Tuesday 27 - Wednesday 28 October 2009

A message from the Minister

A message from Senator The Hon Kim Carr, Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research

It is a pleasure to welcome HASS on the Hill delegates to Canberra and to Parliament House.

The equivalent event last year was called HASS in the Capital. As part of that event I delivered an address on The Art of Innovation, in which I outlined some of the challenges facing Australia's research and higher education sectors, and the country as a whole. The Government's reviews of Australian higher education and the national innovation system were still in train at that time, and we did not know then that the trans-Atlantic financial crisis was rapidly mutating into a global recession. A few weeks after I gave that address, the world was a very different place.

The Government responded swiftly to this changed environment - not just with a highly successful stimulus strategy, but with an ambitious program of investment and reform in research, innovation and higher education. We have lifted Commonwealth spending on research and innovation by more than 25 per cent in 2009-10 - the biggest increase on record. We are making this investment when times are tough because we know that our prosperity and wellbeing in the better times to come will depend very much on our capacity to produce and apply new ideas. The time to build that capacity is now.

One way we can do that is by participating in events like HASS on the Hill, which give researchers and policy makers the chance to network and lay the foundations for future collaboration. HASS on the Hill is also a valuable reminder to people in Government and beyond of the vital role the humanities, creative arts and social sciences play in our innovation system and in every sphere of Australian life.

Welcome again, and I wish you all a busy and stimulating couple of days.

Senator Kim Carr
Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research
October 2009