Here I go mixing photos and politics. Australia’s new Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, held his visionary 2020 summit over the weekend. For you non-aussies, the 2020 summit brought together some of the best and brightest brains from across the country to tackle the long term challenges confronting Australia’s future –challenges which require long-term responses from the nation beyond the usual three year political cycle.

1000 leading Australians met in the nations capital to debate and develop long-term options for the nation across 10 critical areas:

1. The Productivity Agenda – education, skills, training, science and innovation
2. The Future of the Australian Economy
3. Population, sustainability, climate change and water
4. Future directions for rural industries and rural communities
5. A long-term national health strategy – including the challenges of preventative health, workforce planning and the ageing population
6. Strengthening communities, supporting families and social inclusion
7. Options for the future of indigenous Australia
8. Towards a creative Australia: the future of the arts, film and design
9. The future of Australian governance: renewed democracy, a more open government (including the role of the media), the structure of the Federation and the rights and responsibilities of citizens
10. Australia’s future security and prosperity in a rapidly changing region and world.

The Summit will had the following objectives:

* To harness the best ideas across the nation
* To apply those ideas to the 10 core challenges that the Government has identified for Australia – to secure our long-term future through to 2020
* To provide a forum for free and open public debate in which there are no predetermined right or wrong answers
* For each of the Summit’s 10 areas to produce following the Summit options for consideration by government
* For the Government to produce a public response to these options papers by the end of 2008 with a view to shaping the nation’s long-term direction from 2009 and beyond.

There have been those, mostly opposition party supporters, who believed the whole exercise a waste of time and a political showboat of Kevin Rudd. I viewed the summit as a straight forward and transparent way to proactively plan the future of the country as well as generating a synergy of ideas.

Oh, yeah … the photo was taken at Beaumaris Boat Club, Melbourne, Australia over the weekend.

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