Peta Murphy (Dunkley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Charities and not-for-profit organisations are made up of people who want to give something back to their community. They are often people who have experienced a difficulty or trauma in their life. They know how that affects other people and they want to do all they can to reduce the same experiences for others or to mitigate the impacts. They are often made up of people who are really conscious that they've had a terrific or privileged life and they know that not everyone else has that same life. They want to do what they can to give back to the community to help others have a terrific life.

By definition almost everyone who sets up a charity or a not-for-profit organisation at the start is a volunteer. It must be the case that every member of this chamber has the same experience I've had, even in the short 18 months of being the member for Dunkley, that people who are setting up charities and not-for-profit organisations struggle with the paper work and the requirements to reach charitable status; to get tax deductibility so that that wealthy people can donate and get their tax deduction; to follow all of the rules and regulations that are properly in place to make sure that charities and not-for-profits have good standards of governance and use donated money well. But often they are people who don't know how to understand what the rules are, let alone how to apply them.

In this year, in 2020, more than any other year, we have relied on those people in charities and not-for-profits to pick up the pieces in broken communities and broken families and to plug the holes that exist in government provision of services. We always do that, but we've seen more than ever in this year, in my state of Victoria, where physical connection and communication has been something that we haven't been able to do for months on end—the importance of local community groups to check in just to make sure people are okay, to facilitate connection when there isn't any, and to try to keep going, to try to keep looking after the people that they care for when they're also looking after themselves.

What we've tried to do in Dunkley is to bring those sorts of groups, the charities and not-for-profits, together online in what we called, imaginatively, the Dunkley charity and not-for-profit Zoom forums, to have connection between the people. Most are volunteers. Some are in organisations lucky enough to have funding, which means they can have paid workers, but most are volunteers. I can't name all of the groups that have been part of the three forums that we've had, but they include, for example, Quill Moves, which is literally two amazing women who donate their time to help disabled children and sometimes their parents to express themselves through writing and to record their experiences; the Bendigo Bank, which is well known for handing out grants to charitable organisations; the Belvedere Community Centre, which hasn't been able to be open all year but nonetheless has made and handed out 250 facemasks and is looking for more people to take more face masks for what they've done; the Fit to Drive Foundation, teaching young people to drive safely; the Frankston Peninsula Multiple Births Association, which is an amazing group of men and women who help families with twins and triplets to get together; and HALT, which is all about men's health. Groups. And there are so many more organisations.

What has been inspiring about these forums is that, yes, all these organisations have said, 'We need more help; there's not enough funding from the federal government. We need ongoing funding to help us with our administration costs and to be able to pay people to do work,' but they've moved beyond that and said, 'How can we help each other?' HALT has worked with the Frankston Peninsula Multiple Births Association and Mums Supporting Families in Need for mental health for men. Frankston Basketball has reached out and held forums for mental health for young players. Project C and Project O have worked together for artistic projects to help young people in need. We need a federal government that will do more to help these organisations get rid of the red tape. (Time expired)

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