Page 927 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 16 March 2010
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constraints on school and staff, and I stress that my visits should in no way interfere with the operations of schools. However, it would be very nice to see the schools as they should be seen, filled with students.
The purpose of my visits is to get firsthand knowledge of one of my key portfolio areas, education. I have made a commitment to visit every school to gain a greater understanding of the issues facing our schools and principals and see firsthand the great work that is being done by our educators in the ACT. I congratulate the principals, teaching staff, families and extended communities of these schools that I have visited to date and I look forward to fulfilling my goal of visiting every school in the ACT during the next two years.
In closing, I would like to pose a question for the minister for education. I am still rather perplexed as to why all the visits this year have been scheduled for after normal school hours. I would hope there are no sinister reasons for this and that the minister will give directions to his staff to ensure that this issue is corrected for future visits. Or better still, I would like to see the minister dispense with this archaic protocol policy and allow my staff to talk directly to education department staff in order to better facilitate a school visitation program.
Canberra Citizen of the Year
MR HANSON (Molonglo) (5.42): Just recently, Rotary was announced as the 2010 Canberra Citizen of the Year. It is a little unusual that an organisation has been named as the Citizen of the Year but I certainly commend it. I think it is a very worthy announcement and I, indeed, commend the Chief Minister for having done so.
There are 17 Rotary clubs across the ACT and they all follow their motto “service above self”. The clubs are all engaged in local work in their local areas but also have an international focus, sending shelter boxes to areas of international tragedy where natural disasters have occurred. I am a very proud member of Rotary but I would have to say that I am probably in many ways one of the least deserving members of Rotary to participate.
Mrs Dunne: You are not claiming to be a Canberran of the Year, are you?
MR HANSON: No, I am certainly not. But with respect to participation in the Rotary clubs as an organisation, the wonderful organisation that they are, there are some people that put in hours and hours of selfless service to the community. I do not pretend for an instant to be one of them. I am very proud to participate in a very minor way with my club. Talking about my club, which is the Rotary Club of Weston Creek, there are members who have been members for countless years and who have been participating in projects within the Weston Creek area, in the ACT more broadly and in activities supporting international endeavours for many years.
What I would like to do is read out some of the names of those people from my Rotary club who do participate so fully in our community and are so deserving of this award: Cliff Armitage, Lionel Barrett, Jacqui Burke, Jim Benson, Bede Curtis, Tim Dalton, Peter Dinn, John Donnelly, David Edwards, Warwick Elliott, our president, Damian Farrell, Simon Felgate, Mal Ferguson, Greg Fisher, John Gibson,
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