Guest Post: Julia Gillard, the Millennium DevelopmentGoals, and the Aid Budget

by Max Collison.

When a federal budget is being prepared it’s a fair guess that different interest groups are going to be advocating for more money. It’s also a fair guess that every advocate is going to be wishing they knew someone who had real influence in the budget process.

“If only I could have the ear of Treasurer Wayne Swan for ten minutes, I’m sure he would understand why <insert cause> needs more budget allocation.”

Even better, what if the Prime Minister really ‘got it’ in regards to the issue being raised!!

Voices for Justice: Finishing the Race

Peter Garrett speaking to Micah Challenge supporters at a ‘Voices for Justice’ event on the front lawns of Parliament House.

Well, the Micah Challenge’s Voices for Justice conference is over for another a year, and I thought I might offer just a few reflections on what we did while we were in Canberra for the four incredible days.

Though the quality of the teaching sessions, the general reality of our diversity in unity, and the important meetings with (over 100!) MPs are obviously very important to note (and great to take part in), I thought I’d take a step back and look at some of the larger themes. The conference this year centred, basically, around two main points:

Voices for Justice 2012

Every year, hundreds of Australian Christians who are concerned with issues of poverty and justice head to Canberra to meet with our elected political representatives as part of the Micah Challenge’s Voices for Justice conference. We meet with them to discuss the Millennium Development Goals, and to remind them of the commitment our nation made to these goals by 2015.

With just 3 days to go until Voices for Justice 2012(!), I wanted to reflect for a moment on what it is that we are actually doing when we descend on Canberra every year, from my perspective, and why we do (and should do) it.