Gai Brodtmann (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On Sunday I had the great pleasure of going to a Deepavali celebration here in Canberra in Glebe Park, where I joined with hundreds of members of the Indian community to celebrate what is one of my favourite Indian festivals, the Festival of Lights. It was a great day of eating fantastic Indian food, but also it provided both the Indian community and the rest of the Canberra community with the opportunity to experience Indian culture through a range of dances and singing and presentations, and it was just a lovely, wonderful day of celebrating this beautiful Festival of Lights.

I also attended a Deepavali celebration here at Parliament House on Monday night with a number of my parliamentary colleagues and some senior members of the Indian community, and last night I attended an Australia India Business Council event here at Parliament House where the keynote address was given by the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, Chris Bowen. Again that event underscored to me the strength of the Australia-India relationship, and the strength of the Indian community in Australia and in Canberra.

At that event last night, I learnt that India is one of the top five sources of skilled migration to this country, and I know, from having lived in India, that it is a great nation that is becoming, if it has not already become, a huge economic powerhouse, and I look forward to it thriving and growing and becoming an even stronger powerhouse in the future. The Indian people are a great people; they are a very well educated, very passionate and very committed people, and they are also great entrepreneurs, which is why I really welcomed the opportunity to go to the business council event last night. Business between the two countries has been growing exponentially over the last decade. When I was living in India it was still in the very early stages of liberalising. It has now liberalised and is burgeoning and growing and just powering ahead.

So it was a great pleasure to focus on India again this week through the Deepavali celebrations on Sunday and on Monday, and to be reminded last night of the strength of the bilateral business relationship and the skilled migration relationship—the relationship in so many areas. I was also heartened to hear that the exchanges between governments has improved over recent years. It has really been strengthened. I understand there have been more than 30 ministerial visits from India in the last three years and that there have been more than 20 ministerial visits from Australia to India in that same period. So the relationship is just strengthening and growing each day of each year, and I look forward to it becoming even stronger over the next decade and also to being part of that.

Question agreed to.

Main Committee adjourned at 13:01.