Subjects: Cultural diversity; Education
E&OE………………………………………………………………………………………
Thank you very much Michael
My Ministerial Colleges Philip Ruddock and Jackie Kelly, to His Excellency Dr Abdullah Omar Naseef the Deputy Speaker of the Parliament of Saudi Arabia, His Worship the Mayor of Auburn, Laurie Ferguson the Member for Reid and Ross Cameron the Member for Parramatta, Alan Cadman the Member for Mitchell, my other Parliamentary Colleges and other distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen.
This is something of a special occasion, it is the first opportunity I’ve had in the time that I’ve been Prime Minister to be involved in the official opening of an independent school instructed by the beliefs of Islam. And it’s therefore an important milestone in the very successful walk of our nation along the road of greater understanding, greater tolerance and greater diversity.
The Party I lead and the Government I now lead has long believed that choice in education is something very sacred. We believe that education should have basic standards. We believe that education should be available to all and we also believe that parents should have a right to choose the kind of education they think is best for their children. And that right to choose not only relates to academic issues but it also relates to issues of culture and issues of spiritualism.
I looked at the motto of the school, I always look at school mottoes and it reads ‘Faith, Knowledge and Success’. There’s something quite logical about that. If you have faith and if you acquire knowledge and you mix the two of them in an intelligent fashion you are normally more likely to be successful. Not just successful in a material sense but also successful in a personal and individual sense.
I want to acknowledge as other speakers have done the great generosity of the Government of Saudi Arabia towards this center and the establishment of this school. That interest, your Excellency, has been ongoing, it has been consistent and it has been a great act of generosity to my fellow Australians of Islamic faith, particularly those living in this part of Sydney. And I do appreciate that.
Many of the previous speakers have spoken of the great gift of being an Australian, of how we have created something very special in our country. And how so much of that special character has been built on tolerance and understanding of difference. And we have been remarkably successful and it is important on an occasion like this to salute that success.
I thought as I came here today and I met a representative of the Bosnian community, I thought of the tremendous impact on people very different who came to Australia from the former Yugoslavia, of the tragic events in that area of the world over the last 10 years. I can understand the depth of feeling that people had at the time, whether they were Bosnian, whether they were Islamic, they were Croatian Catholic, they were Serbian Orthodox or whatever the great diversity was, the sense of feeling and identification and outrage yet compassion for what was occurring in their former homeland or the former homeland of their parents must have been very intense. Yet remarkably, miraculously although those feelings remain very strong and understandable they did not exhibit themselves into discord and unreasonable anger and conflict here in Australia. What that tells us is that the bonds we have as Australians keep us together in a way no other force can pull us apart and that is the great success of this country. And the reason that that is so, is complex yet simple. It is so because what binds us together is always greater than what might pull us apart. But it is also so because we do practice the sort of tolerance and understanding and respect for difference of which Dr Rowe, representing the Uniting Church here in Auburn, spoke so eloquently.
So this today is a great celebration of a number of things. It is a celebration of the commitment that many Governments in Australia have had not least my own to the course of choice in education. It is true that the establishment of this school was made easier by the changes to the new schools policy brought in by the Government in 1996. Without those changes it would have been a great deal harder. It is true that the maintenance of choice in education remains a cornerstone of our philosophical approach. It is also true that the support of the Islamic community drawn from so many different countries around the world has been absolutely crucial to the establishment of this school, as indeed has been the practical support of the local council here in Auburn, and I thank them for their contribution to it.
The very last thing I want to say is directed to the really important people here today and they are the teachers and the students. I visit many schools. They’re different, each has a special character. This visit today was very different again, yet it was also very familiar. The songs, the interacting between the teachers and the students, the open happiness, the innocence of the younger children, the dedication of the teachers. Can I say to any of the students that may be here perhaps to their parents who will no doubt tell them that your teachers are a very important part of your life. Teaching is a very noble profession. It’s very important to the nurturing of future generations and I want to place on record my admiration for the teaching staff of this school as I do for the teaching staff of any school that I visit. What students learn from their teachers just as what students learn from their parents are things that stay with them all of their lives. And if those lessons that we were shown today are the lessons of this school the students who come out of this school won’t go far wrong in life and that is a wonderful legacy for the school to leave.
Thank you very much for having me.
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