WITH the glory days of the British Empire long gone, what is the value of Australia being a member of the Commonwealth of Nations in 2011?
Peter Beattie
When Australian travellers arrive in London we are relegated to a queue with the rest of the world.
But surely our link to the Commonwealth must mean more than just the excitement surrounding the royal wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton and participating in the Commonwealth Games, likely to be on the Gold Coast in 2018?
The Commonwealth consists of 54 member countries focused on promoting democracy and good governance, human rights, free trade, multilateralism and world peace. Worthy objectives, but its membership does not include our main trading partners, China, Japan and South Korea, or our closest military ally, the US, which Prime Minister Julia Gillard is visiting this month.
The emergence of the economically powerful BRIC nations, Brazil, Russia, India and China, is changing the world's economic power structure. India is the only one of these to be part of the Commonwealth and Australia is finally moving beyond cricket to engage India in increased trade.
In 2004 my government opened a trade office in Bangalore providing significant market access for companies and substantial export and investment outcomes. The Indian energy billionaire Madhusudan Rao was in Queensland and Western Australia recently scouting for investment projects.
But why bother with the Commonwealth at all? The answer is simple: we need to use every link we can in this globally competitive world, especially in expanding free trade.
While her majesty is Queen, Australia will remain part of the Commonwealth and moves to become a republic will fail, even though being a republic would not prevent Australia from Commonwealth membership.
The Commonwealth has a population of 2.1 billion. This is almost a third of the world population with India being the largest member with 1.17bn people.
Therefore we should make better use of the Commonwealth's historic links, otherwise it will slowly sink into history not with a bang but a whimper, to misquote T.S. Eliot.
There is another Commonwealth country on which Australia should be more focused, and that's Canada. India and Canada are like family members we have taken for granted, and ignored their potential for too long.
Canada is a land of opportunities with more than the same sense of humour. Like us they are active in regions such as Latin America and southern Africa, where we can partner and work together.
Queensland has been quick to seize opportunities in one of the most dynamic Canadian provinces, British Columbia, and its main city, Vancouver.
I signed a co-operation agreement on behalf of Queensland with British Columbia in 2008 which encourages research collaboration, biotechnology partnerships, university links and tourism development. My successor, Anna Bligh, led a trade mission to Vancouver in 2010.
Australia is active in Vancouver, with an Austrade office led by the redoubtable Kevin Lamb; Griffith University has a significant education presence in the eastern province of Ontario and its capital Toronto.
Australia also has a golden opportunity to get further into the Canadian market by partnering with the Rick Hansen Foundation in a global tourism strategy, which could provide long-term dividends for our tourism industry.
Hansen, who recently visited Australia, is a strong supporter of the Queensland partnership with British Columbia and is one of the most impressive and well-known living Canadians.
Twenty-five years ago Hansen became a worldwide inspiration when he suspended his athletic career to embark on the Man In Motion world tour to demonstrate the potential of people with disabilities if barriers are removed. At 15, he became paralysed from the waist down due to a spinal-cord injury in a car crash, but went on to win 19 international wheelchair marathons.
His tour came through Australia in February and March of 1986, when the conversation on disability accessibility was just beginning in Australia.
He celebrated his half-way point of 20,000km in Melbourne and wheeled through Sydney, Adelaide and Bundaberg.
Hansen travelled through China and other parts of Asia, then the US, finishing with a cross-Canada trek. In all he wheeled for 26 months over 40,000km and through 34 countries and raised $26 million.
The Rick Hansen Foundation was formed and has since raised more than $200m for programs and spinal-cord injury research.
Hansen and his foundation are celebrating the 25th anniversary of his original tour. The goal is to move closer to a cure for spinal-cord injury. Some of the spinal research will be done at Brisbane's Princess Alexandra hospital.
An opportunity for Australia lies in his foundation's work in developing a five-star accessibility rating tool to guide and inform disability consumers, their families and friends.
The natural starting point for this tool is in global tourism, with transport, airlines, taxis, hotels, retail shops, restaurants, resorts and excursion sites evaluated and rated within a standardised format and available to the public in a mobile application.
This tool could be used by city planners and the construction industry to advise on how new and old buildings can meet the needs of an ever-increasing number of people with disabilities.
The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities reports that 650 million people, roughly 10 per cent of the world's population, live with a disability. The tourism potential for countries who lead in the development of this accessibility rating tool is immense.
Partnering with the Rick Hansen Foundation would make Australia a world leader in disability tourism, providing accessible, inclusive holiday experiences and significant new revenue streams for our tourism operators, who have been doing it tough in recent years.
Today we are seeing a very significant demographic shift of ageing baby boomers who will have a number of disabling conditions.
This week's long-overdue draft recommendations from the Productivity Commission on properly funding care of the disabled are the keys to treating the disabled with dignity.
It is also important for people with disabilities who want to continue to lead an active and fulfilling life to be included and accommodated by an accessible and inclusive world. This relates to everything from transportation to housing, employment, sport and recreation and tourism.
We have to think outside the box about new tourism markets and disability tourism is a significant opportunity.
©theaustralian.com.au
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