Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you. I agree wholeheartedly with the member for Page. He is done. He is cooked, as we say in this day and age. I thank our pre-poll warriors: Deb, Wendy, Sasha and Dylan. We had 150 supporters come out on election day, including branch members, unionists and community members. In fact, we even had two members of the Liberal Party. That's how much it meant to people, to get rid of that mess that was the former government.

I thank our central support through the state ALP and national ALP: Chris Ford, Nicola Castleman and Jet Fogarty. I thank Young Labor, including a man we call the Stig—he was there; that's young James McDonald—and his dedicated team. They would get up in the morning and letterbox drop, and do everything that needed to be done. Thanks to my friends in the trade union movement, the TWU Vic Tas Branch and the CFMEU. To Muhammad and the AEC team in McEwen: thank you for everything you did. At times it was testing, but they worked hard and delivered a fantastic, clean, open result and kept communication going so well. I also want to thank—this might brighten up the member for Page—the leaders of both major parties for coming to my electorate during the campaign. I say this, particularly, because no matter which leader came I have no doubt it delivered votes to the Labor Party.

We are now in the middle of working to build a better future, something Australians can now be proud of—a government that works for them, not for themselves. I am humbled and grateful to the people of McEwen for putting me here again. I'll guarantee the same as I have done at every election: every promise we make, we deliver on. We've done that. Compare that to the record of those opposite. Every promise they've made, they've broken. Now it's up to us to continue cleaning up the mess that we've been left with from the former government.

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