Honorable speaker, Honorable Prime Minister, the Honorable Leader of Opposition, Honorable Ministers and Assistant Ministers, Honorable Members of Parliament, good morning. Today, I rise with a very simple message. Fiji cannot afford to become a throwaway society. Every bottle thrown from a car window, every plastic bag dropped on the roadside, every rubbish bag dumped beside a river, every piece of waste washed into the sea, it does not simply disappear. Waste does not disappear. It travels. It travels into our drains, into our rivers, onto our beaches, into our ocean, and eventually, someone else pays the price. Our ratepayers pay. Our taxpayers pay. Our tourism industry pays. Our marine [clears throat] environment pays. And our children inherit the consequences. That is why our government is taking stronger action. From $40 to $200. Honorable speaker, Parliament enacted the Litter Amendment Act 2026 in April. Last week, Cabinet approved the regulations required to operationalize the new fixed penalty for littering. Subject to completion of the gazetted process, from 1st September September 2026, the fixed penalty for littering will increase from $40 to $200. That's a fivefold increase. If you litter, you pay. Not because government wants your $200. We would rather collect zero dollars in litter fines. But because zero dollars in fines would mean people are doing the right thing. The purpose is deterrence. The purpose is accountability. And ultimately, the purpose is to change behavior. For too long, littering has been treated as a small offense. But there is nothing small about thousands of pieces of rubbish accumulating across our country every single day. There's nothing small about blocked drains contributing to flooding. There is nothing small about plastic entering our rivers and oceans. And there is certainly nothing small about taxpayers repeatedly paying to clean up rubbish that should never been thrown in the first place. Yes, the fine may be $200, but the cost of littering to Fiji is much, much higher. And it's nothing without enforcement, um, honorable speaker. We do recognize something else, that the law without enforcement is just words on paper. The weakness of the old system was not only the $40 fine. It was also the limited likelihood of offenders being caught. That must change. The ministry is therefore strengthening the network of litter prevention officers, including officers from municipal councils, the Fiji Police Force, and the Land Transport Authority. They will be trained in identifying offenses, gathering evidence, and properly issuing fixed penalty notices. And we will measure enforcement. We'll track how many notices are issued, where offenses are occurring, and whether behavior is changing. Because we don't want to simply assume the law is working, we need to prove that it is working. So, from the 1st of September, the people of Fiji should expect two things. A stronger penalty and a stronger enforcement presence. But enforcement is only one part of the solution. Government must also make it easier for Fijians to do the right thing. That means better collection, more recycling, better infrastructure, greater public awareness, and ultimately less waste being produced in the first place. We cannot clean our way out of this, honorable speaker. Across Fiji, thousands of people volunteer for community cleanup. Our schools participate, our churches, our youth groups, businesses, civil society, government ministries, and I sincerely thank them. Honorable speaker, last week uh the Lagilagi house Lagilagi housing community uh did a cleanup in their community, and it was mostly made of children and women and maybe a couple of fathers. But honorable speaker, they did do a cleanup and um as part of their cleanup acknowledgement, uh we installed installed solar lights uh for their community volleyball court. And in the house today, honorable speaker, I'd like to acknowledge um a family that has come all the way from Belgium here on holiday, and that's Lionel and Marie De Wolfe, and their beautiful girls, Carole, Sophie, and Emeline, who are here in in parliament today. I WANT TO ACKNOWLEDGE THEM, HONORABLE SPEAKER, because they reached out before they left from Belgium uh to look for a community service that they could do to Fiji. And so, we identified the need for these solar lights or these lighting up of communities, including the the multipurpose court at Lagilagi housing, as well as the Irish crossing from Newtown to Vunivau, uh where it needs lights, so especially for the uh safety of our children and women and elderly and the general community, but they have kindly donated [clears throat] uh those solar lights and I just wanted to acknowledge them uh being here today. Honorable Speaker, there is an uncomfortable truth we must confront. We cannot clean our way out of Fiji's waste problem. We'll clean a beach today, we'll clean up the whole of Nasinu uh today, but there will be rubbish dumped again tomorrow. We'll clear the drain this week and then we'll fill it again with plastic next week. The cleanest country is not the country that cleans up the most. It is the country that litters the least. That is the change we are pursuing. Honorable Speaker, we approved last month Fiji's National Integrated Waste Management and Pollution Control Strategy 2026 to 2035. This gives Fiji a national roadmap for the next decade. Because waste management is no longer simply about collecting rubbish and taking it to a landfill. It's now a public health issue, a climate resilience issue, a food security issue, a tourism issue, and it is about our ocean. And increasingly, it's about our economy. For small island developing states like Fiji, this challenge is particularly serious. We have limited land, we have hundreds of islands, and waste collection across maritime and rural communities is expensive. We import large quantities of packaged goods. Tourism increases waste generation. And because we are islands, rubbish dumped on land very quickly finds its way into waterways and eventually into the ocean. There are small island states today where waste disposal sites have grown into enormous artificial islands of rubbish. That should be a warning to all of us. Fiji must act before our waste problem becomes a waste crisis. From a throwaway economy to a circular economy. The strategy therefore embraces the principles of a circular economy. The old model is simple. Take, make, use, throw away. That model is no longer sustainable. We must move towards reduce, reuse, recover, recycle. A plastic bottle should not automatically become rubbish the moment we finish drinking from it. An aluminum can is not rubbish. Glass is not rubbish. Cardboard [snorts] is not rubbish. Many of these materials have economic value. What we call waste can become a resource, and that creates an opportunity. Instead of spending money simply collecting and burying waste, we can create systems that recover materials, create businesses, generate income, and protect our environment at the same time. And this starts with our children. Honorable Speaker, one of the most important places we will begin this change is in our school. The Ministry is progressing the school waste management initiative to strengthen proper waste practices among our children. Students are learning to reduce waste, to separate waste, reuse materials where possible, recycle, and dispose of the remainder responsibly. Because children do something powerful. They take lessons from the classrooms back into their homes. If we teach a child today that throwing a plastic bottle on the ground is unacceptable, we begin changing the behavior of an entire generation. Our ambition is simple, Honorable speaker. A generation of Fijians who do not need to be told to litter because they would never think of doing it in the first place. That is real behavioral change. Honorable speaker, we are also develop developing the container deposit regulations in close consultation with the industry. And the principle is simple. Return the container container, get your deposit back. Instead of bottles and cans becoming rubbish, they become [snorts] something worth collecting. That changes the economics of litter. Suddenly, the bottle lying beside the road is not just rubbish. It has value. The container deposit system can create opportunities for recyclers, businesses, collection operators, young people, community groups, and families. And that's exactly where the coalition government wants to go. Turn waste into value. Turn recycling into opportunity. And turn environmental responsibility into everyday behavior. Honorable speaker, government cannot do this alone. Government must provide the laws, policies, infrastructure, and enforcement. Businesses must take greater responsibility for the products and packaging they import in and they put into our economy. >> [snorts] >> Municipal councils must strengthen collection and local waste management. Communities and civil society must continue education and local action. But ultimately, every one of us must take responsibility for what we consume and what we throw away. Because a clean Fiji is everybody's business. We want to a Fiji where throwing rubbish from a vehicle is socially unacceptable. Where dumping rubbish into drains is unacceptable. Where indiscriminate dumping is unacceptable. Where burning rubbish is no longer the automatic answer. Where recycling is normal. Where returning containers is normal. Where children grow up knowing that caring for the environment is simply part of being a responsible citizen. And where we do not need national clean-up campaigns to remind us to have pride in our own communities. Honorable speaker, the Litter Amendment Act 2026 gives us greater and stronger accountability. The National Integrated Waste Management and Pollution Control Strategy 2026 to 2035 gives us the road map. The School Waste Management Initiative begins changing behavior at the youngest level. And the Container Deposit Regulations will help us recover value from materials that would otherwise otherwise become litter or landfill. Together these initiatives represent a fundamental shift from cleaning up pollution to preventing it. From throwing away resources to recovering their value. From government carrying the responsibility to everyone sharing the responsibility. But legislation can only take us so far. We can increase the fine. We can appoint enforcement officers. We can provide bins. We can provide collection or improve it. We can introduce recycling systems. But government cannot stand beside every person when they finish a bottle and decide what to do with it. That decision belongs to every Fijian. And perhaps that is the most important environmental policy of all. Honorable speaker, we are so blessed with a beautiful country. We only need to talk to our tourists. Talk to the whole family who've come all the way and we've shared continually how beautiful Fiji is. Our rivers, our forests, our reefs, our beaches, our oceans, they are not rubbish dumps. They are our inheritance. They sustain our communities. They support our economy. They feed our families. And they belong just as much to the Fijians who will be born 50 years from now as they belong to us today. So, our message is simple. If you litter, you pay. If you produce waste, take responsibility for it. If it can be reused, reuse it. If it can be recycled, recycle it. And above all, do not leave your rubbish for somebody else or for the next generation to clean it up. It's not simply about keeping Fiji beautiful. It's about respecting it. And that responsibility belongs to each one of us. And yabaki. Thank you, honorable speaker.