You could also use Excel for this (if you are in a Windows environment) - see the following code

#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;
use warnings;

#use Win32::OLE qw(in with);
use Win32::OLE::Const 'Microsoft Excel';

my $Excel = Win32::OLE->new('Excel.Application', 'Quit'); 

my $text = "Hello!";

$Excel->Speech->speak($text);
exit 0;
[download]

Hope this helps
Rata