Andrew Laming (Bowman, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I also support this motion put forward by the member for Cook. It truly behoves every member of this parliament to engage in often complex questions about what can strengthen community, what the role of government is and how much can be done from the ground up—from community efforts. It would be difficult to start anywhere other than with the works of Robert Putnam and others, who first promoted the notion of social capital back in the 1980s—Bourdieu and Coleman were in fact the first to coin the term. Since that time, many social researchers have worked hard to determine what exactly can promote social capital. We all seem to be able to define it, but what actually delivers more social capital and what does not? What works in the community sector?

To define the term, obviously we are all familiar with financial capital and physical capital but, as Eva Cox pointed out in her 1995 Boyer lectures, there is just not enough focus on the sense of social capital and the things that can promote it. To put it into simple terms, social capital is about building an inclusive community where many of the social norms are neither written nor spoken but still understood, and where individuals can have shared and mutual trust. One would hope that through the work of the 2006 National Year of Community we can promote more enterprising and more vibrant communities that have more room for individual expression and that are able to form the cross-cutting cleavages that bring people from different backgrounds together on potentially common and agreed grounds.

It was Putnam who attempted to quantify it by looking at the number of small community groups that exist in a society. He argued that where there were small community groups that brought together people from potentially different groups—cutting across political, ethnic and religious divides—there was better class and school retention and there were lower levels of crime. There is no more stark an illustration of this than the difficulties we saw in southern Sydney just recently. One wondered where the social norms were—those unwritten rules which allow respect for different points of view, without the whole thing breaking down into the kind of farce we witnessed a month ago.

Reciprocity within a community includes the understanding that we are looking out for each other. That seems so simple to say, but it is something that has been very difficult to quantify. There are many parts of the world where there is no social capital and very little trust, and when a situation arises those communities must rely more on rules and regulations to ensure they have some sort of stability. The hope is that with a strong community that would not be the case. I refer to my electorate of Bowman, where a number of community driven programs are receiving support from all levels of government. That is the way it should be. Australians expect that there be programs—such as a community garden program—that bring people together from different backgrounds to share a common resource, without overutilising it, without free riders and where there is a common concern that that garden be something of beauty and utility that everyone can enjoy.

We also have a number of community groups that do enormous amounts of work, including some of the great Indigenous groups in my electorate. Goori House is one in particular that now has very strong government support. It looks out for young people who are having difficulties with substance misuse and helps them to get the life skills they need to re-engage with the community confidently. Goori House does that in an excellent manner.

Dell Bonner, a lady who lives in the southern part of my electorate, has just been named ‘Redlander of the Year’ in the Australia Day awards. Dell Bonner has held together her Neighbourhood Watch group for nearly a quarter of a decade. While people have moved from one community group to another, she has been a stalwart. She is a person that the entire community can come to and discuss community issues with, openly and frankly. Through the toughest of times, Dell Bonner has looked out for her community of Victoria Point. They are some examples from my electorate, but certainly in the end it is up to every person within a community to manage the place in which we live and which we love. There are many people doing that in my electorate. I strongly support the motion put today by the member for Cook. The year 2006 is the National Year of Community.

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