When the Government was elected just one year ago, we committed to building a modern Australia equipped to face the challenges of the 21st century.
In our first year in office we have been delivering on that commitment.
Just a few of our achievements include:
Cut taxes in the last budget for working families and low income earners;
Starting our education revolution by building Trade Training Centres in high schools and installing new computers in nearly 1000 schools;
Abolishing the previous Government's extreme workplace laws;
Implementing the Water for the Future plan to restore the health of the Murray Darling Basin and securing our future urban water supplies with funding to build desalination, water recycling and rainwater harvesting projects;
We have ratified the Kyoto Protocol and signed Australia up to international action to tackle climate change;
And we are introducing a $480 million dollar national solar schools program to encourage schools to switch to solar power.
We are establishing over 1000 new training places for nurses and providing incentives to encourage thousands of nurses who are out of the workforce to return to work, because we need them.
By the end of the year we will have held nine community cabinets across the country as part of our commitment to hear people's ideas and concerns first hand, wherever they live.
And we have said sorry to Indigenous Australian on behalf of the Australian Parliament.
But you know? This is just the start.
Australia now faces the worst financial crisis since the 1930s and we've taken early and decisive action to protect our economy and to protect Australian jobs and business.
We guaranteed all depositors and all deposits in all Australian banks, building societies and credit unions for the next three years.
We invested $10.4 billion into the economy to stimulate economic activity and to support jobs.
And we are bringing forward investment in major infrastructure like rail, roads and ports to boost economic activity for the long term.
Together we will steer our economy through these rough waters and at the same time deliver on our commitments to take Australia confidently forward into the future.
Thank you for listening.
A video of this speech is also available. The Goverment's One Year Progress Report is also available.