Page 2545 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 1 August 2018

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make the right choice. Let us bring everyone together. Canberra is unequivocally the best location for the Space Agency. We will nurture and grow this industry, ensure it thrives in the competitive market, and provide answers for those kids staring up at the night sky and wondering what else is out there in that final frontier.

MS CHEYNE (Ginninderra) (4.10), in reply: The writing is on the wall. When it comes to the necessary elements to support Australia’s premier space policy agency—government partnerships, research partnerships, private investment, a skilled workforce and infrastructure—Canberra dominates. We have achieved critical mass in all of the key areas necessary to effectively conduct the Australian Space Agency. To now move the Space Agency out of Canberra would deal a significant blow to our national space industry, at a cost to its future capability right at a time when the global space industry is really taking off.

Mr Assistant Speaker, we have already demonstrated the vision and the foresight, in actively supporting our space industry in recent years, to lead us right to this point. I look forward to the future of the Australian Space Agency right here in Canberra. It simply makes sense.

Question resolved in the affirmative.

Multicultural framework

MRS KIKKERT (Ginninderra) (4.12): I move:

That this Assembly:

(1) notes:

(a) that the ACT is a richly multicultural territory where, according to the latest census:

(i) 32 percent of residents were born overseas;

(ii) another 14.7 percent of residents had at least one parent born overseas;

(iii) a non-English language is spoken in 23.8 percent of households; and

(iv) its residents report nearly 200 different nationalities;

(b) that as many as one-third of the ACT’s overseas-born residents are relatively recent arrivals;

(c) that the ACT has declared itself a Refugee Welcome Zone, making a public commitment to enhance cultural and religious diversity in the community; and

(d) that through the “ACT Multicultural Framework 2015–2020”, the ACT Government has pledged to:

(i) “effectively deliver their services to people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds”;

(ii) provide “the tools and resources for all Canberrans to reach their full potential”; and

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