Arthur Sinodinos (NSW, Liberal Party, Minister for Industry, Innovation and Science) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable senator for his question and his interest in all matters scientific. He is a great Western Australian. Yes, I did launch National Science Week last Thursday. Senator Bilyk was there with me. We had a great time. What a privilege it was to be there as minister for science in a room full of great scientists, including our Nobel laureate Professor Brian Schmidt, leaders of our science organisations—Questacon, the Australian Academy of Science and others—and, importantly, high school science teachers. A great number of high school students have been working away over the last eight months in 17 schools across the country on the first Young Australians' Plan for the Planet. It is an initiative that gets young people looking at the challenges we face, drawing on their STEM skills, articulating the questions and developing methodologies for coming to solutions—in other words, learning the scientific method and learning how to be scientists. This is a program that will be built on each year from now and will go to schools overseas.

The government is supporting this year's National Science Week by providing $500,000 in grants for 39 projects under the Inspiring Australia—Science Engagement Program. More than 1.3 million people are registered for more than 2,000 events across the country through to 20 August. There are hands-on activities, competitions, plenty to do online, astronauts at the Sydney Opera House explaining to people what it takes to have a mission to Mars—this sort of thing—and a young guy who did a video trying to explain how it is that cats when they fall off a table land on their feet, and that's being used by space scientists to work out how we should walk in space. No, it's about exciting the scientific curiosity of our young people and getting more young people involved in science, technology, engineering and maths.