Governors and Administrator; Prime Minister and Ms Haydon; President of the Senate and Mr Lambert; Speaker of the House of Representatives; High Commissioners and Ambassador; Leader of the Opposition and Mrs Dutton; Honourable Members; Auntie Violet, on behalf of the Ngunnawal people and the Wiradjuri Echoes; Ladies and Gentlemen,
I am enormously touched by those very kind welcomes and by your invitation, Prime Minister, to say a few words here in Parliament House, the national home of Australia’s strong and vibrant democratic tradition. Let me also say how deeply I appreciated this morning’s moving ‘Welcome to Country’ ceremony, which offers me the opportunity to pay my respects to the traditional owners of the lands on which we meet, the Ngunnawal people and all First Nations peoples who have loved and cared for this continent for sixty-five thousand years.
In my many visits to Australia, I have witnessed the courage and hope that have guided the nation’s long and sometimes difficult journey towards reconciliation. Throughout my life, Australia’s First Nations peoples have done me the great honour of sharing, so generously, their stories and cultures. I can only say how much my own experience has been shaped and strengthened by such traditional wisdom.
Today, I am proud to follow in the footsteps of my late Mother, Queen Elizabeth II, who spoke of the warmth she received from her first visit in 1954. This was a feeling which, I know, she returned in equal measure.
My own first visit came in 1966, as PM, you mentioned, when I had, indeed, the life-shaping – and life-affirming! – opportunity to continue part of my education in Victoria. And, Ladies and Gentlemen, what an education it was!
I had thought that the school I had been attending in Scotland was remote and testing enough, but nothing had quite prepared me for the realities of the bush country around Mount Buller. All I can say is that I arrived as an adolescent and left as a more rounded – if not even somewhat chiselled! – character once I had contended with brown snakes, leeches, funnel-web spiders and bull ants, and - bearing in mind this was very nearly 60 years ago - been given certain unmentionable parts of a bull calf to eat from a branding fire in outback Queensland. So it was, therefore, that my own bond with Australia was formed early on. Every time I return to the “Sunburnt Country”, I am always moved by the hauntingly evocative cries of the Kookaburra, the screeching of the Galah and the warbling of the Magpie.
Over the six decades since my first visit, I have, of course, witnessed both continuity and great change. It is worth reflecting that Australia’s unique character has endured and also evolved, and that Australia has become a stronger nation as a result of becoming one of the most multicultural on Earth. Today, with all due recognition of the impacts of the global cost of living crisis, Australia’s economic growth has been remarkable. And this is a country which, for all its size and diversity, never omits to look outward. Australia has offered – and continues to offer – so much to the world.
The character of this country and its people is hardly more vivid than when both are tested by disaster – the Black Summer of 2019 and 2020; the relentless floods of 2022 and 2023; Tropical Cyclones Jasper and Kirrily in 2023 and 2024, and, of course, so many more. I cannot tell you how much I have felt the grief and shock of what you have gone through, having visited many of those communities myself over all these years.
Amidst such overwhelming challenges, I have always been deeply impressed by the extraordinary bravery and resilience of those who look up, look out, and, in that most Australian of ways, battle on.
The way, for instance, in which firefighters, police, emergency services, defence personnel and many thousands of volunteers, risk their lives to stand by their mates, neighbours and strangers – not to mention livestock and property – represents, to me, the essence of the Australian character.
The disasters were not in themselves new at all; life here has always entailed these extremities of survival and endurance. Yet, in their magnitude and ferocity, as well as their frequency, they are new. The regular roll of unprecedented events is an unmistakeable sign of climate change, to which Australia is so particularly vulnerable.
This is why Australia’s international leadership on global initiatives to protect our climate and biodiversity is of such absolute and critical importance. Indeed, the world’s first Global Nature Positive Summit was held in Sydney in the past fortnight.
The private sector’s involvement in the Summit demonstrates that environmental challenges are not just problems. The transition to restoring the balance of Nature on our planet offers immense opportunities, and I am increasingly encouraged by the private sector’s efforts to help turn the tide. Australia has all the natural ingredients to create a more sustainable, regenerative way of living. By harnessing the power with which Nature has endowed the nation – whether it be wind or its famous sunshine – Australia is tracking the path towards a better and safer future. It is in all our interests to be good stewards of the world, and good ancestors to those who come after us, because we are all connected – both as a global community, and with all that sustains life. That is the timeless wisdom of Indigenous people throughout the world, from which each of us can benefit.
With the Covid-19 pandemic barely behind us, the impacts of climate change deepening, and the horrors of war, death and needless destruction all too visible, this moment in our history requires both ancient and new thinking. It requires more of our minds, our hearts and our hands. It also requires us to come together with courage, care and compassion. The challenges we now face call us to show not only constancy and valour, but also humanity, empathy and generosity of spirit.
Looking out across the global Commonwealth of Nations, I see a family of some two and a half billion people, striving for peace, justice and mutual respect.
The Commonwealth spans six continents and, as a group, has the size and influence to play a significant role on the global stage, while being small enough to nurture personal relationships. It has the diversity to understand the world’s problems, and the sheer brain power and resolve to formulate practical solutions. I need hardly say that I am looking forward to joining Leaders in Apia shortly to support their work...
Here in Australia, meanwhile, my wife and I will have the great privilege of meeting remarkable scientists, entrepreneurs and community leaders who are paving the way in environmental management or healthcare, addressing domestic and family violence, promoting literacy and literature, and helping young Indigenous Australians to realise their full potential.
I cannot begin to express how pleased we are to be here again, nor how sad I am that it has to be so short on this occasion.
When we turn our steps homeward, we will carry memories of friendships renewed, of new ones forged and of the characteristic warmth and inimitable humour of Australians which you share with those who are fortunate enough to know you.
