Subjects: Child water safety; McDonalds; social coalition
E&OE................................
Well thank you very much Laurie and Ted Russo of McDonalds, ladies and gentleman. I've come here today because I think this is a terrific way of getting a very simple message of safety across to the whole of the country. Australian's love their summer, they love their water, and of course there's nothing more tragic than the loss of young lives through swimming accidents, it's something that haunts all of us, when my children were you it was something that was always on my mind and I know it's on the mind of all young parents all around Australia. And it is absolutely marvellous that one of the icons of Australian swimming, Laurie Lawrence, and a very public spirited company in McDonalds have come together to create this very simple, I think, ear and eye-catching and I hope emotion-grabbing way of getting a very important message of water safety across.
The notion of "Keep Kids Alive - Do the Five", very simple, very catching, very compelling, is of course the product of the incredibly enthusiastic and public spirited mind and spirit of Laurie Lawrence. He's something of a legend in Australian swimming, he's certainly an icon amongst Australian sports spectators, there's nothing quite like him. But I also commend very warmly the public spirited character of McDonald's, for being willing to make the resources available, it's a great example of the social coalition, of somebody whose an icon in Australian swimming and a company that has given so much to Australia, has employed so many young Australians and given them their first job and an understanding of what it's like to be in the workforce.
But ladies and gentlemen I'm delighted to launch this campaign, I know it will be successful because it has all the ingredients of a successful public campaign. It's got an enthusiastic promoter, and when you have an enthusiastic promoter there's really nothing you can't achieve. And Laurie is certainly an enthusiastic promoter, I wish him well. I've got to say this is not as noisy as Question Time is on occasions, and I can assure all of you Laurie has our very good wishes, congratulations to both Laurie and McDonalds to get together in such a public spirited way for a great cause. Let's have no child drownings this year, let that be part of the result of this campaign.
Thank you very much.
[ends]