Thanks Nick for that warm Tasmanian welcome.
It's so good to be among so many friends.
Some friends I've known for so many years that it's best we pass over the detailed chronology, some friends I made here last night and I see again today.
It's good to see my Federal colleagues.
Dick and Geoff, Julie and Sid, Anne and Catryna and Carol, Helen and Lisa and Nick.
I see them too rarely down here but I see them very often in Canberra.
And believe me when I tell you this is an unusual occasion, one where I'm talking and they're listening.
Friends, Tasmania has the ten strongest voices in my ear in Canberra, every one of them is a Labor voice.
It's good to be here in a Labor State and among so many state colleagues.
And it's really good to see Lara.
I remember the first time I met your Premier.
A young EMILY's List activist speaking passionately about her State. And as I listened, I thought “this one will go a long way”.
But as I've worked with her this last year - on health reform, on broadband, on forests - I've come to believe Lara will go all the way.
Your Premier, Lara Giddings, is not just going to govern this state well for the next three years, with your help I know she is going to lead this Party to victory in 2014.
I love coming to Tassie. It's my kind of place.
In the faces I see and the places I go, I don't just meet people I like, I find values I recognise.
Because hard work, education and respect run through the spine of the State.
Through this place where people work hard: in the trucks and the laboratories, the wineries and restaurants, at the factories and on the farms, feeling the benefits and dignity of making their own way.
And where people understand that everyone who can work, should.
Those values run through this place where people chase the fair go for the future by chasing education for their kids on the long drive to lift school retention rates.
And this is a place where respect is a thing to show not just a word to say.
Where you can feel in every pub and workshop and office that great Australian belief that just because you're better-off doesn't mean you're better.
And these values of hard work, education and respect don't only shine through in the people of your State.
They burn brightly in the Government of your country as well.
And they illuminate our vision for Australia.
We're building a strong economy, where future growth is secured.
A new-technology, clean-energy, high-skill, high-wage economy for the future.
An economy where a small manufacturer of generic pharmaceuticals has a video conference with his supplier in Delhi and Shanghai every Monday.
An economy where an engineer visiting a mill in the northwest doesn't have to drive back to Hobart to get in for a check up with his GP.
An economy where great ideas in a digital age aren't born in Burnie and then raised in Seoul or Boston, they come to maturity in innovation hubs of our own.
An economy where carbon finally has a price, where economic growth is decoupled from emissions growth, where the clean energy jobs of the future are created here and created now.
And while we work to secure growth, we are determined to leave no one behind.
To build a fair society for the future, where all our people can make the choices which build them and their family a better life.
Where every principal has the authority and the incentive to lift school performance every year and every parent has the information to join in the task of school improvement too.
Where local clinicians can run the local hospital, responding to the economic incentives of our health reforms and where patients feel the benefits, in the emergency ward and in the operating theatre.
Where a teen mum can be studying her certificate three in child care services while her own baby is taken care of close by and where through the opportunity of new skills and new work she can create a new life for herself and her child.
Where every older Australian has security and choice where our two senior generations enjoy productive, positive older ways of life.
And where security and choice extend to every Australian person in every Australian State.
And it is when we govern well, driven by these Labor values, that this vision becomes reality.
When we make the hard decisions to build a strong economy.
Getting the Budget back into the black, walking the reform road.
Creating hundreds of thousands of jobs, lifting the living standards of millions of families and pensioners.
Not reforming policy for its own sake but modernising the economy to secure our strength into the future.
We have seen significant declines on markets over the week as Australia has been affected by events in both Europe and the US.
We know we are not immune from global developments - but we know our economic credentials are among the strongest in the world.
Low unemployment, low public debt, a strong pipeline of future investment and positioned in the region with the strongest growth.
And we know we have dealt with global instability before, through sound economic policies and the hard work and resilience of the community.
No economy is better placed than ours to remain strong in this environment.
This is the strength which enables us to continue making the investments which ensure no one is left behind.
$2.2 billion for mental health.
130 000 new training places and apprenticeships.
The parents of hundreds of thousands of teenagers with over $4000 a year extra in family tax benefit.
Millions of low-income workers with more in their regular pay packet through the reforms to the Low-Income Tax Offset.
Not just a Labor Government led by a Labor Prime Minister, a Labor Budget brought down by a Labor Treasurer.
We do these things for the living standards of our people, to give a hand to families, to give a hand to pensioners.
And these things we do speak not only of our Party's deepest purposes at its founding, they speak of our practical priorities today.
Because we are a prosperous country we have the resources, because we are a Labor Government we have the will to do what is necessary to make sure no one is left behind.
So Labor people can be proud that we are governing well.
Can be pleased with the decisions we have made and reassured by the delivery we have achieved already this year.
We've switched on the National Broadband Network on the mainland, in Armidale and Kiama and Brunswick - and we've signed up hundreds more subscribers across this State.
We've created new incentives and new support to extend the benefits and dignity of work to families and communities who have been excluded for far too long.
We've signed the national health reform agreement, created a single funding pool and a new efficient price, and the benefits are flowing today.
And this Federal Parliament has done what the last could not: made the decisions to put a price on carbon.
To cut pollution, to support the household budget, to protect Australian jobs, to build a clean energy future for Australia.
A strong economy - opportunity for all - no one left behind.
This is the vision we seek to build through so many areas of policy.
And this is the vision at the heart of the historic agreement on the future of forestry in this State.
You know well that changing market conditions, both in Australia and around the world, have created pressures on the industry which cannot be ignored.
And we know Gunns Limited's own decision to exit from native forestry will have significant impacts on workers, communities and the Tasmanian economy.
So the State and Federal Governments, the representatives of industry, workers and the environmental organisations, all recognise the need for change.
But together we've recognised that there is an opportunity here as well.
And that's why we've taken deliberate steps forward together, to end the long-running conflict over native forestry in the state.
The Statement of Principles, the Heads of Agreement and now the Intergovernmental Agreement have brought certainty to Tasmania's forestry industry.
And they bring hope of settlement in Tasmanian society as well.
The State's been divided, sometimes bitterly, for decades.
There is a genuine chance now to heal that divide.
Not to abolish democratic differences, but to end the social conflict.
I don't agree with those who say we can't protect native forests and develop a sustainable timber industry in Tasmania.
I don't agree with those who say the people of this State can't settle this issue for the future.
I know there are political players still wanting to fight the war but I believe this community has had enough.
Tasmania is ready to move on.
The signatories to the Statement of Principles, the people who have endorsed the Heads of Agreement - the representatives of industry, workers and the environmental organisations - they see this possibility.
And I know many of you can see the opportunity as well.
A historic opportunity, now before each party in the Tasmanian Parliament, as it considers the passage of the required legislation between now and the end of June next year.
Under our agreement, the State Government will reserve native forest and both Governments will support workers and their families affected by industry restructure.
Immediate assistance for workers and contractors who are losing their jobs and livelihoods as a result of industry restructure.
Employee assistance, retraining and relocation support and assistance for voluntary permanent exits for haulage and harvest contractors.
But more than this: a genuine partnership to develop and diversify the Tasmanian economy. To build resilience in the economy here, to add more strings to the economic bow.
With new opportunities for Tasmanian families, with job-creating projects in communities affected by forestry restructure.
A regional economic development partnership to create investment and jobs opportunities.
Tasmania's economic future is a picture of Australia's economic future: diversifying, adding value, balancing growth.
The whole economy strong, modernising for the future, driving clean energy, high technology, and productivity growth.
The Agreement is the end of a long policy debate. It can be the beginning of a new era in Tasmania's public life.
As Prime Minister I'm proud of the opportunity we have created together because it is good for the State.
But as Federal Labor Leader I'm particularly proud of this process - and this outcome - because it shows so distinctively the Labor way.
Only Labor Governments could bring the whole community to the table - no other Party could genuinely include industry, workers and environmental organisations in the discussion.
Only Labor values could bring the solution to reality - no other Party has so deep in its DNA our faith that we can make prosperity, fairness and sustainability come together.
Only Labor's vision - a strong economy and opportunity for all - could ensure that in our progress toward these good things we leave no one behind.
The contrast with our opponents could not be more clear.
Sometimes we're pretty tough on ourselves in the Labor Party but gee, things could be worse.
How'd you like to be the Liberals, who had a party review after the last election and had to turn to Peter Reith to do it!
And if having the godfather of Workchoices tell you what went wrong isn't bad enough, what is seriously scary is that he actually made some good points!
Like the good point he made, when he said that the Liberals' 2010 election Tasmania package - put out just 3 days before polling day - was “more insult than policy”.
But even more, the point he made when he agreed with the Leeser review of the Liberals' policy on broadband, which said:
In the view of many, the [Liberal] Party's policy amounted to a threat to come into people's homes and rip the internet out of the wall ...
Tasmanians could see the NBN being rolled out, Tasmania is often behind the mainland in receiving new technology so being at the forefront of the NBN was seen as a boost to Tasmania ...
Jobs for Tasmanian contractors, people to Tasmania from the mainland, flow on effects for Tasmania's tourism, hospitality and service industries ...
The [Liberal] Party needs to make a clear and unambiguous statement about its intentions on Broadband infrastructure in Tasmania in the future
Clever bloke, Peter Reith, and Tasmanians are pretty smart too.
They know Liberal policy on broadband is already clear and unambiguous. It's the original one-word slogan: NO.
These things we have done together, not just in forests, but in health and education, in clean energy and new technology and so much more, they say something about who we are.
Not just about Labor's vision for the kind of country we are determined to build but about Labor's determination for the kind of governments we are determined to be.
Not just what we are doing and why but how.
Yes, having a plan: seeing a vision, pursuing it with passion.
Not always taking the easy path, always putting the national interest first.
And also, governing for all: bringing people together.
Listening carefully, speaking honestly, showing respect.
That unique combination of progress and unity - of new ideas and sticking together - which has always been the Labor way.
In the 1890s, they called it “just being mates”.
When we do that, we can do good things together - good things like ending the conflict over native forests.
When we respect each other, respect the facts, and get on with the job, our country can reform health, deliver the NBN, get more Australians into work.
That's how we'll put a price on carbon as well.
And that's how we'll deal with the big challenges to come and how we'll seize the big opportunities that lie ahead.
As the world changes, working together, to master change, and protect the things we hold dear.
Friends, ours is a great country.
And throughout our history, whenever our great country has had a government worthy of its great people, we have done great things.
And in this decade to come, we must do them again.
We live in a world in transition.
And in that world, the only way we can keep hold of the things we love about Australia today is to shape change to the purposes we choose for ourselves.
To recognise the need for change and to take deliberate steps forward together to get us ready for tomorrow, to keep us strong.
To secure the things we all hold dear for all the years to come.
In the strong economies of the future, high speed broadband will be a matter of fact.
In the strong economies of the future, everyone who should work will work.
In the strong economies of the future, health systems will be sustainable.
In the strong economies of the future, economic growth will not mean pollution growth.
I am determined that Australia will be a strong economy like that.
That determination is written into everything we do.
And I am determined that in Australia there will be opportunity for all - that no one will be left behind.
The opportunities of new technology won't only go to the people and places who get them now.
The opportunities of new jobs won't only be created for those who already have a chance.
The opportunities of new kinds of care, new cures for disease, won't only be there for people who can afford them.
The opportunities from new sources of energy, from the power of the wind, the water and the sun, will be driven through our whole nation in the best and most efficient way.
And I know, we know, that these good things will not just happen to our country.
We must make them so, together.
Together, I know we will.