I've always thought, and it gets tested at times, that I have a great faith in the fundamental goodness of human beings.

With a small fraction of the hundreds of billions of dollars spent on the Iraq war, the US and Australia could ensure every starving, sunken-eyed child on the planet could be well fed, have clean water and sanitation and a local school to go to.

For comprehensive Earth action, an all-of-the-Earth representative democracy is required. That is, a global parliament.

The future will either be green or not at all.

As a Green, my goal is to put a smile on the face of the coming generations.

I think I could have been quite difficult to fathom as a youngster, this kid who didn't talk about himself very much.

Exxon, Coca-Cola, BHP Billiton and News Corporation have much more say in organising the global agenda than the planet's 5 billion mature-age voters without a ballot box.