ADJOURNMENT

Ms BOELE (Bradfield) (19:30): 'What is one big issue shaping your future, and what is a meaningful action you want parliament to take on it?' Raise Our Voice asked women and gender-diverse people under 25 years of age to write a speech in response to that question. We received many speeches from my electorate, all more clear eyed, moving and honest than much of what gets spoken in this place.

So it's my absolute pleasure to read two of them today. The first was written by Eve, who is 13: Our generation is told that we are the future, yet it feels like people's actions are denying us a future. Climate change isn't just something we hear about, it's affecting all our lives.

In 2019, bushfires ripped through my neighbourhood, schools were evacuated, and friends lost … pets and homes. Animals are becoming extinct. Droughts and floods are causing food shortages, water contamination and loss of lives.

We keep prioritising short-term benefits and forgetting the long-term cost. We must not lose sight of the ongoing challenge of climate change with other events taking place in our world. Every year we increase the greenhouse gases in our atmosphere.

Global temperature has already risen by 1.5 degrees Celsius since 1910, causing 70% of coral reefs to die, among other things. If this increases by an additional 0.5 degrees, our coral reefs will be destroyed. I ask the Parliament to tax use of all fossil fuels to discourage use.

Then use the taxes raised to develop infrastructure for renewable energy. Make renewable energy accessible and affordable for everyone. lncentivise 'being net zero'. Educate our community on accessing environmentally friendly ways of running households, businesses and schools.

We need a today where our environment comes first, so that we can have a tomorrow. The second speech was written by Sophia, who is 23: It's the year 2050. I'm 46 years old.

Summer keeps stretching longer. I tell my daughter we can't go to the beach today because the heat is too dangerous. Instead, we stay inside with the blinds closed, listening to the air conditioner hum.

I show her photos of the reef I once dived, and tell her about turtles, colourful corals and fish she's never seen with her own eyes. Bushfire smoke has become a familiar smell. We turn on the news, only to see another flood.

Another community rebuilding. More families forced to leave the places they once called home because they can no longer afford to stay. When my daughter asks, 'Didn't people know this was happening?' I don't know what I'd say.

That is one possible future. But it doesn't have to be ours. The biggest issue shaping our future is our planetary crisis.

I've come to realise this isn't just a climate crisis. It's a crisis of the systems we've built. Everything is connected from our oceans, our food, our economy, our biodiversity, our communities and our wellbeing.

Pull one thread, and everything else moves. Today, Australia has a choice. As we prepare to co-host COP31, we can help change the course of history.

I'm calling on Parliament to take three actions: 1. stop approving new fossil fuel projects, 2. establish an Ocean Sovereignty Fund to protect the ecosystems that protect us, and 3. ensure young people have a genuine voice in the decisions shaping our future. Because none of us has a crystal ball. The future isn't something we predict, it's something we create, beginning with the choices we make today.

Let's create an Australia where our economy thrives because our planet thrives. Where Indigenous knowledge and science shape the future together. Where our Pacific neighbours are our partners.

Where our oceans are protected because they protect us. And where every young person has the opportunity to help shape the future they'll inherit. So … when the next generation asks what we did when we had the chance to choose a different future... we can tell them we chose courage.

I want to sincerely thank everybody who submitted to me their speeches for Raise Our Voice. It was incredibly moving—very powerful—and today I've read just two around the issue of climate. It gives me great confidence that these young people are using their voice.

Through their local representative, they are having their voice heard, and it's my sincere hope and aspiration that people in this House heed the voice of our young people—who aren't yet able to vote, for example—and act in the long term for their futures.