Teresa Gambaro (Brisbane, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Citizenship and Settlement) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you very much. I would also like to add my congratulations to the member for Mayo's recent elevation and wish him well in his future role. I would also like to congratulate the Member for Chifley—congratulations all round—on the new addition to your family. I am sure that you will have great joy brought into your lives.

It is wonderful to be here to make a statement on the Olympic Games and the return of the Australian team. Australians are enormously proud of our Olympic team and the wonderful efforts that were put into the London Olympics. Just watching our athletes wearing the green and gold on television, watching the coverage in the magnificent city of London, seeing all the historic monuments and buildings as the athletes made their way around the various sporting activities, made us immensely proud of the fact that Australia was represented by such a wonderful group of young men and women. They did do us proud.

To be an elite athlete requires a huge amount of discipline and commitment, and the financial expense to get to elite sport is absolutely massive. We should be very proud of every single one of our athletes, whether or not they collected a medal. It is an enormous privilege just to be chosen to go to the Olympic Games and compete at that level, let alone win a medal. We are enormously proud of the standard of excellence and acknowledge collectively the great effort put in by the Australian team.

I want to make mention of a few people. There were some particular highlights, and there were different highlights for different people. But, for me, I would like to make special mention of Lauren Jackson, our champion basketball player and captain of the Opals. At London, Lauren became the first female athlete chosen to carry the Australian flag during the opening ceremony at the Olympics, and it was a remarkable sight to watch Lauren leading out the Australian contingent. I would like to offer very special congratulations to her.

We saw some remarkable achievements at these wonderful games. We saw Sally Pearson—and I was very privileged to meet Sally Pearson at the Olympic parade in Brisbane when I welcomed the Olympians, along with the Lord Mayor of Brisbane, Councillor Quirk; and the Premier, Campbell Newman. It was great to see someone like Sally Pearson elevate herself to absolutely legend status with that fantastic win in the 100 metres hurdles, and we all remember the agonising moments as we waited for the results to confirm that our girl had won the new Olympic record. Of course, we also experienced the heartache. Members have previously spoken about the heartache of an illness which, at the last minute, causes an athlete to withdraw or of the heartbreak we saw of James Magnussen missing out in the pool by one-hundredth of a second. You cannot even imagine how tiny a hundredth of a second is. It was not meant to be.

Time does not permit me to delve into all the memorable occasions of these games as there were so many of them. But also for me the women's 4 x 100-metre freestyle relay was a very exciting moment. I have to put a plug in for Queensland, as I think we do provide a large number of our elite swimmers. When I was the member for Petrie, a number of our elite swimmers got their start in the Redcliffe area, particularly under coach Woods. Many of them had their start there, swimming as young schoolgirl regional athletes and progressing to the elite levels that we saw. That particular freestyle event was just an awesome moment for me. We were always the underdogs going in, but our four young Australian girls really swam their hearts out and they won the first gold for Australia. I want to acknowledge Alicia Coutts, Cate Campbell, Brittany Elmslie and Melanie Schlanger. They really deserve to take a bow for their wonderful effort. I want to read some of the names of the athletes from my electorate who represented Australia at London: Julian Wruck, athletics; James Connor, diving; Anabelle Smith, diving; Nicholas D'Arcy, swimming; Brittany Elmslie, swimming; Edward McKendry, swimming; Stephanie Rice, swimming; Eloise Amberger, synchronised swimming; Andrew Grant, volleyball; Bronwen Knox, water polo; Jane Moran, water polo; and Sophie Smith, water polo. These are absolutely remarkable and incredible Australians and they make the electorate of Brisbane and Australia very, very proud. As I said, it was great to welcome them. I felt very humbled welcoming them and being part of that 'welcome back' ceremony in the CBD of Brisbane. To meet them in person was an incredible experience. The crowd was absolutely euphoric. It is fantastic to see them.

It reminds of a more low-key event that I had in my electorate recently with the Australian Sports Commission, where I awarded junior athletes—who will be the future Olympians of tomorrow—some sports awards at the Wilston Grange breakfast. I was very pleased to meet our future athletes of tomorrow. The Olympic spirit is well and truly alive and well.

I congratulate the magnificent city of London. There were certainly detractors who were very quick to criticise the organisation, the logistics and everything else in the beginning, but London and the Lord Mayor of London and its people should be congratulated, particularly for the magnificent way that they organised the games and the security and all of the logistics that they put in place. They hosted a truly magnificent games. As I mentioned earlier, bringing the modern in with the historical buildings like Westminster and Buckingham Palace and including them as part of the program really added to the great success of that fantastic city. I want to congratulate London for a great games that we witnessed.

I know that some of my athletes back in Brisbane have had a few weeks rest. I think they have had a few weeks off and now the fun begins: preparing for the next games in Rio. I wish them all the very best in their preparation for the next magnificent games, which will be held in Rio in 2016. I look forward again to watching our magnificent athletes represent our country and do us proud.

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