LIBBY TRICKETT, OLYMPIAN: Hi everyone, and thank you so much for joining us here for today’s exciting announcement about the future of sport in Australia. My name is Libby Trickett. I am a nine-time Olympic and Commonwealth Games gold medalist, proud Queenslander, now co-host of the podcast, Sportish. Also, probably most importantly, I am a mother of five small children. I am absolutely delighted to be with you in the host city for Brisbane 2032.

A very special welcome to Minister for Sport Anika Wells MP, Member for Bonner Kara Cook MP, Australian Sports Commission CEO Kieren Perkins, Australian Institute of Sport Director Matti Clements over there, CEO of Paralympics Australia, Cameron Murray, CEO of Commonwealth Games Australia Craig Phillips, our Summer and Winter Olympic Chefs de Mission Anna Meares and Alisa Camplin-Warner and, of course, our representatives who are also here from Brisbane 2032. But, most importantly, the people that we are all here for today – a huge welcome to our brilliant athletes in attendance.

I would like to start by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we are all meeting today, the Quandamooka people, and pay my respects to elders past and present. The Quandamooka people are comprised of three distinct groups: the Nughi, Nunukul and Gorenpul peoples, the people of the sand and water. I wish also to recognise the outstanding contribution that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples make to society and to sport in our country and to celebrate the power of sport to promote reconciliation and reduce inequality.

It is such an honour to be here today at the Anna Meares Velodrome. This is my first time in the centre, and it is amazing. It’s incredible to think that in six years’ time, this venue will be hosting events as part of Brisbane 2032. But as we know, today is not about venues. It is about the people and it is about our sport, and how we are creating exceptional environments for our athletes, coaches, staff and all of our sports that they need to reach their potential on the world stage.

So, to kick us off, I would like to welcome our local Member for Bonner, Kara Cook.

KARA COOK, MEMBER FOR BONNER: Thanks so much, Libby. And good morning everyone, and welcome to the Anna Meares Velodrome. And how special to have Anna with us today. This is such a wonderful facility in my local community of Bonner. I’m so proud to represent this community and so proud to welcome all of these fabulous athletes here today.

It is great to be part of the Albanese Labor Government that is delivering, of course, for our athletes, but of course, also for wonderful facilities like this right across our city and across our country. And I can’t wait to welcome athletes here for 2032 and, of course, the pathway to get there is so important. And that is why we are here today, and it’s wonderful to welcome our Sports Minister, Anika Wells, to make a very important announcement for all of the athletes behind me and certainly everyone who will be journeying to 2032.

So, I’d like to welcome Minister Anika Wells.

MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS AND MINISTER FOR SPORT ANIKA WELLS: Good morning, everyone. It’s a really good morning. Thank you, Libby, and thank you all of our sports fans who have joined us this morning. Can I acknowledge everyone – Kara Cook and, in particular, ASC CEO Kieren Perkins, and all of my colleagues from the sports sector. And to our incredible athletes, you are our hearts, you are our minds and you are the muscle behind everything that we do here in the Australian sporting ecosystem. Thank you for being here, thank you for supporting me, and thank you for inspiring all Australians as we move towards Brisbane 2032.

It’s about this time two years ago now that I stood at the AIS in Canberra to announce a 50 per cent increase in funding dedicated to helping our top athletes bring home gold and silver and bronze and personal bests and so much more. That investment has paid off. Australia delivered its best-ever Winter Games, 14th on the medal tally and beating nations that fancy themselves against the land, the sea, the salt and the sunshine. And athletes will tell you themselves, this funding has helped make the difference.

So today, I’m pleased to announce that we will keep that momentum going. With Brisbane 2032 just over six years away, this morning, we are announcing record funding of $513 million across the next two years, showing confidence that the Albanese Government has in those who are so proud to wear the green and the gold. It means investing in 68 different sports programs. It means grants paid directly to athletes. It continues opportunities for our current and our future Para-athletes, so more Australians with disability can reach their full potential through sport. It ensures women in sports leadership and high-performance coaching roles. And it means certainty and stability as we all push towards LA 2028 and Brisbane 2032.

Since I became the Minister for Sport four years ago now, I’ve set out to ensure that all Australians, from playground to podium, can reach their full potential through sport, and I’m proud that the Albanese Government has made that commitment through investments like this. We see every day how sport brings us together. Just look at the reaction to the Socceroos’ incredible win against Turkiye at the World Cup, or how much the Tillies galvanise Australia every time they play, or what we’ll see in just a few weeks at the Commonwealth Games in Scotland. We see it when Cam [McEvoy] sends the strongest possible message to the world that he is still in blistering form. We see it when Lachie [Kennedy] and Gout [Gout] incite the Americans to trash-talk us, or when Hani [Watson] reminds us all that despite multiple major surgeries and barriers, she is indeed our bench queen.

This $513 million investment helps our athletes directly and gives you the support and the stability to reach the highest levels on the world stage. The Albanese Government is proud to back our high-performance athletes and our sports, and this record funding will help us set up for LA 2028, for the French Alps 2030 and for Brisbane 2032.

Back to you, Libby.

TRICKETT: Minister, thank you so much for your ongoing support of Australian sport and, of course, our athletes. It is now my pleasure to welcome the CEO of the Australian Sports Commission, Kieren Perkins, but more importantly, my old squad mate.

KIEREN PERKINS, AUSTRALIAN SPORTS COMMISSION CEO: Thank you very much. The swimmers are taking over. Look, it’s really wonderful to be here, and I’m so very proud to have this opportunity to obviously be a part of the announcement, to thank the Albanese Government and Minister Wells for the incredible work that’s been done to enable this $513 million funding package to come through.

The reality is that the Australian sporting system is the envy of the world. Every time I travel overseas or talk to any of my counterparts globally, they absolutely want to know how is it that Australia does so well, how is it that we’re able to line up behind the Win Well strategy, and I reinforce the quality of the investment that comes from the Federal Government to enable all of our athletes to be able to train in the incredible facilities they’ve got with the amazing support staff, coaches and the environments that they need to enable them to perform on the world stage and continue to do us proud. And I know that we’re all very excited to see our team as it’s forming for Glasgow in a little over a month’s time, and the runway to LA, French Alps and, of course, Brisbane 2032, where we can’t wait to be back here seeing our athletes performing on home ground in front of the world stage and knowing that that journey– I was going to say starts now. It’s actually already well and truly started for our athletes. These guys are already working very, very hard for 2032, and this funding is absolutely an integral part to enable that to happen.

So, thank you all. Thank you again, Minister Wells. And we’re very much looking forward to continuing on this exciting journey for all. Thank you.

TRICKETT: Thank you, Kieren. And now, to the people at the centre of everything that we are doing here this this morning, our athletes. We are so proud to be joined by an outstanding group of Olympians, Paralympians and Commonwealth Games athletes who represent the depth, talent, and ambition of Australian sport. I’m going to ask two athletes to come forward to say a few words, and all athletes will be available for interviews and photos at the end of our formalities this morning.

Firstly, I would like Hani Watson to come forward if you don’t mind. So, from your perspective, Hani, what difference does this kind of investment make for an athlete’s day-to-day preparation?

HANI WATSON, PARALYMPIAN: It’s huge to hear $500 million being invested in the next couple of years and then beyond Brisbane 2032. Thank you, Minister Wells. It’s a massive pat on the back to every single athlete here. It’s a pat on the back to the next generations that are coming through. It’s like, with para-powerlifting, a lot of people don’t know what that is, and we’ve gone from being two people in my sport to now, at the  Commonwealth Games, any country can send about eight athletes. So, we have six, and that was because back in 2024, Minister Wells made a promise then. And that promise has now led our sport to be able to represent Australia in such an incredible strength sport. And it’s going to give that promise to everybody else here that we can do the best that we can and have that connection to our countrymen far and wide in Australia. We’re such an incredibly proud country with our sport, especially with our swimmers and our Dolphins. You know, I guess it makes me shaky to think about how I can now be supported to do what I love to do best, and then to support the next athletes coming through as well.

TRICKETT: And what do you feel like it means for the wider system? You know, when you’re aiming success at the world stage, to have the knowledge that that support is there, how does that affect what your dreams can be?

WATSON: Well, like, you know, to try and find a para bench in Australia was so incredibly hard. We now have a para bench in so many states and cities all across Australia now. We now put assistant coaches part-time that help guide these athletes so that they get that perfect knowledge of, like, how do we do this sport, that they feel that they belong, that they feel like they have somewhere to go and that they get that guidance, which we never had before. Two, three years ago, it was not there. So now every other sport is now going to get that too. So we can get that expertise and we can get the coaches in and pass that knowledge on and ensure that by Brisbane 2032 we’re going to have the biggest Australian team, Paralympic Games, winter across summer as well, and we’re going to do it proud.

TRICKETT: Accessibility for our athletes is amazing. How does the next month play out for you? Obviously heading into the Commonwealth Games before your event, what are you doing in the next month?

WATSON: The next month, it’s trying to survive everything I possibly can. But essentially, it’s like head down, bum up. I’m pushing as much weight as I possibly can. I’m hopefully going to scare all my opponents. They can’t see my social media because I don’t want to scare them too much. But that’s not fair. Just enough, just a little bit enough. But I’m definitely going to be hitting that podium and making everyone proud. And Minister Wells, I’ll be looking out for you, sister.

But thank you for supporting us. It means a great deal that we can continue on with our dreams and passions.

TRICKETT: That was amazing, thank you so much. Can I just say, what’s your PB lifting bench?

WATSON: Training PB is 153, and then in competition it’s 145.

TRICKETT: Next up, we have Lachie Kennedy who is the first Australian to legally break the 10-second barrier on home soil. It’s incredible.

You are also off to Glasgow for the Commonwealth Games. How are things shaping up for you?

LACHLAN KENNEDY, OLYMPIAN: Good, I’ve had my most injury-free season in a while. And I haven’t actually been to Comm Games. I haven’t really had much of a Comm Games experience at all. So, yeah, I’m super excited. I mean, any chance you get to put on the green and gold and represent your country, it’s the ultimate privilege. So I’m just going to go out there, do my best, and hopefully bring home some medals for the Aussies.

TRICKETT: Your sport is in incredible form right now. It’s unlike anything we’ve ever really seen before. I imagine the support like what we’ve seen today is absolutely critical to even taking athletics to another level.

KENNEDY: The sport is in a great spot right now. We’ve got so much talent across all events, field and track. I mean, I think we’re going to be a real threat at Comm Games. We’re going to be winning medals everywhere you look. Can’t speak for all the events, but hopefully we’ll be getting a lot of medals in the men’s sprints.

But, the support, especially the funding, it’s imperative to our success, you know? It’s critical, especially with the home games coming up. I mean, you look what the Sydney Olympics did for Sydney. I mean, if we can bring even a fraction of that to Brisbane, which I’m sure we can, it’s going to be huge, not just for us, but for future generations of athletes as well – making stories, making memories. I mean, this funding is crucial for that sort of stuff. So thank you, very gracious.

TRICKETT: Yeah, it’s incredible the impact and the legacy that will continue to have for years to come. As a fellow Queenslander, are you pinching yourself at the moment with the momentum in sport leading into 2032? What does it feel like with the momentum that we’re gaining in the lead-up, the next six years? What does that look like for you?

KENNEDY: It feels sort of perfect, you know, with just the influx of talent in track and field, all leading into a home Games being raised here in Brisbane. So it’s sort of like perfect – it’s sort of the stuff you dream about, you know? I mean, a home Games – how sick is that? I’m very lucky. Not many people can say that they even get the opportunity to compete at a home Games, let alone the place where I was raised. So yeah, I mean, I’m still buzzing about it. It still doesn’t feel super real. I’ll be 28, so hopefully, if things are going as planned, I’ll be there competing and in my best form. But, I mean, who knows what will happen. But I can assure you that there will be some cracking athletes out there, and it’s going to be a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I mean, it’s just truly going to be awesome, and so good for the city and for the sport and for the country.

TRICKETT: Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much, Lachie. All the best at Comm Games.

JOURNALIST: Kieren, I guess there’s been a lot made probably in the last week, some comments about athlete pay as far as Kirsty Coventry. I guess, what’s your view on it? You’ve got the crop of athletes standing right behind you – do they deserve to be paid at the Olympics in particular?

PERKINS: Look, there’s no doubt that the amount of work and effort that these guys have to put in and the whole system puts in to enable the type of performances that we see is extraordinary. It’s full-time professional effort that goes into it, and it’s only appropriate that the athletes have got a desire to be rewarded for that.

I think from our end, creating the environment, making sure that funding that we’re providing through the Federal Government is enabling us to give them what they need to train, to compete and to travel so that we can get the best selected teams is really important. And, of course, for the dAIS funding, the direct athlete grants, you know, we’ve got almost 1,000 athletes now in Australia who receive tax-free grants from the Albanese Government’s pool of funding through the Sports Commission. And that is extraordinary support. It really is quite generous of the Australian taxpayer to provide that, but we all appreciate that the cost and the challenge to deliver on what they need - it always needs support, and I know that there’s a lot of effort goes out into the broader system to help with that.

JOURNALIST: Just on that, I guess, this is an incredibly positive announcement. Obviously, the money going up at a time that the economy is struggling. But we saw someone like Kyle Chalmers come out last week and say that it costs him $5,000 to get to the swimming championships. Just how harsh of a reality is it for athletes, particularly in those sports that are more individualistic and things like that too?

PERKINS: Look, I think the thing that often gets missed in the sort of the general population conversation about this is that while we see the big dance, we see the Olympic, Paralympic and Commonwealth Games, and they’re extraordinary events, and they certainly are an environment that makes Australia very, very proud. The work, the effort and the amount of time that goes into actually enabling those athletes to be there is extraordinary. It’s why the Albanese Government’s providing $513 million over the next two years to give that support, but there’ll always be more support. And I think that’s where giving everyone an understanding that our Olympic, Paralympic, Commonwealth athletes, they’re not highly paid. They’re not commercially viable in their own right, and those supports that we see out from the community to help them to do that is imperative to enabling them to get there. But it’s all very much built off the back of that incredible support that we get from the Federal Government to provide the environment and the base funding to allow them to do what they do.

JOURNALIST: We’ve obviously heard how good it is for the athletes. What about the younger kids that are aspiring to be athletes?

PERKINS: Look, there is no doubt that Australia is in a really privileged position. We have an entire community support system that is focused on providing opportunity for kids to play sport, providing the opportunity for them to live their dreams and get to where they need to with whatever aspiration they might have. Fundamentally though, of course, it’s volunteer run, it’s very difficult to maintain and deliver, and I think that the more focus that we can provide at that community level on giving people fun, safe and supportive environments to play, the more likelihood we’ll have to have a thriving system in the long term.

JOURNALIST: I have a question for an athlete, if that’s okay? Just piggybacking on the question, I don’t know if you heard, but we’ve got so many young kids that are also wanting to be athletes like yourself. What do you think this kind of funding means for the kids that are looking up to you?

KENNEDY: I mean, grassroots sports is like the foundation of Aussie sports in general. I remember being five, and my dad would throw me into footy right from the get-go, you know? I mean, that’s just part of our culture I guess, how we do things here. I think having the support of the government funding sports, like Olympic sports as well, it’s crucial, because like I said, that’s the foundation. They’re the future generations. Like, in 10 or 20 years, I’ll be done so I won’t matter anymore, and it’ll be all about the future kids who have grown up hopefully watching me perform well at these big events, largely due to the funding. So, I mean, it speaks for itself. The better I perform, the better the funding, the better our grassroots will hopefully be.

JOURNALIST: What’s your message to kids that might be looking up to you and watching you ahead of the Commonwealth Games?

KENNEDY: Just do your best, you know. If you’d have asked me when I was 5 or 10 at school I would’ve told you, no chance, I wouldn’t have even been thinking about Olympics, I would have been thinking maybe rugby or soccer or something. You never know what can happen, so I say take every opportunity that comes your way, say yes, don’t say no, and just believe in yourself. Aussies are always known for punching above their weight across all forms, especially sport. I mean, we’re a small population but we always seem to be competitive in almost every sport. So, believe in yourself and just try your best. Say yes.

JOURNALIST: I was just going to ask you what athletes you looked up to when you were younger?

KENNEDY: I mean, as far as athletes, I was a big Johnathan Thurston guy, a big Cowboys fan, NRL. Their grand final was momentous for me. I was at a father-son camp with my dad and a bunch of other boys from my school. And I was like one of the six Cowboys fans surrounded by a bunch of Broncos fans, so it was a great day. I mean, obviously I was a big Shirvo guy. He’s been very helpful for me now as well, even in my own athletic career. So, he’s a weapon. But I mean, any athlete who’s competed professionally I have just the utmost respect for because I see how hard I work and I know they must have worked even harder, and I’ve got so much support for me now, and I know there are athletes who’ve got way less support but done way better things than me, so I just have the utmost respect for any professional athlete because I know what it takes and it’s hard.

JOURNALIST: I have a question for Cooper. I guess, Cooper, you’re probably one of the newest gold medalists at an event at the Winter Olympics. Just on the Kyle Chalmers question last week, I’m not sure if you’ve seen his comments, but gold medals can change lives for some people. What has it done for you since you won that gold medal incredibly a few months ago? And to back up that, do you think it is a struggle for athletes if you don’t have that life-changing moment as well?

COOPER WOODS, WINTER OLYMPIAN: Yeah, I mean, what a gold medal does for you is it opens doors. It doesn’t give you direct financial support. It opens doors, and it’s what you can do with it. You know, it’s hard. You know, we’re not professional athletes in that sense. We’re not signed on to the Sydney Roosters or anything like that. So we don’t have a wage coming in. There’s a little bit of funding coming in from World Cups and results like that, but we heavily rely on ASC to provide us with funding and support. I had teammates that went to these last Olympics that were still paying. (Indistinct) So, gold medals open doors, opens opportunities and it’s kind of what you do with them.

JOURNALIST: These funding announcements are incredible, because what it does, is it stops maybe a hundred people or kids that would choose maybe rugby league because they can see the big million dollar paycheck a year, as opposed to the true passion they might have for an individual sport or an Olympic sport, perhaps?

WOODS: Yeah, I mean, from the financial standpoint, I believe everyone else that’s standing here behind me, we do it not the money, and we’ve been doing that our entire life. But funding like we’ve just received, that creates opportunities for us Australians to go out there, be the underdog, beat everyone, and that inspires the next. And if we’re inspiring the next, that’s like so important. You know, 20 years down the track you want to see that next kid stand on top of that podium just because we did that also.

JOURNALIST: I just have a question, you know, with sport in particular, we always have the naysayers sitting at home with things like Olympics and stuff, going we don’t need to spend all this pointless money on something that’s just happened for a couple of weeks and things like that. What’s your message to Australians today that are probably going to sit there and go, $513 million that could be better spent on cost of living or hospitals? Like, what’s your message to that?

WELLS: We are laser-focused on what sports does from playground to podium, and our funding goes to grassroots participation, things like Sporting Schools. More than 20 million kids have been through Sporting Schools, which means it doesn’t matter if your parents have a car or not, it doesn’t matter if they can get you to practice or not, you can try sport out for the very first time in your school. You know, I saw flag football get introduced last year. That’s off to LA 2028. Just think of the Queenslanders out there who, like Lachie was saying, already know some footy skills, but getting to try flag football might see them in LA in 2028.

So, there are other programs like that, plus our $200 million Play Our Way program, which we could have done that fivefold with the number of requests we had for people to upgrade female change rooms, put on a bus to get girls around, uniforms that are culturally appropriate, lights to extend the times that people can train. So I do think that in terms of cost of living, it is a big whack when you look at the season fee for your kid to play sport across winter, and anything that we do that helps support sport to make parents feel like that was a worthwhile spend of their time (is a good thing).

I also, I know a lot of you have heard me say this, but I’m going to say it again, weekend sport is a modern religion for us in Australia in the same way that people used to go to church every Sunday and check on each other. Now everyone goes to parkrun on a Saturday morning, and you notice if someone’s turning up week after week and they stop turning up, you notice if they’re not there, someone checks in on them. You see the babies come, you see the babies grow, so all of that whilst things are tough – and we don’t shy away from that and we will pull every lever– I genuinely believe that sport in Australia has such a vital role to play.

JOURNALIST: Just piggybacking off that, what would it mean to the athletes if this funding didn’t get delivered?

WELLS: Well, it impedes everybody, many of you probably already been training this morning, had to shower and turn up offer themselves to you guys. It impedes their ability to achieve their dreams. You want every single kid born in Australia to be able to ride that dream if they’ve got it, if they’ve put in the effort. Athletes do a lot for our country. It’s not just for health benefits, it’s not just social cohesion, it’s not just the community building that keeps us all together. Athletes light us all up, give us something to talk about, you know, sport makes you want to hug strangers. This is what athletes do. Like, you can’t put a price on that. But with all the budget constraints, we’ve put it at $513 million for the next two years to try and give them everything we can to make sure that we’re successful in Glasgow in a month, in LA 2028, in the French Alps in 2030 and of course here in Brisbane 2032.

JOURNALIST: Do you think Anna and her team will be able to deliver an even bigger medal haul in LA?

WELLS: Never in doubt. Also our Paralympics had the best result in Sydney in the home Games and that’s really something that I’m aspiring to as well for us to get the best possible outcome. We know only one in four Australians with disability play sport, but we could get three out of four if we put in the right amount of money and gave them the opportunities to do so. So, the benefit’s there for Brisbane 2032. I think you asked Lachie who his favourite athletes were. Not to fluff feathers here, but Kieren and Libby, they’re my vintage, and it means something different when you see someone who grew up in your town, who used the same facilities that you use when you go to regional cross-country or you go to Chandler for swimming trials.

It means something different to you as an Australian kid when you see someone who had the same upbringing as you achieve things on the world stage, and the impact that Brisbane 2032 is going to have. There’s going to be problems right up until the opening ceremony, no doubt, but when that torch gets lit, this city is going to present itself to the world in a way that we never have before and it’s going to be brilliant.

JOURNALIST: I have a question for Cam, is that alright? Can you tell us how your preparations are going ahead of the Commonwealth Games and how you’re feeling?

CAMERON MCEVOY, OLYMPIAN: Preparations are going well. We had our trials last week, got on the team for 50 freestyle, 50 fly. So I’ve got my two events over there and now we just enter that final peaking block. So I’ve got about four weeks here before we fly out. I fly out the day after my son’s first birthday as well, so that’s really good timing. And so really, it’s just most of the foundation- well, all of the foundation is set, and it’s really just putting things in line to allow for the days that I’m racing to be the days that I can drop my best time of the year.

JOURNALIST: What will specifically happen between now and then to make that?

MCEVOY: Not to get into too much detail, but basically I’ll be leaning into a little bit more power development as opposed to just general strength. Focusing a lot more on just trying to sprint as close as I can to my goal race speeds over at Commonwealth Games in training, and accumulate as much volume of that as I can going into it.

JOURNALIST: I’ve got a couple of questions for Minister Wells. Regarding our social media laws, in light of the UK going further than Australia has done on their social media ban, in terms of enforcement and being inclusive of AI chatbots, do you concede that Australia needs to change or refine our social media laws?

WELLS: Well, firstly, I think despite England being our sworn enemies in sport, and let’s not shy away from that, we do absolutely welcome them joining us in the social media ban. Social media doesn’t stop at international borders, it’s porous and we’re all stronger together when we have more nations joining the fight. We recruited a mighty ally yesterday when Prime Minister Starmer came out and announced that they too would be doing a social media ban and, like you say, they’d be going further in some areas.

I’ve always said that the social media ban is like being a modern parent, it will look untidy as we implement it on the way through, but it’s about the cultural change that it embeds. And yes, it’s difficult when a 15-year-old has something taken away from them. And of course, they’re going to try and get around it. But this is about the nine-year-olds and five-year-olds who will never experience social media until they’re 16 and the cultural change that embeds in our country, and the digital literacy that we can equip them with so that they’re ready for that when the time comes.

So you’ve seen me make changes to the rules even in my time as the Communications Minister. I’m always alive to ways that we can adapt and improve the laws. That’s no problem. We’ll keep a close watch on that. The AI chatbots we have turned our mind to already. The eSafety Commissioner has that in her remit. You saw me talk about that at the last Parliament sitting when we were in Canberra, and we’ll continue to work on it as we advance towards the digital duty of care, which is the next tranche in our world-leading social media and online safety reforms.

The digital duty of care resets the balance, so rather than the harm occurring, and someone, probably who’s had the harm occur, or maybe their parent has to go and try and appeal and seek some form of justice after the fact, this ensures that platforms who want to transact business on Australian shores do the right thing by their customers on Australian shores. So I’m working really hard on that at the moment, and we hope to introduce that to Parliament this year.

JOURNALIST: Can other countries learn from Australia’s mistakes? As we know, there’s still plenty of kids getting around the ban or still who haven’t been removed from their social media accounts.

WELLS: Yeah, I have had bilateral meetings with my counterparts. Kanishka Narayan, who’s the AI minister for the UK, was out here recently. I met with him a couple of times. Places like Singapore, Malaysia, who have now moved to introduce a ban, met with us first, so that we can just be honest and peer under the bonnet about what it all looks like. I’ve always said this is going to be far from perfect but it’s too important not to have a crack, so I’m always happy to work with everybody on what we can all do better.

JOURNALIST: And just one final question Minister, are the UK’s laws better than ours? If not, why not?

WELLS: They haven’t introduced them to Parliament yet. I feel like as a matter of national pride – as the sport minister – it’s only possible for me to say no, of course ours are better. But I think that’s not fair. I think I will continue to work with Kanishka Narayan and his senior minister about what they’re doing and what we can all do as a global alliance focused on online safety. I mean, this is the Wild West. This is really unconquered territory. And I genuinely think we, Australia, are at the coalface of one of the most consequential policies, public policies for that.

So, you know, no stone unturned in the journey to make that better.

JOURNALIST: Just one for the Minister as well. Just with Brisbane ’32, I believe we’re getting close to the time when sports vying for consideration will be decided. I guess can you walk us through or give any insight into where that process is at and just what the prevailing factors will be in getting certain sports over the line and where decision might be?

WELLS: So you would have known that the organising committee met, I think it was two Fridays ago now, as we do routinely in Brisbane. We had an update from all the people that are experts in that field for us here in Australia. But at the moment we are in the hands of the IOC and their timetable around solidifying their sports and events, and then from there Australia will be able to make its final decisions.

JOURNALIST: How involved is that? How much does Brisbane 2032 actually get a say?

WELLS: Well, Kit (McConnell) is a huge recruit for us, getting him over from Lausanne to work with us in Brisbane 2032. And part of Kit’s assets for us is how close he is with the IOC. He can speak both languages. He understands keenly what I and what the Queensland Government are looking for out of our sports. I think it’s really important for us to have iconic Australian sports, and like you’ve already heard me say, I really want to see sports that Australian kids already play and can see themselves playing and training for to get to Brisbane 2032. We’ve got Liz here from netball. Netball’s put in a really strong bid. I think sports like surf lifesaving, iconic Australian events that give kids the opportunity to go for it no matter what their personal family background are. Like, that’s what drives me in in sports selection.

But I am one voice among many and like you say, whilst Brisbane 2032 has a big part to play in that, we work collegially with the IOC so that we reach a decision that we can all live with.