Michael Sukkar (Deakin, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

One of the best features of my electorate of Deakin, and one that makes it such a great place to live, is the presence of a wide variety of people from very different cultural backgrounds. One of the great things about that is that last weekend we celebrated lunar new year. It is one of the largest festivals that we celebrate in the area. Over the weekend I was very pleased to join with literally tens of thousands of people to mark this occasion, and it was very special to know that we were celebrating that occasion with billions of people around the world.

This year, as has been noted by many others, marks the beginning of the Year of the Monkey. Very prophetically for this government, it is a time where agility, creativity, courage and determination will prevail—a great omen for our country this year. As I mentioned, in Melbourne's east celebrations took place in Box Hill, where thousands of local residents came to enjoy the festivities. It was wonderful for me and my team to be there all day to meet as many of them as possible.

I really enjoyed catching up with my good friends from the Chinese Women's Association of Victoria and the Chinese Association of Victoria, as well as from the Asian Business Association of Whitehorse—in particular, their president, Tom Zheng. They do such a great job in organising the event and making sure that residents of Deakin and, in fact, all the eastern suburbs get to celebrate lunar new year.

I wish everybody a very happy and prosperous Year of the Monkey.

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