Female Orphan School, Parramatta
[ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS OMITTED]
I've had quite a week. It started here and it's finishing here, so what could be more appropriate than having started at the University of Western Sydney and finishing here at the University of Western Sydney.
It started when I came on Sunday evening to address friends of the Labor Party - Labor members and friends - about our vision for the country and our vision for this part of the country, for western Sydney.
And when I spoke in the Turbott Auditorium I made the point that this university is a factory of suburban opportunity.
It speaks to us about the things that we are trying to achieve for Australians around the nation, including particularly women. Because when we trace our life as a nation, for too long it was women who were locked out of the doors of universities.
For too long it was women who didn't get an equal opportunity for higher education - indeed for education at all.
And we are changing that. This university is changing it. Our policies are changing it.
Moving to a time when universities can grow - and this one is - there need be no false debate about standards dropping because of growth. Janice and I had a discussion about that on Sunday evening.
A university of high standards still able to offer more in opportunity and to offer that opportunity to people who traditionally haven't got a go at a university education, and who in great numbers are the first to come from their family to a university.
So I'm very proud to be here, and nothing really lifts up my heart more than hearing these stories of opportunity and achievement.
I spent a great deal of time out in western Sydney in the community this week. But I did go to Melbourne for one occasion - and I do want to just mention it because it was an occasion at which we honoured a great woman.
I went to the state funeral of Joan Child, the first Labor woman ever elected to the House of Representatives, and that happened in 1974.
Now there are probably some young women in the audience who are going ‘1974, before the dawn of time'. Actually for most of us, 1974 doesn't nearly seem that long ago that we could be talking about the first ever Labor woman to serve in the House of Representatives.
But serve she did, she was a formidable woman, a formidable campaigner.
For those of you who know something about the political scene there is always a scramble come elections to get out in front on the postal votes; to make sure that those people who are getting to vote by post actually get your ticket and they know how to vote for you if they are so-minded to vote for you.
Joan Child is famous for having when necessary climbed through a bathroom window into a suburban home to ensure that someone marking their postal vote did get a Labor ticket.
I'm sure the person in question did want a Labor ticket and somehow had managed to lock themselves in the house, but undeterred, she got through that bathroom window to make sure that they ended up with a how to vote card.
So she was a formidable woman!
But when we farewelled her, the first Labor woman in the House of Representatives, the first woman to serve as Speaker in the House of Representatives, a colleague of mine in saying farewell used these words:
She lived a life of strength, so others could live alife of opportunity.
A life of strength because she was the first woman to be elected - Labor woman to be elected to the Parliament.
A life of strength because she was effectively a single mother to five sons.
A life of strength because she lived to such a great age and made sure she continued to be active and supported her community.
But all of it was dedicated so others could live a life of opportunity.
And I think those very simple but powerful words actually catch the spirit of what International Women's Day is about in the modern age and why we do want to have occasions like this and honour women in our community; in this case, women in the west.
Because there are so many women from various walks of life who live lives of strength so others can have lives of opportunity.
And I know many of the women here this evening well and truly fit into that category and I'm looking forward to being able to meet people during the course of this evening's event and talk to them about the way in which they are harnessing opportunity for others in their community.
As a Government we strive to do that to. But we can only be as good as the local community efforts that work with us.
We can only be as good at bringing early childhood education to children, as the people - predominantly women - working in those child care centres and working as early educators.
We can only be as good at creating opportunity for kids in primary school as the teachers - predominantly women are - as they go about transforming lives for those young children.
We can only be as good as the teachers in secondary school, as the people in university, as the people who guide young apprentices are.
So in trying to create a life of opportunity for the nation, we know we've always got a lot of big and sometimes difficult decisions to make, but we know the carrying of our work into reality in communities rest on the shoulders of citizens of goodwill who want to work with us.
Fortunately right around the nation I find those citizens of goodwill and I've certainly found them in large numbers here in Sydney's west during the course of the last week.
From the people I've met who are spending their lives creating opportunity for Australians with disability and who are anxiously awaiting the start of the National Disability Insurance Scheme, to the teachers and principals I've met who are transforming lives of the young people in their care.
To the New South Wales Young Australian of the Year, Corey Payne, and the work he is doing to inspire others to live a life of opportunity.
To the people I've met at suburban libraries, in small businesses, just walking down the street, all of whom have a story about how they are trying to enrich this community, their community in their place.
So it has been a great week, and no better way to end it than right here celebrating some women of achievement. So it's a delight to join you.
We gather in this building, and this building I think too is a tremendously significant place. I'm glad we were able to help with that renovation, which is still going on.
But it says something about Australia that when we look at our universities - our great institutions of learning - that the oldest surviving building is this building. And it was a school for orphaned girls.
Now I suspect in its day it was making a difference - of course we would never conceptualise an institution like this in the modern age, we would never seek to recreate it - but you do have to admire the spirit that did create it.
And did create it so early in the life of our nation.
And did create it to make a difference for girls who otherwise would have lived lives of absolute disadvantage.
Did create it for those girls to give them some opportunity and some access to a life and learning so this place, something we wouldn't create now but created with the best of intentions.
And if we can take from what is in some ways a beautiful and other ways a very austere building, take with us from this evening tonight some of that spirit of endeavour that the creators of this building had - Anna King, Elizabeth Paterson and others - when they first decided that their fledgling colony did need to make a difference for the life of orphaned girls, if we can take some of that spirit with us then I think it will be a better place.
So it's truly a great pleasure to join you here this evening and I'm looking forward to hearing the individual stories of the women who are being honoured in this place.
Thank you.