As I was walking up those stairs, I thought, Jesus transforms the hardest of hearts. So, even as we gather here today, the grounding principle, the foundation principle, is Jesus and the gospel. We can discuss political will, but we can also get on social media and express outrage about certain things. However, if we are not actively engaging with people to share the goodness of God that leads them to salvation, we’ve missed the point a bit.

It’s been fantastic being here with you and as well as partnering with Dave to bring this to Perth. You know, good things happen in Perth. Revival is going to happen in Perth as well. It’s been an absolute whirlwind the last month, wrapping my head around things.

​Nick, thank you so much for your mentorship and your support. And, I mean, this man has got a million and one things yet makes the time to help and support and guide. I really honour and appreciate you so, so, so much.

​​I haven’t shared previously my journey and, of course, what’s gotten me to this point. But beyond that, some of the main challenges we face today are.

​One of them, of course, is the gender experiments happening on our children. But before that, it’s been really interesting the first year sharing with you all about the power of prayer. You know, how with AC, discerning God’s priorities, making sure we’re praying about things first, asking, “Lord, does this line up with what you want us to focus on? Does this line up with what you want us to tackle?” So the first year was all about the power of prayer.

Then last year at Church And State, I found myself speaking about the Magna Carta for humanity. What would a blueprint for human flourishing look like? And, of course, the word of God gives us this incredible blueprint for human flourishing. It really got me thinking about this year and this incredible culmination of now being in Parliament and continuing to champion those values.

​Everything I’ve done, whether it’s been in community, whether it’s been professionally or voluntarily, has really been to bring people hope and to stand in that gap. There is a massive need out there. I’ve been lucky to be able to say yes to a lot of things over the last 38 years. I’m not the sort of person to sit on my hands and say no.

​I think a big encouragement for us, and especially this year, is what we are actually doing to get out of the four walls of the church. What we are actually doing to equip ourselves to know how to share the gospel and how to take that away from the computer, away from our phones, our comfort zones, and actually share that with people around you. I want to share some encouraging things. And I can share this here. We’re amongst friends.

​Three main areas that have been really impacting that I’ve been involved with. One of them has been leading anti-trafficking initiatives, developing community development programs, and mission work. Now, before “Sound of Freedom” came out a few years ago, Australia actually released its own movie called “The Jammed”.

​This was probably about 15 years ago now. They wanted to make people aware of the plight of human trafficking and what happens in Western Australia. Now, of course, this is a very out-of-sight, out-of-mind kind of thing.

​At uni I often found myself getting involved in a lot of these groups and I thought,

“It’s a first-world country, it’s WA, surely things like this don’t happen in a place like Australia.”

The more I delved into it, the more I was shocked. WA is actually a bit of a Southeast Asia gateway.

​So what a lot of these traffickers do is go out into places like Southeast Asia and say to families in villages, “Have we got an opportunity for your daughter.” They will go into these villages armed with suitcases, their uniform (because they’re representing a hospitality company), and a start-up fund. This might be as low as $300, which is just phenomenal for a lot of these girls and families in their villages. They would then load these girls on buses and then on a plane, land in WA, and then all their identification documents are stripped away. I never knew that this was happening in our backyard.

I got quite involved in leading some of those initiatives, getting involved in “The Jammed” and the conversations, and simply raising awareness of it and, of course, what happens in WA. Now, funnily enough, I won’t give too much away, and it was quite embarrassing at the time, but I did mention in my maiden speech, one of the things we used to do is put ads in the sex services section of the classifieds, so that men or people accessing these services call call this tip-off line if they suspected human trafficking.

​Now, it was quite ridiculous at the time because I thought, “Who the heck is going to do that?” But we got so many tip-offs. One of the girls, her mother actually declared her missing. She went through Interpol, she went through every avenue that you can imagine, and here was God using this little old organisation to put ads in a newspaper in Perth, literally saving these girls out of trafficking networks and brothels. That was an incredible time.

Again, just being mindful of the sheer change that the Gospel brings and never underestimating what Jesus can do with very, very little. Years later, I actually found myself in Keribakan prison. One of the big things is that Bali is a real worry for a lot of these networks in Indonesia.

​Chatting to some of the families in prison was also eye-opening. Of course, some of those stories will absolutely blow your mind, and I have to just tell you this one.

One family had their daughter taken from one of these villages and didn’t think they would see her again.

​They used to come through in droves. A lot of the villages are so out of sight, out of mind that you just really didn’t know what happened. People would come in, take a group of girls, and the families didn’t know where they ended up in Indonesia.

Anyway, this group started praying. There was a group of missionaries that came through, and they really started praying for these girls. A group of them later found out where this particular house, or I’d call it a brothel, was.

​One night, a group of missionaries, when they found out where it was, said,

“Okay, we’re going to go and we’re going to trust God and we’re going to save these girls out of this brothel.”

Now the security is incredible. I mean, you can imagine.

​It’s no small feat getting in and out of these places. And these missionaries started praying and walking around this area. It was midnight that night when all of a sudden the missionaries were praying outside this village, this safe, this house, this brothel, and three of the girls came running out.

​They were completely surprised and asked, “How the heck did you guys get out of this brothel, like these security guards, these people walking around with guns?” And they replied, “Well, the doors just opened. The doors just opened. We were walking past the guards. The guards didn’t see us walk past them. We just knew we had to walk past these guards, so we just kept walking past them.”

And they literally just walked out of this place with the missionaries in a getaway car, and off they went.

But, you know, this is, again, why you partner with Jesus in these things. When you bring the Gospel, when you bring God into what you’re doing, it far extends and exceeds whatever you think you can do in your own strength, and not that we ever should do anything in our own strength. It’s not the political will that’s going to transform; it’s the Gospel. It comes down to some basics, doesn’t it? One of them, of course, is the orphan.

​I remember years ago, working with children and young people in care. That was a phenomenal area to get involved with because I honestly see now young people struggling with identity and trauma. So many of those young people, their house situations were so different, fatherlessness, and layer upon layer of trauma.

​So even being involved in something as basic as God calls us to take care of the orphan, the widow. Working with these young people in care, journeying with them, they often didn’t have anybody speaking hope and a future into their lives. So what do you do?

You’ve got all these organisations enveloping around these young people, telling them,

“If you feel a certain way, you absolutely are. No, you should be feeling down and trodden, and you are a girl, but you were born a boy.”

I mean, this is again the absolute gap in this space when we’re talking about the orphan and kids in care.

​I just saw it happen so often time and time again that these young people and the ability of how we can speak into young people’s lives, what a tremendous impact that had. So some of the young people actually, one of the people that I worked with messaged me on LinkedIn after my speech and said,

“You know Maryka, I’m not a Christian.”

He’s in a gay relationship.​ He continued,

“But you know, there was always something different about you. There was always something different about you. We always knew you loved us and you cared for us.”

​You know, even that, the seed’s been planted, right? The knowledge is there. So, again, bringing ourselves into spaces where we know there needs to be redemption, there needs to be hope, and, of course, working with young people in care was a big part of that. Opportunities are everywhere to give hope, but we have to start somewhere, and we need to commit to it and mobilise people along the way.

​As I mentioned, community development was a big area for me to get involved with, and I have loved learning so much about metro communities, regional communities, and remote communities from here to South Australia to the Northern Territory. It’s just been remarkable. But there’s no shortage of places where we can get involved.

​We must help transform our local schools into community hubs and centers of life. Someone mentioned earlier, possibly PJ, that we should get involved in P&Cs. You know, it’s such an incredible way to serve in such a simple way, get involved in your child’s schooling.

And if you don’t have a child, I mean, see how you can help out at the local school. There’s always, always opportunity. You know, I remember one principal telling me we were involved in a project in seven hours.

I won’t mention the place, but it’s seven hours from Perth. And the principal said, 

  “You know what was incredible? This particular program, when families started getting involved in the schools, helping their kids, whether it was canteen or doing the gardening, vandalism stopped at the school.” 

So when we’re talking about culture change, we are talking about our involvement. You might be watering the garden or you might be working in the canteen, but it’s bringing the presence of God into your situation. That light is illuminating that space around it, and that is the absolute ability that we have. 

Now, a big part of my job will obviously be to try and identify what a community really needs because I’ve seen the gaps in what the government hands you and what is needed. I really look forward to briefly discerning that as well.

And you know that God gives us the blueprint, so I have no doubt that we’re going to be able to see some exciting things over the next couple of years. Every one of these experiences has really profoundly shaped me and prepared me for what’s ahead. And the next thing is protecting minors from gender experiments.

It’s not just a medical issue. This is a common-sense and truth issue. And ideology has absolutely hijacked this.

Praise God that we’re now starting to see some headway in this area, but it is shocking that we are still in Western Australia, not able to say why gender experiments on children are wrong. This is the fear that’s out there. We can’t even speak the truth.

We need to understand that we are living in a time where the gap is growing and our children are standing in the middle of it. We have to step up and start challenging these narratives as well.

For those who aren’t aware, who’s heard of this gender experiment? Some call it puberty blockers? Okay, everybody’s heard of them. Do people know what puberty blockers are? Are you aware of the hormones and the cocktail of hormones involved? This is the problem we’re seeing now. 

We were told they were safe.

​They’re not. 

We were told they were reversible. 

They’re not.

​Okay. The vast majority of children who start on blockers go on to cross-sex hormones and they’re then put on this trajectory towards life-altering surgery. It’s not just to block puberty.

This is an absolutely irreversible road that they’re on, and yet politicians and lawmakers are still out of sight, out of mind. 

Blockers impact bone density, fertility, brain development, and emotional growth. It has a massive impact on the mental health of young people.

I remember a few years ago, did you know James (Parker) and I could not get any MPs to meet with young people who have detransitioned? It’s almost like they do not want to hear and be confronted with the truth of young people being put on this irreversible cowboy medicine and not able to actually hear from these people who have found hope. Wouldn’t you want that? Wouldn’t you want to hear stories of people who have found hope and capacity and understanding 100%? 

Follow the money, right? 

So, worst of all, what I found over the last couple of weeks is that so many of the guidelines in these gender clinics and hospitals lack informed consent.

The Cass review, the big court case, which I’ll mention in a minute, is currently underway with Michelle Telfer, who found that for many of these young people, there wasn’t informed consent. Even if you had parents with you in these meetings. 

Nick can confirm this. If you have any medical procedure, you have to make sure that the person understands all the risks, albeit how small or how big they are. You’d expect that.

What we’re seeing now is an absolute avalanche of medical negligence because young people and parents are not being informed what the implications of these life-altering transitions are. From a biblical worldview, puberty is not a mistake. Their gender is not a mistake.

I think for churches, what we’re doing with talking about the value and the uniqueness of male and female, and helping young people feel comfortable and know it’s okay to go through these times of confusion. It’s okay to go through times of questioning certain things, but you’re not going to affirm that. The knowledge, the graciousness, and the truth to be able to share that with them is important, very important.

As a quick snapshot, where are we at now? 

We saw that globally, the Cass review now has implications in Australia. That actually found that the base for puberty blockers is so weak and the risks outweigh the benefits. Wouldn’t that be enough of a red flag to go, hang on, Australia, let’s just have a quick look at what we’re doing? Sweden, Finland, Norway, the most progressive countries where kids go to kindy, not even having a being able to say he and she, have reversed all their gender treatment plans. Every single affirmation model has been rejected in those countries. 

In the USA, 21 states have now introduced restrictions or bans, and the Supreme Court upheld Tennessee’s right to protect children as well. So we’re seeing leadership and courage on this issue, but here’s the thing: you need leadership and courage.

The more we talk about this doesn’t change the science; what has changed is how we look at it. WA will continue to be a voice in this space. 

Now closer to home, the SACS review in New South Wales confirmed what Cass had already known: weak evidence and an urgent need for better oversight.

So these are studies now finding that there is almost a cowboy medicine approach taken to gender affirming care in Australia and Western Australia. Queensland, as Dave always says, “the promised land”, has paused prescriptions for minors, and they’ve also now launched a public review. 

Yet Western Australia remains silent. It’s only been a month of Parliament, but I’ve already asked questions about this, about the puberty blockers, and about the process.

Praise God for people like Nick (Goiran). There’s probably a million questions about it, but we’re chipping away. And this week,I raised two things.

One was asking the government, given that all these jurisdictions are now treating this as an absolute issue, what is it that we are actually doing to restrict it for young people here? And all they said is, “Oh, we’ve got the Australian Medical Research Council”, “they’re looking at a guideline”, “there’ll be an interim report next year,” blah, blah, blah. 

Do you know what’s interesting about that is Michelle Telfer, who wrote these guidelines, is currently undergoing or was an expert witness at a court trial because she gave misleading evidence in terms of the treatment. 

So what we have now is saying thank you, WA Government, for telling us that this is the guideline that we’re operating under.

But more than that, they said that it is informed by a range of evidence-based materials. So we’re going to go back, aren’t we? We’re going to go back and we’re going to keep chipping away. The next steps here are to see what it is that we’re actually operating under and what these guidelines are.

If the interim report is only ready next year, we need to know what’s happening in our services now. We need to know what’s happening at the gender clinic now. 

Three things: minors are being prescribed irreversible treatments without appropriate psychological review, parents aren’t being informed and the Government can’t guarantee the reversibility of these drugs.

What boggles my mind is why this investigation and raising the lid are still seen as controversial? It’s going to have to change. We’re going to have to completely change the tide, absolutely. In October coming up this year, I get the opportunity to move a motion, and one of these motions will be to actually establish a committee to look at the gender services here at PCH and how it operates at the gender services at Perth Hospital. This is something that we just can’t leave any longer. This is so crucial, it’s so urgent. 

In closing, a few things.

The thing with gender, the treatments, the fact that it is so an onslaught on young people’s minds, it so affirms and puts them on a trajectory that is so hard to get out of once you’re in it. During the week, I was listening to my Bible scriptures when Romans came up and I thought, isn’t it so true, 

“Do not conform to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” 

The first thing you do, even with all the stuff that we’re celebrating in schools, the Wear a Purple Day, the IDAHOBIT Day, I mean, there’s a plethora of them. All of this is chipping away at how young people think, their identity and their minds.

If we’re not speaking truth and hope and courage and grounding them in the word of God, encouraging them to renew their mind, you can so quickly see how that gap gets filled with all the other rubbish, can’t you? Children are not test subjects. They are image bearers. They deserve the time, the love, and truth.

Parents are not obstacles or enemies in this. That’s what I love, what James shares. If you have a church or a home group, please get James to come and share practical ways to have these conversations with parents, with leaders.

It is so, so crucial. The other thing we can’t do is turn a blind eye. That’s just not going to do us any favours.

So if we’re able to have these conversations with leaders and everybody’s on the same page, how can we better support these young people? That is absolutely something we should do. Truth is not hatred and caution is not cruelty. Asking hard questions is the responsible thing to do.

So friends, in closing, we all have the opportunity to give hope, to stand in the gap, to honour every child’s dignity. This is just symptoms now, what we’re seeing. I look at the abortion legislation, as Nick mentioned, in this country.

Everything we look at as foundational, everything flows from how we treat the most vulnerable. How we treat people, our laws, and our legislation come from how we treat the most vulnerable. So when we say honour every child’s dignity, this is one area, but it starts with having those conversations about the value of life.

​If we can’t comfortably talk about why abortion is evil, then we’re not going to be able to comfortably talk about why gender experiments are. I think we really need to start challenging ourselves and equipping ourselves in that as well. Open doors to truth and opportunity.

​It might seem overwhelming, but honestly, equip yourself with the information. Host a momentum workshop. Get James to come through.

Equip yourself with the facts. Make sure you know what’s happening. And don’t throw the Bible at people either. That’s not going to help them.

I said to someone in the week, and someone just mentioned it earlier too, that you can’t expect people to have a knowledge of God or morality if they don’t have an awareness of Jesus, if they don’t have an awareness of the word. So we have to share that.

​We have to pray that God gives us the opportunity to do that. Protect the innocent and promote family. That’s as basic as getting involved in local projects, local programs. 

Volunteer. See where there’s a need. I know church life is so busy already, but maybe there is an opportunity outside of church to get involved in a local program, working with young people. I love to do youth on Friday nights. We play volleyball and chat to them and create those spaces, or just help and share a meal with them. Basics.

Empower communities with faith. Tell young people that they have a hope and a future. I don’t think we talk about that enough.

​Telling young people they are valued, they have a hope and a future. Even at church, connect with some of the young people. Speak to the valued.

​Speak about how God has created them so fearlessly, so wonderfully, so uniquely. I want to assure you that you have my absolute commitment that I’ll continue to ask the hard questions. It’s not going to be easy, and I know Nick has done this for so many years by himself.

​None of us can do it alone. So I’d encourage you, share the petitions. I know there are so many of them, but you know what? It’s such a small thing we can do to keep this in the conversation.

Keep sharing, keep the awareness going, and get immersed in a project or several. Commit to taking the good news of Jesus out there with you in everything you do. Outside of the walls of the church, beyond the Sunday, and away from the computer and the phone.

Awesome. Thank you so much.