1983 School Magazine

That night we had a debate on the topic "Government is too serioris a matter for politicians". It was won by the affirmative. One funny incident happened when Stephen Eertwistle got up and stated, "I'm Stephen Bertwistle from Queensland" to which a boy behind retorted, "It's not yiur fault". The Queenslanders were not amused' We had another talk on "T'he Role of the Public Service" by Dr. Peter Wilenski the next morning' F{e was excellent, ind ttre Department of Education and Youth .Affairs was a bit of a let down after him' Then we went to the Eotanic Gardens, which was lovely (i like trees)' To get there, we went by bus past the Embassy areas' All the Embassies were in their national styles and were very impressive. Telecom Tower is 800 metres high, which is scary for someone afraid of heights, like me, but I found it very interesting. The High Court of Australia is very impressivi, with high ceilings and wooden walls' It has an aiiof solemnity, and a quiet that it seems disrespectful to break. I liked it verY much. We also went to the New Parliament Flouse construction site and decided that the government deserved it, considering the cramped conditions in the current Parliameni F{ouse. Parliament House was very interesting' Question Time and Sitting Time in the-Senate and House oi Representatives were fascinating, although they were not the politest discussions I have seen held' We also saw the War Memorial, the National Library and the National Gallery, all of which were beautiful buildings. We heard many more talks, the best being SenatoiChipp's speech on "The Role of the Democrats" ' "Chippie" is^an excellent and honest speaker and gained many supporters for the Democrats. Altogether, we had a wonderful week and learnt a lot about our country and how it is run. No one wanted to leave. When we left the airport, we were no longer nervous or unsure. We knew what we wanted, and that was another week in Canberra. My thanks go to the school and the Trust who gave me this marvellous opportunity' Susan Warren 11 Griffith

CANBERRA _ VSORE ?'FAAF{ SUST'T'T{E NAT{@NAL CAP{g'AS, (Repont osi the NlationaaB Cnpitan Seamiraan) Weil, you may or rnay not have been to Canberra' Eut whether you have or not, X know that there are not many of you who have had the sort of experience I had at the National Capital Seminar. We arrived at the airport very nervous and a bit unsure about whether we would make it through the next week' The students frorr the year before managed to dispel our indecision, but not our nervousness, with non-stop chatter about how wonderful it was. They all seerned very good friends, and, to our surpise, so were we by the end of the week. F{owever, we boarded the plane as strangers, but as strangers deterrnined to get to know each other better and get tlie most out of the Seminar' That's just what we did' After a brief stopover in Sydney' we greeted our bags and lugged them onto the buses that took us to Canberra Grammir School. We were put into dorms, the girls in Jones F{ouse and the boys in Blaxland F{ouse, each with four people from four different states. After dumping our bags we went to the dining hall and picked up badges with or.i n^*.t on them (security passes in disguise) and black satchels with programe, house rules, map, tutor groups and student list inside' From there we went to a meeting about conduct at the seminar, dinner and a talk on the Westminster system of government. The next day we had four more talks, one on "Pariiamentary Frocedures" plus film, one on "The R'ole of the Senate" by a Queensland Senator who was most pleased to meet our "Dysart, Central Queensland" girl, Wendy, another on "The Role of the Opposition" by a highly biased J. W. Howard and a last one on "The Aistialian Electoral System"' By this time we knew ali about the Senate (four times) and were getting quite tired of sitting down.