At the Summit you will hear from some of the key decision makers, including:

Stephen Smith, Minister for Foreign Affairs: Prior to his appointment as Foreign Minister, Mr Smith held a range of Shadow Ministerial positions. Mr Smith has been the Federal Member for Perth since March 1993. In his first Parliamentary term he was Chair of the Joint Parliamentary Committee on Corporations and Securities and a member of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Banking, Finance and Public Administration. We are very excited to hear from the Honourable Mr Stephen Smith and his views on foreign aid.

Senator Sarah Hanson-Young: Hanson-Young became South Australia's first Greens Senator, and the youngest person ever elected to the Senate, and the youngest woman ever elected to Australian Parliament. As well as this, Hanson-Young has also been very active in community groups and NGOs on environmental, human rights, women's and youth related issues and it would be a great benefit to hear from such a prominent leader and politician in this area.

Bob McMullan, Parliamentary Secretary for Overseas Development Assistance: A former Labor Party National Secretary (1981-88), a former Minister for Trade, Minister for the Arts, and shadow treasurer (amongst other things) McMullan is the current member for Fraser. In his role as Parliamentary Secretary, McMullan is responsible for the implementation of Australia's Aid program and the development of policies to support the implementation of the Millennium Development Goals as a part of Australia's Foreign Policy.

Kate Ellis, Federal Minister for Youth, Sports & Recreation: The youngest woman ever elected to the House of Representatives in 2004, Kate was appointed Minister in 2007. As Youth minister she's passionate about hearing from young people and representing them in federal parliament. At the MAKEPOVERTYHISTORY Summit she will be consulting directly with you about how Australia can take a lead in ending extreme poverty.

Senator Guy Barnett: Since becoming a Senator for Tasmania, Guy Barnett has lobbied hard for his home state in the Federal Parliament. Senator Barnett has also pushed for greater recognition of the contribution of volunteers in Australian communities, and is continuing in his campaign to establish support for volunteers so that they may continue to provide invaluable services to the community. He has also been involved in World Vision’s MAKEPOVERTYHISTORY campaign, assuring that fight against third world poverty remains on the national agenda.

The Hon. Malcolm Turnbull, Member for Wentworth: As a prominent leader and member for Wentworth (NSW) since 2004, Turnbull has since been a key politician in areas such as Economics, Health and Ageing as well as Legal and Constitutional Affairs. On 27 January 2006, Malcolm was appointed Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister and just over twelve months later, he was appointed to Cabinet as the Minister for Environment and Water Resources; a position he held until the Federal Election on 24 November 2007. In September 2008, Turnbull was elected by his Liberal Party colleagues to lead the Coalition as a Leader of the Opposition, however stepped down in December 2009.

You'll also hear from key leaders within the aid and development sector:

Tim Costello, CEO, World Vision Australia: Tim Costello is one of Australia's leading voices on issues of social justice, and has been CEO of World Vision Australia since February 2004. Before joining World Vision, Tim was the Minister at the Collins Street Baptist Church in Melbourne, and also the Executive Director of Urban Seed, a Christian non-profit working with the urban poor in Melbourne. Between 1999 and 2002, Tim was also the National President of the Baptist Union of Australia, and he is also the Co-chair of the MAKEPOVERTYHISTORY coalition in Australia.

Marc Purcell, Executive Director, Australian Council for International Development (ACFID): Marc started his career in the community sector 20 years ago working with disabled people in independent living programs. Before joining ACFID, Marc held the role of Advocacy Manager with Oxfam Australia from 2004. He was previously the Executive Officer with the Catholic Commission for Justice Development and Peace and worked on refugee detention reform and building social movements. He worked as Country Program Manager for Africa for Australian Volunteers International covering 13 countries in Southern and Eastern Africa, including responsibility for HIV and AIDS peer education programs in Southern Africa. Marc has also worked for UNHCR in Nepal and researched China’s global rise and impacts on developing countries for Oxfam Hong Kong.

Cameron Neil, Australian/New Zealand Operations Manager, Fairtrade Association of Australia and New Zealand: In his role Cameron oversees all Fairtrade's operations in Australia and New Zealand, including the certification of key producers, policy development and community education and awareness initiatives. In his spare time Cameron is Chief Executive Officer of the International Young Professionals Association, a network of young professionals working to achieve the Millennium Development Goals.

Tom O'Connor, CEO, The Oaktree Foundation: Tom leads Australia's largest entirely youth run aid and development agency the Oaktree Foundation. With over 300 active workers, 7 offices around the country and over 30,000 members the Oaktree Foundation has raised over $2 million for development projects and previously lead the 2006 MAKEPOVERTYHISTORY Concert in Melbourne and the 2007 MAKEPOVERTYHISTORYZEROSEVEN Road Trip which played a critical role in securing an additional $2.3 billion for the worlds' poor. Tom was named Young Victorian of the Year for 2007, and was selected to attend both the Australia 2020 Youth Summit and Australia 2020 Summit in April 2008.

Hugh Evans, CEO, The Global Poverty Project: The Global Poverty Project has created a ground breaking presentation called "1.4 billion reasons" which aims to catalyse the movement to end extreme poverty. Having already delivered the presentation to tens of thousands of people across the Australia, New Zealands, the USA, Canada and the UK - alongside the likes of Archbishop Desmond Tutu - Hugh is bringing the presentation to the Summit. Hugh is previously the founder of the Oaktree Foundation, the 2004 Young Australian of the Year, 2005 Junior Chamber Young Person of the World and 2008 Youth 2020 Summit Co-Chair.

Paul Smyth: Smyth is Professorial Fellow in Social Policy and coordinator of the Masters of Social Policy program at the University of Melbourne. Co-funded by the Brotherhood of St Laurence and the University of Melbourne, Paul's chair appointment is to lead research and development policy around partnership solutions to Australia's social problems. He was the Director of Social Policy in the School of Social Work and Social Policy at the University of Queensland. Prior to this he was senior researcher at Uniya, the Jesuit social research and action centre at Kings Cross, Sydney.

Carlyn Chen: Chen is the National Advocacy Coordinator for TEAR and coordinates Voices for Justice with Micah Challenge. She is passionate about empowering ordinary people to find their voice in creative ways bring change for a more just and compassionate world. She seeks to find out what it means to follow Jesus at a personal, local and global level.

Benny Callaghan, CEO of school for social entrepreneurs: Callaghan has a breadth of experience in the community sector and a passion and expertise in experiential and action learning. He has worked for and supported a number of social ventures in Australia, Rwanda, and the Philippines. In particular, he has had a long-standing involvement internationally with the Outward Bound organisation and is dedicated to enabling individuals and organisations to develop and reach their potential. Benny is passionate about the social sector and having a broad impact on the wellbeing of communities through active citizenship and social entrepreneurship.

Simon Sheikh: Sheikh is national director of the community advocacy group GetUp! GetUp is an independent, grass-roots community advocacy organisation giving everyday Australians opportunities to get involved and hold politicians accountable on important issues. Whether it is sending an email to a member of parliament, engaging with the media, attending an event or helping to get a television ad on the air, GetUp members take targeted, coordinated and strategic action.

Nick Moraitis, Partner, MakeBelieve: Nick is a consultant in social change communications and strategy. Before that he was Public Engagement Manager at Greenpeace Australia Pacific, and has been Online and Outreach Director at GetUp!, and Global Youth Strategy Director at Amnesty International. Before Amnesty, Nick was Strategy and Partnership Coordinator at TakingITGlobal, an international network of more than 100,000 young leaders where he focused on building relationships with UN agencies, companies, governments, and local youth organizations to tackle major global issues. Nick remains an advisor to TakingITGlobal.

Amanda McKenzie, CEO, The Australian Youth Climate Coalition: Amanda leads the AYCC, a national youth movement with over 50,000 members. Prior to this Amanda established ASCENT, the Australian Climate Change Education Network in 2006, and also played a key role in the development of the international youth climate movement. Amanda has been at the forefront of key climate change campaigning in Australia, including Powershift, Youth Decide and recently at Copenhagen where she was one of the leaders of the international youth movement advocating for strong outcomes.

Chris Varney, Australia's 2009 Youth Representative to the United Nations: Chris has met and consulted with young Australians from all over the country about their views in order to represent them at the United Nations General Assembly. Chris is formerly the National Co-Director of Vision Generation Australia (VGen), World Vision’s youth movement. In this role he was an ambassador for VGen’s vision and youth spokesperson for World Vision.

Samah Hadid, Australia's 2010 Youth Representative to the United Nations: Samah is a 22 year old human rights advocate from western Sydney, completing her Masters in Human Rights Law at UNSW. Samah serves on the Australian Commission for UNESCO and co-chair of the Multicultural Youth Network. Samah has previously been a member of the National Youth Roundtable and selected as a participant to the Prime Minister’s 2020 Summit. She has been a volunteer with the Muslim Women Association for 7 years. In 2009 she completed a fellowship with the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, and is a co author of The Future by Us.

Emeli Paulo, Global Poverty Project creative guru and Make Poverty History Concert producer: Emeli is Communications and Media Manager at the Global Poverty Project where she helps produce and communicate a presentation which will catalyse the movement to end extreme poverty. As a Senior Facilitator at the Reach Foundation Emeli has worked to help young people realise their dreams for over a decade. Emeli was also the producer behind the MAKEPOVERTYHISTORY Concert in Melbourne in 2006, and was on the executive team that ran the ZEROSEVEN Roadtrip in 2007 which successfully lobbied to increase foreign aid by $2.3 billion.

Jarrod McKenna, Founder of EPYC and activist educator:Jarrod McKenna is Empowering Peacemakers in Your Community's (EPYC) Founder and Creative Director. EPYC is an award winning youth empowerment initiate. Established in 2004, EPYC has fast become the leading youth nonviolence training program in the nation. As well as being an activist and nonviolence trainer, he is also a social and ecological justice consultant and Biblical literacy educator for “kingdom” transformation.

Viv Benjamin, Roadtrip Director
Viv is coordinating the whole MAKEPOVERTYHISTORY Roadtrip nationally. At 21 years old she has an energy and vibrancy which even manages to overshadow a truly extraordinary history of activism. In her work with the Oaktree Foundation, Viv has coordinated the ZEROSEVEN Roadtrip in 2007, created the End Child Slavery and Stand Up For Change campaigns, and worked on the historic 2006 MAKEPOVERTYHISTORY Concert with Bono and Pearl Jam.

Nick Allardice, General Manager of The Oaktree Foundation
Nick is General Manager of the Oaktree Foundation and oversees all Oaktree’s social change and fundraising campaigning in Australia, including the 2010 MAKEPOVERTYHISTORY Road Trip. Nick has consulted to the United Nations Millennium Campaign on large scale youth mobilisation strategy. He is a Non-Executive Director of OzGREEN, where he also trained as a facilitator. Nick is a trainer and facilitator for The FRANK Team and a consultant for The Human Race.

Additional speakers include:

Adrian Greenwood
Paul Ronalds
Alistair McCrae

Check back soon - more to come!