Sharon Claydon (Newcastle, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to congratulate a constituent of mine whose social media campaign helped save a great Australian company that this government was prepared to abandon. On Thursday, 6 February, Linda Drummond, a resident of Merewether in my electorate of Newcastle, tweeted:

Guys, to support SPC let's have a Twitter Peaches and Ice Cream night this Sunday Feb nine.

And with that tweet, the grassroots SPC Sunday movement was born.

I suspect few people would have predicted the avalanche of support that was to follow. SPC Sunday had more than 20 million mentions on Twitter and more than 10,000 Facebook likes. Support came from families and individuals alike, celebrities and even members of this House. Thousands of people around the country celebrated the contribution that SPC and their products make to our national fabric over breakfast, lunch and dinner. Shelves emptied, sales boomed and, thankfully, the Victorian government took notice when others failed to do so. Knowing that SPC's future in Australia was secure, Woolworths signed a $70 million deal with SPC Ardmona to supply 24,000 extra tonnes of produce. SPC Ardmona's managing director acknowledged that without Linda's support those deals could not have happened.

Next time you sit down to a breakfast of baked beans, pack a fruit snack for your child's lunch box or mix some crushed tomatoes into your family pasta, think about Linda Drummond and thank her and the thousands of supporters of SPC Sunday for their faith in the power of people to make a difference. (Time expired)

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