Guy Barnett (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Senator Parry. I would specifically like to recognise the trekkers: Ivan Dean MLC, and Bruce Scott, President of the Scottsdale RSL; Caroline Burridge, fellow person with type 1 diabetes; Angela and Will Edwards; Patrick Fleming; Courtney Hogan; and Kristi Seymour—all from Tasmania; my brother, Nick Barnett; Paul Dale; Marco Fragiacomo, who is in the gallery tonight—and I acknowledge Marco’s presence and his strong support and friendship, both along the track and continuing; David Lloyd Jones; Sam McCardel; Alisdair Norton; Matt O’Brien, Chief Executive Officer of Diabetes Australia; and Christopher Perry. I want to give particular thanks and acknowledgement to our platinum sponsor, Medtronic. They gave us tremendous support, and without their support we could not have achieved the success we did. Our gold sponsor was Executive Excellence, our silver sponsor was Eli Lilly and our bronze sponsors were Abbott Diabetes Care, GSK, Medibank Private, Forest Enterprises Australia, Insync Surveys, McDonald’s and sanofi-aventis. It is with great pleasure and great honour that I acknowledge them and thank them for their support. I note that there are special events coming up in the near future in Launceston on 24 May and a dinner in Melbourne on 30 May. In Parliament House in Canberra on 26 June, we will hear from Patrick Lindsay on Kokoda and its importance to Australia.

I thank the Senate for the opportunity to share in this story and this trek.