Paul Fletcher (Bradfield, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am pleased to rise to take this opportunity in the national parliament to congratulate the cast, the crew, the orchestras and all involved with two fine school musical productions that I have been lucky enough to attend recently in my electorate of Bradfield. The first was a production of Annie, a joint production of Hornsby Girls High School and Normanhurst Boys High School, and the second was the St Ives High production How to succeed in business without really trying.

The plots of both of these musicals, for those who have not seen them, contain moments of interesting relevance to politicians. Annie is set in the depression and features Franklin Delano Roosevelt as a character. How to succeed in business without really trying could be described as a series of case studies of successful tactics in office politics, but those tactics may have some broader relevance. Be that as it may, I want to warmly congratulate all who were involved in these two fine productions. I thoroughly enjoyed attending them and the standard of the singing, acting, music and all aspects of the technical production was excellent.

I particularly congratulate the principals of the schools involved, Mr Robert Phillips of Hornsby Girls High School, Mr Mark Watson of St Ives High School and Mr Jeff Bruce of Normanhurst Boys High School. I also want to congratulate the producers of the two productions, Mrs Nicole Johnson for Annie and Mrs Pam Bullock for How to succeed in business without really trying.

In my view, the staff of these three schools are to be very warmly congratulated for giving their students the opportunity to participate in these two productions. I believe that they have given these students a very important message about complementing their academic work with interests in other areas. By exposing their students to the witty and sophisticated lyrics and the infectious music of a top-notch Broadway musical, they have demonstrated how high intelligence, combined with hard work, can produce all kinds of output which is of human and social value.

There is no doubt that legal opinions, medical diagnoses or financing proposals will loom large in the career plans of many students of these three schools, but these two musical productions are a powerful demonstration to all students of these schools that there are many other forms of human endeavour which are of equal importance.

I therefore want to warmly congratulate all who were involved and say that I thoroughly enjoyed attending both productions. Everybody involved with them—cast, crew, staff and supporters—can take great pride in what they have achieved.