Prime Minister
PRIME MINISTER: Well, thank you very much for that introduction. It's very exciting to be here with Assistant Minister Stoker in particular, but with all of you and to launch this very exciting program. And can I also acknowledge the Indigenous owners of the land and their elders, past, present and future and can I acknowledge any veterans who are present with us as well.
The work that we did, found in the research undertaken in developing this program, that 40 percent of young women are inspired to start a business having seen another woman do it. And that shouldn't be terribly surprising. Doing the sorts of things that you’re doing here is not easy and it takes courage. It takes a high level of confidence to be able to put yourself out there. And say I got this idea. I think it’s a great idea but I’m not sure everyone else will think it’s a great idea. And how am I going to convince other people to come and back this idea and invest their funds and their resources in realising this. Because we know you can't do anything necessarily on your own. You have to work with others. And I think what's great about places like these is they provide those skills, they provide that encouragement. They provide that shared experience as people come through pretty much all the same fears, concerns, excitements and opportunities all at once. And when you have mentors as well that can seek to guide you and encourage you down that path, who have done it before and provide you with that example, well, I think it's a time honoured formula and that produces a tremendous success. And so to kick-start a program which will enable you to compete for that, amongst others, $60,000 or thereabouts, which is a program which I think will greatly encourage five successful entrepreneurs will share a portion of $60,000 seed capital funding to help their businesses come to life as result of this program. And that's something worth having a go at. And, of course, that of itself is not going to see that idea of itself realised. But I think the opportunity for that recognition is incredibly important.
We've already seen through the first enterprising girls program, which was for girls under 18, 12-18, [inaudible], move into the next program. $5 million in this most recent Budget, which is backing in women with skills in this area but more importantly, passion and ideas and the energy levels I think to actually realise what they see as their vision. We all to aspire to different things, we all have vision for different things. Earlier today, I was talking to people buying their first homes and that was their vision and that was their dream. And they were realising it and that was fantastic. You’re pursuing your own vision, your own dreams, when it comes to realising that tech start-up or that tech innovation. And it can have many motivations. Of course, there's the commercial motivation, but in my experience, I've got to tell you, working with people in the tech sector, people are more excited about what this thing can do and how it can change lives, change livelihoods, change how the world works. Whether it's ensuring that we have a cleaner, greener future. Or whether it’s releasing the potential of people or massively reducing the amount of effort it requires to do something and relieving the stress burden on families or enabling small businesses or agricultural producers to get through tough times and particularly we’ve seen that through drought. And I think, Queensland in particular is a place where the ag tech sector is so important.
In the Budget this year, we put in $1.2 billion to support the digital transformation of our economy and ensure that we are one of the leading digital economies in the world by 2030. Now we're already making, I think, tremendous progress in this space, one of the first countries in the world to introduce the consumer data [inaudible], establishing the open banking system 24/7, a new payments platform which enables so much technology to take place. What we’re seeing in the ag tech sector is revolutionary and world-changing. This investment focuses on things like artificial intelligence, ensuring that the Government interface, so when you’re working in reg-tech, that those tools can be used to ensure that compliance with important standards doesn't become an impediment to people actually going forward and doing business that they’re going to do. Now that comes on top of $800 million that we put in the Budget just last October. So, I can assure you that the digital transformation of our economy is one of the biggest challenges we've got for our economy to continue its recovery.
Three areas I’m focused on and one is workforce. The skills, the abilities, the training that are necessary and those skills to bring from overseas too. There’s no doubt about that, importing the knowledge and some of the best talent from around the world. We have the global talent programme at the moment, where Peter Verwer who heads up that programme for the Government, is seeking to secure and hire basically, some of the best and brightest minds and tech companies around the world today that sit and plan with our six big areas of focus of our modern manufacturing initiative. They seek to bring them out here and put them in our universities and create these ecosystems across our economy. Workforce, so important. Digital transformation of our economy, also so important. And at the end of the day, also energy, affordable, reliable and low emissions energy. These are the challenges, that I think are most important in driving our economy and jobs. And we want all Australians to be equally benefiting in the opportunities that are there and I think the Enterprising Women programme does that. It gets you on the platform, it gets you in the space, it gets you the opportunity and once I think, you get that fair go to have a go, then I think you’ll take it from there and that's what this programme is all about.
So can I congratulate all of you for what you’re doing. I’m pleased this is going to have the boost I think it’s designed to give you and I look forward to seeing wonderful things coming out of Queensland and out of the Enterprising Women program more broadly. Thank you.