Mark Coulton (Parkes, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'd like to bring to the attention of the parliament a couple of outstanding young residents of the Parkes electorate. Goodooga, in northern New South Wales, a very small community about an hour's drive north of Brewarrina, has been the home of some amazing families of shearers. Young Tyron Cochrane, who is 18 years of age, has just won the junior Golden Shears in New Zealand. He's only the 11th non-New Zealander, the first Australian since 1961 and the first ever Aboriginal Australian to win that prestigious award. And Tyron's 18. His partner, Jolie Orcher, from Bourke, is 17, and she came third in the wool handling at the same Golden Shears competition.

Now, in this place we quite often hear lots of negative stories about young people, and we hear negative stories about, particularly, young Aboriginal people. These young ones are great examples and role models of what can be done. Not only that, but, if you do the maths, at $4 a sheep, they are making a lot of money.

I also want to pay tribute to the Regional Enterprise Development Institute and the director, Peter Gibbs, and deputy director, Michael Cooper. It was their idea to take some young Australians to New Zealand. They had to go there for a little while because they're different sheep and the combs they use are different for the strong wool. By doing this, they're actually working now on training more young Aboriginal people in western New South Wales and introducing them to the shearing game. It's an honourable profession that is much needed. The wool industry is still a very large part of the economy of this country.

I'm incredibly proud of Tyron and Jolie, and I'm looking forward to following their progress as they work their way through the shipping industry. I'm looking forward to visiting them in a shed before much longer, with Peter Gibbs, to see them at work in the shearing sheds. Peter Gibbs was himself a shearer out of Goodooga some years ago. I've been known to shear a few—quite slowly!—and I'm looking forward to catching up with them again.