Well thank you very much for that very warm welcome. To my friends and colleagues, the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs, Morris Iemma representing the Premier of New South Wales, Laurie Ferguson representing the Leader of the Federal Opposition, John Caputo, John Brogden, the Leader of the New South Wales Opposition, ladies and gentlemen.
This is a very happy occasion. It's a happy occasion for two reasons. It's a happy occasion because it celebrates a very important and momentous day in Italian history, the establishment of the Italian republic in June of 1946. But it also, to me as the Australian Prime Minister, celebrates something even more important and closer to us and that is the wonderful contribution that has been made to our nation by people of Italian decent.
And I want to say there's rarely been a time in the history of Australia when the prestige and the respect and the reputation that this country enjoys around the world has been higher. Our economic strength, our commitment to sound values in international relations, our determination to stand with other countries to liberate oppressed people. Take all of things together, Australia is very warmly regarded around the world at the present time. And one of the reasons, one of the main reasons why Australia is now so warmly regarded is that we made a decision as a nation some 50 years ago or more to open up our country to people from different parts of the world, to extend a hand of welcome to people from all around the world. And of all of the people that have come over that 50 to 60 year period to Australia, none has made a bigger contribution numerically and in other ways than have the Italians in Australia. I want to thank you all for that.
But it's also important to remember that it's a relationship that just doesn't belong in history. It's very important when you have close relations with countries and with people not only to think of the history of that relationship and the contribution the history has made to the modern reality, but it's also important to think of the contemporary face of the relationship. And modern Italy and modern Australia have an enormous amount to share. Italy may be in Europe, it may be sharing some of the policies of the European Union that occasionally Australia doesn't agree with, but that's beside the point. We have so many other things in common and the growing links on a person-to-person basis, the increased reciprocal efforts that both countries are making to delve into the future of that relationship gives me great heart.
I had the opportunity last year to pay an official visit to Italy and I was very warmly welcomed by my counterpart, Silvio Berlusconi. Doesn't matter what his politics are, he's Prime Minister of Italy and I will always pay him great courtesy. In fact, I found him a very engaging bloke to meet. So ladies and gentlemen, what drove home to me in that meeting with the Prime Minister of Italy is how much we share the dynamism of a modern contemporary relationship.
So we celebrate here today the friendship of our people. I, on behalf of all your other fellow Australians, thank the Italians of Australia for the contribution that you have made in so many fields to building the great success story of the modern Australia. I salute the closeness of the relationship between our two nations. It can only get better, it can only get stronger and our friendship can only get deeper.
Thank you.
[ends]