Mr Aggarwal, Mrs Kate Carnell, the Chief Minister of the Australian Capital Territory, Senator Margaret Reid, President of the Senate, Greg Cornwell, Speaker of the Legislative Assembly, His Excellency the High Commissioner for India, other distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen. It is, for me, a particular pleasure to be here and to share with this community a very special day.
Today is a magnificent Australian autumn day.
I think Canberra is at its absolute best at this time of the year and the absolutely stunning weather that has been turned on today is a tribute to the diverse exhortations, diverse in a religious sense, that have no doubt gone heavenwards in order to deliver such a beautiful day and it has been very successful. It is a celebration of the tolerance and the openness and the diversity of the Australian community. It is a celebration of religious freedom. Today marks a demonstration that in Australia one of the enduring strengths of our society is the right for people to believe what they wish to believe in a spiritual or religious sense and indeed to choose not to believe anything of a spiritual or religious kind. Australia now, of course, accommodates many religions.