Page 3935 - Week 12 - Thursday, 29 October 2015
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
I had the pleasure of joining the club’s 40th birthday celebrations on Saturday. Belconnen Dog Obedience Club is testament to the special bonds developed over millennia between humans and dogs. It is a rewarding relationship of love and trust. This was especially evident meeting Carolyn Shrives and her dog, the legendary Digby, “the flying westie”. Digby is a west highland white terrier and a renowned flyball champion with the club’s team, the Belconnen Bullets. Digby and a range of dogs of all sizes and breeds demonstrated their flyball skills at the celebrations.
The flyball relay race involves dogs racing over four hurdles to trigger a flyball box pedal, catch the ball that drops and then return over the hurdles so that the next dog in the team can take off. Owners yelling encouragement often accompany the dogs down the laneways. Other events at the birthday celebrations included “dances with dogs”, where dogs and their owners performed routines to music.
I thank all of the members of the club and the Belconnen Dog Obedience Club committee, including its president, Jenny Thistleton, and vice-president Lesley Hayes for the work they do. The club grounds were looking magnificent on Saturday and they were filled with well-trained dogs and their owners enjoying themselves. It is great to know that the club’s fees and fundraising over the years, and the sport and recreation grants to the club, have benefited the community generally, and specifically dogs and their owners.
AFL youth girls team
MR DOSZPOT (Molonglo) (6.48): A few days ago I received an email from a proud father, Bill Mason, whose two daughters, Zoe and Zarah, were part of a history-making team as the AFL under 18 Canberra youth girls became state champions. I rise tonight to honour the ACT AFL under 18 youth girls team, who are now state champions after winning the NSW-ACT AFL state cup grand final, against the highly rated Sydney Harbour team, in a close game. They won 3-5-23 to 2-10-22.
The magnitude of this win is even more incredible when we consider that at last year’s carnival the team unfortunately returned without a win and without scoring a goal. As such their goal was a simple one—to improve. They not only improved but they went on to become the very first youth women’s team from the ACT to win the state cup. Over the weekend the team managed to defeat Hunter Valley by 23 points and draw with a highly rated Riverina team. These results were enough to qualify for the tournament’s grand final against two-time winners Sydney Harbour.
The grand final was to be a game for the ages. The team scored two goals to level the scores late in the game. With the scores locked at full time the game was headed to overtime and after two periods of overtime the teams still could not be separated, forcing the game to a rare period of golden point. In a slice of sporting drama the winning point was scored by AFL Canberra captain Morgan Kemp.
Canberra has produced some incredible Australian football players over the years, including Alex Jesaulenko, Craig Bolton, James Hird, Aaron Hamill and, more recently, Josh Bruce and Phil Davis. We can now add our very first NSW-ACT state
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video