Subjects: tough on drugs; Don Bradman; George W Bush; education system; teaching.
E&OE................................
Thank you very much Mrs Sayer and to the students of Brigidene College, the students of the other schools that are associated with this gathering today, to the teachers and parents of the college and other visitors. May I thank the school for the courtesy it has extended to me in allowing me to visit it and to launch another initiative to be funded out of the Federal Government's Tough on Drugs strategy which is combining elements of education, law enforcement and rehabilitation services to tackle the problems of drugs.
And before I come to the details of the local programme that I am announcing today, can I take this opportunity at Brigidene College of saying again how very strongly the Federal Government supports the Catholic systemic education system all around Australia. Freedom of parental choice in education has been a fundamental philosophical belief of my Government and the party I lead for many years. We believe that parents have the right to choose the kind of education their children should receive and I have long admired the commitment of Catholic parents around Australia to maintain a strong, independent system of their own based on the values that they hold dear and they believe are important to the education of their children. For many years they received no government help but that of course ended in the 1960s and now their schools are supported, particularly by the Federal Government and our recent funding decisions guarantee years into the future the financial security of the Catholic systemic system. And indeed the financial capacity of parents to choose other independent schools if they want for the education of their children and we do that side by side with strong support, beside State governments for the maintenance of a strong state government school system.
Can I say to all of you that it has not been possible, as an Australian, over the past week, to be other than quite moved and overwhelmed by the reaction of our people to the death of Sir Donald Bradman. Indeed, the other day I had a brief telephone conversation with President Bush who rang to discuss a number of issues. And the first part of our conversation was taken up with a reference to Sir Donald's death and I indicated to him, a baseball fan, that on a proper comparison I understand that if you use baseball language, Sir Donald would have had a batting average of five hundred plus. And when you bear in mind that Joe Di Maggio and Babe Ruth were in the four hundred plus area he was fairly impressed and so he might have been. But the honour paid to the memory of Don Bradman is not just for his sporting prowess but as your principal said, it is an honour paid for the sort of values he stood for and the kind of contemporary society that Australia has become but also preserving its traditional strengths and its traditional values.
Today, ladies and gentlemen, I am announcing funding of $80,000 for the Brisbane West Youth Partnership Programme and this partnership is designed to work to prevent the use of illicit drugs. And the partnership brings together not only Brigidene College but Brisbane Boys College, Kenmore High, Indooroopilly High, Drug Arm and some other local community agencies. And this is an extension of an initiative based at Indooroopilly High where Drug Arm focuses on crime prevention strategies for young people after school. It also builds upon successful programmes by Drug Arm at the Bundamba State High School in Ipswich last year. It is very worthwhile that this partnership will involve students from the state, the independent and systemic schools as well as other young people who are not at school. The project will provide training for peer leaders and adult mentors and implement a community youth forum in western Brisbane. A project committee to oversee the partnership will include representatives from the project partners, the Queensland drug courts, the Queensland Police, local businesses and others including representatives from local action teams to be formed.
This is a part of a $500 million programme that the Federal Government launched more than two years ago to provide extra support for the campaign against illicit drug taking around Australia. I am very pleased to say that it is a programme where the Federal Government has been able to work in very close partnership with State governments of both political persuasions because tackling the drug problem is something above and beyond party politics and we have also been able to work very effectively with community organisations.
The Tough on Drugs strategy is not just focus on crime prevention, important though that is. It is also focussed equally on education. On explaining in a sensible direct understandable fashion how unwise it is to commence experimentation with drugs in the first place and how to use that old expression but still very relevant expression that prevention is better than cure. And therefore an important part of everything we do is education. And another very important part of it is to provide rehabilitation services. One of the gaps in tackling drugs around Australia that is evident all around the country is that rehabilitation services have not been adequate. But there is nothing more sad for me to be on a talkback radio programme and a mother to ring up and say my child wants to kick the habit but I can't find anywhere that is going to give her the support and the attention and the care that will enable her to do so. And therefore we have to as both Federal and state governments to provide more facilities to help young people, indeed any people who have a drug problem that they want to get rid of to receive rehabilitation and help. So we are tackling it in three ways. We are tackling it at an education level, we are tackling it at a crime prevention level and we are tackling it at a rehabilitation level.
Now it is fashionable for some people to say that it's a waste of effort, the fight has been lost, that we should give up. That we should accept that there is no way you can reduce the incidence of drug taking or reduce the ravaging impact of drug taking on the lives of some many people. That is not a view I hold and I don't think it is a view that most Australians hold. And there are now some tentative signs, they are tentative, and we still have a long way to go that some of the initiatives of both state and federal governments over the last few years are beginning to win some gains.
We're starting to see some evidence, particularly in New South Wales, of a reduction in death through heroin use. We're starting to see through the more successful campaign of drug seizures by the Federal Police working in cooperation with the state police we're starting to see some impact on the availability. It's a long and tough campaign but it's a very crucial one. And the important part of it is to educate, particularly young people, but all people, about the long term devastating effect of drug abuse. There used to be a view that marijuana could be used with no effect no matter what the length of use was. That is now a proposition that is heavily disputed by all sorts of evidence by people in the medical profession. The reality is that the use of illicit drugs has damaging social, physical and psychological effects no matter what the circumstances may be.
Tough on Drugs and the campaign that I've announced in this part of Brisbane today, which brings together community leaders and schools and those who understand the problem better than most. It is an initiative designed at a local level to display and advocate cause but not to mention drug taking in the first instance. And I am very pleased to announce this initiative today. I want to thank Drug Arm which has had a conspicuous success here in the state of Queensland in the campaign against drugs. And to say once again this is a partnership between the government, schools and the local community. And it is only through bringing all of those together that we can have a hope over time of not only bringing the drug menace under control, but gradually eliminating it.
Can I finally address one or two remarks the students who are here today particularly those from Brigidene College and elsewhere who have entered their last year of school. The last year of school is always the most challenging one because it is the one that more than any other to chase your opportunities in life. You're entering a world that is very different from the world that I entered when I left Canterbury Boys High School in the suburbs of Sydney in 1956. It was a very different world then. Some aspects of it were more secure than today, but other aspects of it were less exciting than the prospects that lie in front of you as you leave school today.
You are really at a time and in an era when the opportunities are far less limited than what they were in the 1950s. The benefits and the horizons opened up by information technology, that the reality of living in a country which is about as stable and cohesive and tolerant and open as any that you can find in the world, and whose lifestyle is so attractive that it is the preferred place of residence of an increasing number of people from all around the world, presents you with enormous opportunity.
It is more competitive to get into a university now than what it was in the 1950s, yet the range of courses offered is much greater than was the case then. And the job opportunities are much greater. I can only say to all of you that the best piece of advice I would ever give to final year students at any school anywhere in Australia be it a Catholic school, another independent school or a government school, is always retain a positive view on life. I've found that in relation to people you always find something positive about everybody you interact with and I say that even after 27 years in political life there's always something positive in people you interact with. And that if you find your relationship with your fellow students, your teachers, your family, your friends, if you seek the opportunity of looking for what is positive in that person you'll have a far fuller and a far happier life.
Of all the happy fulfilled people I've met in life have been the people who've looked for the positive side in their fellow man. People who I've found most miserable are those who essentially adopt a negative view of those with whom they interact. Now I know that's a wonderful piece of advice for all of you. I know that people will be marvellously impressed that I've given it and they would think it might make a contribution to relations between the teaching staff and the students.
Can I also say to the teachers that teaching is a very noble profession. And I know on occasions all of us when we've been through school wonder about that proposition I think the longer you are on this earth the more you appreciate the contribution that teachers make to the shaping of your life. And I look back on my years at school now with even greater appreciation of the contribution that teachers made. I honour the contribution they make to Australian society. I thank the principal and the students and the staff of Brigidene College for paying me the courtesy of letting me come here this morning. I wish all of you who are finishing exams at the end of this year the very best of reports. I hope you get the results you work for, I hope you get the tertiary opportunities that you seek, and I hope you have happiness and success in life that I know all of you want. Thank you.
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