Kate Ellis (Adelaide, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Early Childhood Education, Childcare and Youth) Share this | Hansard source

I am sure they are a wonderful team. In fact they are travelling overseas to compete in Sweden later this year. They have offered to act as ambassadors for Australia’s bid on the world stage. This is an offer that we will certainly take them up on. I would like to call on all Australians to get involved and log onto the newly launched website, www.australia2018-2022.com.au, to register their support for our bid and to get behind the campaign to show to the entire world that there is no better place on the planet to hold the World Cup than right here in Australia, because there is no doubt that there is a lot of hard work that lies before us from this point on.

We also know that there are significant benefits in terms of infrastructure and job creation and of course massive benefits in terms of tourism potential. So we as a government will continue to work very hard to support Frank Lowy, Ben Buckley and Football Federation Australia. We will work on a coordinated approach across government but we will also be working in very strong partnership with all of the states and territories, which have signed up to supporting the bid through COAG. Australia will be making its first presentation before FIFA later this year in December before submitting the formal bid in May of next year, with a decision being made in December next year.

We know that the competition is very tight but we also know that when it comes to hosting major sporting events there is nobody in the world that does it better than Australia. Together we will work on a united and inclusive bid to show to the whole world that Australia will put on the best World Cup the world has ever seen.

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