We gather to discuss important matters - and the setting could not be more appropriate.
Perth is a beautiful city - as you all now know.
But it is more.
Perth is a vibrant multicultural city.
A centre for Australia's burgeoning minerals and resources industry.
A fitting symbol of the future of prosperity in the Commonwealth and the world.
Here among so many people from so many places, even some from beyond the Commonwealth, I am very strongly reminded of the distinctive things which we really share.
We share a distinctive way of doing things internationally.
Consulting and co-operating, in the common interests of our peoples, supporting international understanding and world peace.
Events in the world and the issues I discuss with leaders of governments, with leaders of business and civil society, regularly remind me:
Not every country in the world shares this way of working.
So it's good to be here with so many Commonwealth partners.
We also share a distinctive set of international concerns.
International peace and order. Liberty for individuals. Deep opposition to racism. Addressing climate change.
An ever-growing commitment to development.
So it's good to be here with so many Commonwealth friends.
The nations and peoples of the Commonwealth - nations and peoples of six continents and five oceans - are of course enormously diverse.
Taking in one quarter of the UN's members, one third of the world's population and including some of the smallest countries in the developing world.
Yet these values we share, our distinctive way of doing things and our distinctive set of concerns for the world's people, unite us in a way that is truly wonderful.
Our association of sovereign nations shares a remarkable international friendship.
We've seen that friendship this week.
CHOGM has drawn together not only heads of government, but artists and athletes, school children and of course business leaders.
All people in different phases of life, with different callings and professions, each engaged in enterprise which can make a positive difference in the world and at home.
You are truly very welcome tonight.
I know you've come to Perth looking forward to the opportunity to work and network to meet and talk as business leaders and friends, to find new ways to strengthen prosperity and spread it to all.
To make a difference.
As Chair of CHOGM, I want Australia to make a difference for the small and medium countries of the world.
No-one should have a monopoly on global decision-making.
No country should be left behind by human development and economic growth.
Australia's history and geography combine to give us a unique perspective: a perspective of both the North and the South.
Ensuring small and medium states have a voice in international decisions is an important priority for CHOGM.
That is true in all the elements of international society.
I want you to know tonight that I am firmly convinced it is true in international trade.
True, that every country should have a say.
True, that every country should share in the benefits.
Australia recognised the value of free trade long ago.
I think it would be fair to say that opening up to the world was one of the best peacetime decisions any Australian government has made.
And I am confident that Australian business would agree.
Opening up to trade has improved the international competitiveness of our industry sectors and firms.
Opening up to trade has helped to drive economic growth and with it, better jobs and better opportunities for our people.
Growth and jobs is the enduring purpose of government and business leadership in the economy.
And our experience here in Australia has taught us a pragmatic conviction in a simple equation:
Trade equals growth which equals jobs.
Something we know is true in Australia ... something we know is true in the wider world.
But to deliver the terms of that equation demands new leadership from all of us in today's world.
Recovery from the global recession of 2008-09 in much of the northern hemisphere has been weak and stuttering.
While economic growth has been much stronger in Asia, continuing softness in the United States and Europe is affecting the global economy as a whole.
All of us here at CHOGM have an interest in achieving a sustainable global economic recovery.
We all share an interest in jobs and growth.
In turn, we all share an interest in trade.
The global economy needs the shot in the arm, it needs the stimulus that greater openness and increased trade would provide.
New sources of economic growth need to be activated.
And millions of the world's poorest citizens can be liberated from poverty, while creating more jobs and growth worldwide, through trade.
So, simply put: we need to fix world trade.
But of course, as you and I know, realising our simple equation is not simple at all.
The Doha Round of the World Trade Organisation has to be part of the solution.
Yet global trade talks under the Doha Round have been going on for a decade now, with no sign of a breakthrough.
Worse, there are disturbing early signs that the world is retreating towards closed-door policies.
A new way for global trade negotiations needs to be found.
If we keep doing what we're doing, we'll keep getting what we're getting.
So if we want to see something different in the news from Doha, we can't just press rewind and replay.
And after a decade of discussion, just waiting for a better climate for negotiations is not an option - it certainly isn't leadership.
So if we can't just press rewind and replay - well, we can't press pause either.
No, if we want to get a better outcome at Doha, we need to stick a new disc in the machine.
The elements of a new approach have been laid out by Australia.
We do so as a friend - as a nation committed to the multilateral trading system and the World Trade Organization - and with a Trade Minister who has been tireless in his pursuit of a conclusion for Doha.
But we also do so with conviction that we need a new way.
First, it is time to consider breaking the Doha Round into more manageable parts and bringing them to successful conclusion as negotiations are completed.
We know that some issues are very close to resolution.
It makes sense to conclude and implement these.
For other, more intractable issues, such as market access, we need to consider alternative negotiating approaches.
We should also contemplate negotiating new issues, in parallel with Doha but beyond the existing Doha mandate, to ensure the WTO keeps pace with the demands of the modern economy.
Second, a commitment to refrain from increased protection along the way to the completion of the Round.
In May this year the WTO, OECD and UN Conference on Trade and Development reported a rise in protectionism greater than in any other period since the global financial crisis hit.
And just last week the European Commission found the overall picture had not improved.
G20 countries had applied yet more protectionist measures - 131 in total.
These signs of a return to closed-door policies should worry all governments, all businesses, who see the benefits of trade liberalisation, and to global economic recovery.
Third, we should make a down-payment for the world's least developed countries - this year.
In its founding and origin, Doha was explicitly intended to be a development round.
If Doha is a development round - then it must deliver greatly improved market access for the world's least developed countries.
Almost a third of them, Commonwealth nations.
At a meeting in Hong Kong in 2005, as part of the Doha Round, countries indicated a willingness to provide these countries access to their markets for up to 100 per cent of tariff lines.
Most countries have not done this, Australia has.
Since 2003, Australia has voluntarily been giving access to our market for least developed countries entirely free of tariffs and quotas.
At the time, the decision was taken by Australia as part of efforts to move the Doha Round forward.
In effect, we already offer all goods produced in the poorest countries entry to Australia free of tariffs and quotas.
I believe this is a path other developed economies should pursue - and it is one they could pursue now.
And to encourage global action, Australia is prepared to keep leading the way in opening doors for developing nations.
Tonight I pledge that the world's least developed countries will have access to Australia's market free of tariffs and quotas for 100 per cent of the goods they export to our country.
That is, Australia will continue the strongest possible commitment to market access for the world's poorest countries - irrespective of the settlement of other issues in the Doha Round.
In making this pledge, I am calling on other countries to make similar ambitious commitments ahead of the biennial meeting of Trade Ministers in Geneva in December.
To make their best possible pledges, whether it be for market access or in combinations of duty-free, quota-free access and direct financial assistance for trade facilitation.
These pledges should be unconditional; they shouldn't be contingent upon the settlement of other issues in the Doha negotiations.
Australia is also willing to play a leading part in the global fight against protectionism.
Tonight I therefore also announce that my government will make a commitment at the WTO Ministerial meeting to no increase in protection while the Doha negotiations proceed - a commitment to what we'll call a “standstill”.
This is an essential policy prescription if an enduring global economic recovery is to be achieved.
Again, I encourage other countries to do the same.
Economic growth and trade is the surest way out of poverty the surest way to create jobs and spread growth.
We owe it to these countries and their people to do the right thing.
Because they are our partners.
They are our friends.
And CHOGM 2011 brings us together as friends.
Friends who share certain values and ideas and friends who share a vision of the world we want to see.
A world of peace and order among nations and a world of liberty for people.
A world free of the scourge of racism and secure against the threat of climate change.
A world where development and prosperity are shared - where trade, jobs and growth leave no country behind.
We can bring that world a little closer through what we achieve here in Perth.
Together.
In partnership.
As a Commonwealth family.
As friends.