Tanya Plibersek (Sydney, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Education) Share this | Hansard source

[by video link] One of the great difficulties of this COVID lockdown period has been that we have been separated from friends and family at some of the most difficult times in our lives. It has meant, for example, that we've not been able to get together to farewell family members and friends. During lockdowns in recent times, we've lost four Sydney Labor members. Four people from our Sydney Labor family have died, and it's with great sadness that I acknowledge their passing today and offer my condolences to their friends and family.

Vale Terry Murphy, who served on both the South Sydney and City of Sydney councils. During his years as an alderman he spent the weekend sitting at a bus stop, talking with residents and listening to their concerns. His commitment to his community will always be remembered. Vale Anne Lawson, a trailblazing feminist who fought for women's rights in the business sector. She ran a local women's writing group and helped her friends publish their life stories. I'm thankful for her long shifts volunteering on the pre poll at election time.

Vale Virginia Walker, the founder of the Bridge for Asylum Seekers Foundation, who helped to raise $5 million to support asylum seekers and who was awarded an Order of Australia Medal for services to refugees. And vale Ethel Driscoll, a bedrock for Sydney Labor, for her local Beaconsfield branch and for the many Labor candidates she helped tirelessly, including me. In more than a decade of holding mobile offices in Beaconsfield, Ethel never missed a single one. (Time expired)

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