Page 1677 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 1 April 2009
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
The week provides young people in the territory with a wonderful week of events to highlight the contribution that young people make to the community. More than 50 events will be held during the course of the week, offering a range of different opportunities for people to be involved. The week concludes on 5 April and was, as I indicated, launched on Friday, 27 March at the Young Canberra Citizen of the Year awards.
Ms Hunter’s motion calls for a government commitment to continue to support Youth Week and other youth activities. I am very pleased to be able to give that commitment. In fact, I will move an amendment to reflect just such a commitment. Having given it, I hope that the Assembly will see fit, through the amendment I will move, to also acknowledge that consultation on development of a new plan has commenced and will continue, continuing on Friday and then throughout the rest of this year, with a new plan to be released in December 2009. I seek the support of the Assembly for such an amendment and at the conclusion of my speech I will formally move it.
It is important to note that a key success of the now finalised young people’s plan for the period 2004 to 2008 and the youth interACT strategy was youth participation. That relates to the genuine development of partnerships between young people and adults across all areas of life, so that young people may take a valued position and role in our society and so that the community as a whole, as well as young people, can benefit from their involvement, insights, ideas and energies.
The government, of course, remains committed to the establishment of a new youth plan. Ms Hunter is right: there is active consideration being given to creating one plan for children and youth. I look quite favourably at that direction, and that is how the government intends to continue its consultation process. However, it is an open consultation process. If there is a view that there should be two plans and that view comes through very strongly, I am open to consider that. But I think there are some clear advantages in incorporating both of the plans together.
I will now formally move my amendment to Ms Hunter’s motion, which simply acknowledges the commitment I have just given publicly. I move:
Omit all words after paragraph (1)(c), substitute:
“(d) the Government’s commitment to ongoing support for Youth Week and other youth events;
(e) that consultation on the development of a new Young People’s Plan commenced in 2008 and will continue at the InterACT ‘Redefine 09’ Conference this week; and
(f) that the new plan will be released in December 2009.”.
I thank the Assembly in advance for their open-minded consideration of this amendment.
MS BRESNAN (Brindabella) (3.37): I wanted to talk briefly today about the need for targeted and adequate services for multicultural youth in the ACT. I support the
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .