the state Labor government. I am currently a Tasmanian ALP vice-president. I thank the state ALP for the support they have provided me. Since joining the ALP I have met many great people and made many friendships along the way, and I would like to mention just a few of these. I thank Senator Carol Brown for her friendship and guidance. Carol is always there for that reality check when needed. I also thank Carol's staff, Brenton, Stuart, Julie and Rikki, for their ongoing support and assistance; Julie Collins, Parliamentary Secretary for Community Services—a hardworking and outstanding member for Franklin; John Dowling, State Secretary of the ALP, for his good humour, advice and assistance; and the Tasmanian Young Labor group: you are an inspiration, and I know our great party will be in good hands into the future.

To the members of the Bridgewater/Brighton and Leven branches of the ALP: it has been great being a rank-and-file member of your branches. I thank the many branches who sent letters of congratulation on my election to the Senate. I thank my great staff: Lyn, with whom I have worked for the past 20 years; Amanda; and Matt. They are all here tonight. And I thank Ian, who just joined us a couple of weeks ago and is holding the fort back home.

I also thank the Clerk of the Senate and all the staff here at Parliament House. Your knowledge, support, friendliness and assistance has been invaluable in working through the maze of information, areas and procedures of this house. I have had the pleasure of working with an enormous number of people from many backgrounds over the past 30 years. Each of them has given me experiences, some I have enjoyed and want to remember; some I would rather forget. But they have all been experiences and part of life's learning, and I guess the experiences I have here will be similar. I am excited by the challenges and opportunities this place brings. During my time in this place I want to be a voice for those who need a voice. I want to offer a helping hand to those who need it and be a strong advocate for Tasmania. I hope that I can contribute to ensuring a better Australia for Shaun, Aydan, Charlize, Cody and for all our grandchildren.

John Hogg (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Pursuant to order, I now call Senator Waters to make her first speech and ask honourable senators to extend to her the usual courtesies.

Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am so pleased that we start our day in this chamber acknowledging the traditional custodians of this land, the Ngunawal people. To that daily ritual, I add my personal respects to this ancient and enduring culture of our land. It is with great pride that I give my first speech today, the first ever speech of a Green senator representing Queensland. Queensland has a long history of green activism but it has taken us 20 years to gain a seat in federal parliament. So today is a historic occasion.

I am privileged to be the first Green elected at any level of government in Queensland. A congruence of history, many years of campaigning by dedicated people, the inspirational leadership of Senator Bob Brown and being in the right place at the right time have meant that this remarkable opportunity has fallen to me. Expectation is high and need is great for there are many pressing issues confronting Queensland.

I want to begin by paying tribute to the Queensland Greens members whose efforts over those long years have put me here today, particularly Drew Hutton and Libby Connors, and more recently Ian Gittus, Mark White and Sam La Rocca. I stand on their shoulders and draw on their wisdom. Likewise, I would not be here without the thousands of committed Greens members, volunteers and campaign workers who share this victory today. Some of them are in the gallery tonight, including the former Democrat senator, and now Greens member, my friend Andrew Bartlett. I am touched that they are here to share this moment.

To my eternally hardworking staff, who are also here tonight: thank you for everything you do for me. Collectively, we will make a difference, and let us have fun doing it. It is a great honour but also a huge responsibility to stand here as the voice of 312,000 Queenslanders who voted one year ago for a fairer and more sustainable future. I hope to do justice to their faith and trust in the Greens.

Eight months ago, our state suffered its worst flooding since 1974, with devastation of our towns, our countryside and our homes and, tragically, the deaths of 35 Queenslanders, four of them children. The sheer destruction was almost incomprehensible. And yet from the depths of this loss grew a great sense of common purpose. People rallied to help neighbours and strangers alike. I will never forget the image of a man rescuing an injured kangaroo joey from floodwaters, carrying it in his arms to safety. There were countless acts of great selflessness and bravery. Overwhelming adversity was a great unifier.

It is the confidence born of that deep community spirit which gives me unshakeable hope for our future. The challenges we face are great and the experts are telling us that we must act quickly—more quickly than those with vested interests in the status quo would like, but we will make it. Despite the awesome global task of arresting climate change and preserving this wondrous planet for years to come, we will do it.

That determined optimism is what drives me in this place. It is what keeps me going despite the long hours away from my two-year-old little girl, Lana, who is upside down up there in the glass gallery. When she is older, I want to be able to tell her that I did everything I could to give her a better future and to ensure that she can enjoy the beauty and the diversity and the glorious joy of this one planet and its multitude of species.

In another life, I went to drama school, so indulge me a Shakespeare reference. Hamlet, in one of his regular self-pitying moments, laments 'the beauty of the world, the paragon of animals' as 'a sterile promontory' and 'a quintessence of dust'. He needed to get out more. And clearly he had never been to Queensland. My home state is blessed with verdant rainforests, stunning beaches, rich but scarce farmlands and abundant community spirit. Queensland has a vast and rugged beauty. And we have the privilege of living on the shores of the Great Barrier Reef, the largest coral ecosystem in the world, an internationally significant biodiversity icon.

Like many other Queenslanders, I feel a fierce protectiveness towards our reef. From my first visit at age 11 to a remote reef island as part of a turtle-monitoring expedition—thanks, Dad—I have loved this underwater paradise. I am not alone. Today it supports a $6 billion tourism industry which employs 67,000 people. Yet this great employer and money-spinner for Queensland, this ancient natural wonder, is being turned into a coal and gas highway in the race to double Queensland's coal exports by 2030 and ride the coal seam gas boom for its 25-year life span in the dying days of the fossil fuel industry. It is a great irony that the burning of those fossil fuels is endangering our coral ecosystems through ocean acidification and increased water temperatures, just as the proliferation of massive tankers and the millions of tonnes of dredging—for new coal and gas ports—within the reef world heritage area are directly threatening our reef.

The extraction of coal and coal seam gas is also threatening that other great Queensland industry—agriculture. Just 2.2 per cent of Queensland is good quality agricultural land, yet the coal and coal seam gas miners want to go into our best food-producing land sitting on top of the Great Artesian Basin and turn our food bowl into an industrial wasteland. You cannot eat coal and you cannot drink gas. It beggars belief that neither the state government nor the federal government is taking a long-term view of how we are going to feed ourselves if the groundwater table drops or if those aquifers are contaminated. The coal seam gas industry is still trying to work out what to do with the billions of litres of water it extracts from coal beds. It does not need a water licence, and it considers water a waste product. In this driest continent on the planet, who could ever conceive of water as a waste product? Food security should be beyond politics and it should not be sold out for short-term royalties and offshore private profits. We simply do not know enough about our underground water resources to understand what new connections gas well drilling and hydraulic fracturing might create. We need a moratorium on new approvals until we fully understand the risks—the precautionary principle demands it and the community demands it.

Likewise, there is no coexistence between open-cut coalmines and farming. Those huge, 30-megatonne mines eat up the landscape. Those generational farming families of our rich Darling Downs should be applauded for the strength of their spirit and their campaign against this rapacious industry. Why risk it, when we have alternatives to energy production but no alternatives to food? We have wonderful solar resources in Queensland, some promising geothermal deposits, wave and tidal potential and, to a lesser extent, wind. Innovative nations like Spain are rolling out remarkable new solar thermal technologies that can supply baseload solar power. I want to see Queensland have a part in that. I want Queensland to lead the way, lead Australia's charge to the new low-carbon economy.

Numerous reports tell us that renewable energy generation is more job intensive than old coal, and that we have the technological capacity to power our nation with 100 per cent renewable energy within a decade. That is such an exciting prospect, environmentally and economically. We need to be making plans now for just transitions for coal based communities so no-one is left behind when the day comes that the world does not want our coal anymore. Getting rid of the $11 billion of fossil fuel subsidies would be a good and fiscally responsible start.

The carbon price is another vital step. I cannot think of a greater honour than to be part of the parliament that passes climate laws, including the complementary measures like $10 billion for renewable energy and $1 billion for biodiversity. That will be a great day for this nation. It is the tireless work of my dedicated and incredibly bright colleagues that will deliver a carbon price. I want to thank all of them for being a constant source of inspiration to me, particularly Bob and Christine. I feel so privileged to be part of this visionary and brave team.

I come to this place from the community legal sector, from one of 200 of Australia's vastly underfunded, non-government, not-for-profit legal practices. Eschewing the emptiness of corporate legal work, I spent the bulk of my working life on an award wage as a public interest environmental lawyer at the Environmental Defenders Office in Brisbane, an organisation which is a great unsung hero of many legal improvements in Queensland.

It was a privilege to work with individuals, community and environmental groups who sought to use the law to protect the environment, those busy folk who took time from their own working and family lives to fight for causes bigger than their own self-interest. They did not sit back and accept bad environmental outcomes; they did not allow developers or government to get away with unlawful conduct; they were not deterred by the sheer magnitude of the David and Goliath challenge to powerful interests. They put their time, their money and themselves on the line and fought for the public interest. They remain my heroes.

Working in a community legal centre brought home to me the lack of genuine access to justice. Having good laws on paper does not do much if people are not aware of their rights, are not able to enforce them or cannot even afford legal advice to know where to begin. The risk of crippling court costs in public enforcement cases, the sheer complexity of environmental laws and the lack of understanding of the handful of rights people actually have to protect the environment all need redressing. We need legal aid for the environment, and all community legal centres need more recurrent funding for services—and decent wages at least in parity with the public sector.

I would like to thank my boss at EDO, the gracious yet tenacious Jo Bragg, for her tutelage on law, politics and negotiation. I miss her companionship, gentle guidance and constant support of me. She is a true friend and mentor. During those nine years at EDO I am particularly proud of using our federal environmental laws to stand up for the Great Barrier Reef and being part of the team who successfully argued that, when conducting environmental impact assessment, the federal minister must take a broad approach and must consider the purpose for which development is proposed. In that case, it meant that the EIS for the proposed Nathan Dam on the Dawson River needed to consider the likely run-off of endosulfan and other pesticides and fertiliser into, ultimately, the Great Barrier Reef. It was also an honour to work on a case that protected 896—we counted them—rare and threatened plants in World Heritage quality rainforest on beautiful Springbrook Plateau in the Gold Coast hinterland, one of my favourite places in the world.

But those wins were, sadly, rare. Over the years I grew increasingly frustrated with the limits of the law to achieve good environmental outcomes. I got sick of having to tell people that they had no legal rights to stop that new coalmine, or protect that local patch of bushland, or stop that infrastructure going right through koala habitat. I realised that the laws needed changing to give people more rights to stand up for the environment for the common good. That is what encouraged me to seek change through politics.

Our family was never very political, but a reverence for nature and a love for all living creatures was imbued in my upbringing. I won the environment prize at Rainworth State School in grades 4, 5 and 6, and my sense of injustice was ignited in my early teens when reading David Day's Whale Wars about the international whaling fights of the 1980s. At 14 I turned vegetarian because of my love for animals and later for ecological reasons, and I have continued that decision for 20 years now.

The Greens were the only choice for me. No other political party captures my beliefs and values so entirely, operates with unfailing integrity and honesty, stands up for what is right even if it is controversial, and has living within our ecological means and treating each other with more kindness as its central tenets.

In that decision I have been supported by my family. My parents always encouraged me to stand up for what I believe in and I would not be here without their teachings. They are in the gallery today along with my wonderful stepparents. Mum and Nick, dad and Anne, thank you for your patience, love and support. I hope to do you proud in this place. I want to particularly thank my mum, Lorraine, who is now giving up a well-earned retirement to be our part-time nanny. From being the best mother in the world to me, she is now the best grandmother a girl could hope for. I couldn't do this without her. Not everyone is as lucky as I am, so we need better support systems for women, particularly young women, to encourage them into politics. I thank the strong women who have gone before me in this place and paved the way.

My stepsister sadly can't be here today but my aunt and some dear friends are—it means a lot that you are here.

To my partner, Brendan, I love you. Thank you for letting me do this and for always knowing what to say. You are a wonderful father to our little girl, Lana, and I am so lucky to have you. To little Lana, who is running around up there, you are the light of my life and it is you that keeps me going. Although you are too young to understand, I hope you will be proud of your mum, and learn to dream big.

I often wonder what the world will be like when Lana is my age. Despite my unfailing positivity, with a world population heading for 9.2 billion by 2050, I worry at the scarcity of resources and I despair at the inequity of their distribution. We need to address the sheer numbers of humans on this fragile and finite planet, but we must also address our overconsumption. We are richer now than at any time in history, we have more stuff, but are we happier? The endless treadmill of consumption is not enriching our spirit or fulfilling us. As a society we are becoming more detached from the natural world and from our communities.

But as a shameless optimist, I can envisage a different future. I see sustainable cities and towns, with active, healthy citizens who have better work-life balance and the time to engage in their local communities, in settlements designed for people and not cars, with local health and educational services and local food production—real communities.

I am not alone in these aspirations. The relocalisation movement is, somewhat ironically, going global, and for good reason. The impact of our current consumption is such that we need 1.5 earths to fuel our greed, and with population growth patterns and business as usual we would need two planet earths by 2030. We have presided over the fastest rate of species extinction in history, sending biodiversity into massive decline. I do not believe that we have the right to do that. We are caretakers of this unique planet and we need to deliver it to future generations and to other species in better condition than we inherited it. To do that, we need to start living within our ecological means and address the disparity of wealth that sees millions of children living in poverty without clean water or enough food. We must recognise that in a finite system there must necessarily be limits to growth, and that we can have shared prosperity without growth. And above all, we must recognise that the economy is a wholly owned subsidiary of the planet. In this great time in history, when the fate of the world and its life support systems is so finely balanced, we in this place must have the courage to be leaders in our community and yet also give voice to our communities. I see a lot of lobbyists walking these halls—powerful vested interests, captains of industry. I see fewer non-government organisations and very few ordinary community members. As the only Queensland senator from outside the major parties, I want to give progressive Queenslanders their voice back in this parliament.

If, when my time is up, I leave this place having contributed in some small way to improving our environmental laws with better community rights, consideration of cumulative impacts, and federal oversight of water, the lawyer in me will be delighted. If I leave this place having been part of putting a price on pollution to protect the Great Barrier Reef, the mother in me will be happy. If I leave this place having delivered better funding to community legal centres, seeing the proceeds of our mineral wealth shared more fairly and helping vulnerable people in our community of all creeds, the humanist in me will rejoice. If I can do all of those things, I will feel that my time away from my little girl and my family was worth it.

For many years I have had a screen saver which says, 'Make a difference.' Now more than ever I have that chance and I am grateful and so humbled by it. It is with a big heart and a passionate belief in the goodness of humanity that I undertake this journey. I hope to play a part in creating a fairer, safer and happier future for the generations to come. I look forward to working with all of you to do so. Thank you.