Mrs ELIZABETH GRACE (12:54 PM) —The speech I am about to read was written for me by young Lachlan Kay who is a year 10 student at Sandgate High School. Lachlan has also been nominated Youth Governor of Queensland. Over the past six months I have been working with a group of young people in my electorate who have now formed a task force. This group of eight young people, after several meetings with me, decided that it would be beneficial to hold a forum for the youth in my electorate in which they could express their views on issues that are relevant to them. The task force, with my assistance, will now hold a youth forum which they have called the Lilley Youth Conference. It will be on 5 April at one of the local high schools. The youth attending will range in age from 15 to 25. The task force has recognised four main issues to be discussed at the forum. These are education, employment, self-esteem, and youth welfare.

We have invited young people that are either full-time or part-time students, those who work part-time or full-time, and those who are currently seeking work. This is to ensure that the outcomes of the forum are truly representative of all youth in the electorate. The issues that are to be discussed were chosen for the specific reason that the youth felt that these were the issues that were of concern to them and that the government should hear their viewpoints and ideas about them so that, when it is making decisions on these matters, young people would have some input into policies that are aimed at, or directed to, them.

Education was an obvious choice, as this is an issue which inevitably affects all youth. Another obvious choice was employment, as it is a major issue for youth today. The task force decided to call the topic `Employment'—which has a positive outlook—rather than `Unemployment', a term which is immediately fraught with negative connotations. Self-esteem is a relatively taboo term, as there are of course ties with low self-esteem, chronic depression and, to a more serious extent, suicide. However, it must be recognised that this is a major problem for youth in our society. The fourth choice, youth welfare, is another key issue in today's society. The financial assistance offered by the government and available to youth is quite often imperative for the standard of living of young people.

Such a forum as the one that the Lilley Youth Task Force and I are holding is a vital tool to bridge the gap between young people and their parliamentary representatives. If we do not know what it is that young people need, how can we help them? The youth task force is one of many active discussion groups currently running in my electorate. These include a group for youth suicide prevention and also a group looking at finances and problems with the elderly. However, the special thing about this forum is that it will include the views of those people who live in my electorate but have not been able to have their say via the ballot box, as either they are too young or an election has not been held since they have become legally recognised as adults.

The guest speakers at the youth forum will be Dr Cheryl Hurst, who was nominated Queenslander of the Year and also received an award on Australia Day. She has done extensive research into breast cancer, and she is going to be talking to the young people on the topic of education. Mr Craig Maney from Albion McDonald's, will be talking to the young people on employment. Mike Young, who is the Olympic coach for the Australian baseball team, will be talking on self-motivation. Ben Myers, who was selected as Queensland's youth representative at the people's Constitutional Convention—

Mr Slipper —An outstanding young man.

Mrs ELIZABETH GRACE —Thank you. He will be talking on youth welfare and the benefits that we can give young people. The main idea of this forum is to inform the government of the views of young people. I am confident that the outcomes will be positive, constructive and truly representative of what young people would like to see happening in these areas. I look forward to presenting the findings of the forum to the House, so that young people's voices will be clearly heard and so that their ideas might be a help for change in areas that are to be reviewed.

As I said at the beginning, this speech was written by a young man in year 10 at Sandgate High School. It is always a pleasure to be able to give young people a chance to develop their skills and express their views. I congratulate Lachlan Kay on an excellent speech. I have every confidence that the youth forum will be a resounding success, when it is considered that young people of this calibre are taking an active part.