Clare O'Neil (Hotham, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Home Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

It's wonderful to be on my feet in the parliament today talking about some of the incredible work that is being done by young leaders across my electorate of Hotham. We all, as members of parliament, have lots of different aspects to our jobs, but one of my absolute favourites is speaking with local school students in my beautiful corner of south-east Melbourne. They are doing some absolutely extraordinary things, and I want to speak about some of those examples today.

Like many members of parliament, I do a big community spirit and leadership award ceremony at the end of the year. Late last year we held that at Wellington Secondary College in Mulgrave. I want to mention Conor, who received an award from Springvale Park Special Developmental School recognising his participation and incredible drive to build positive friendships with his classmates. Madina from Noble Park Secondary College is one of their vice-captains and she perfectly represents the motto 'Our Best Always'. Zakeem from Wellington Secondary College did—get this!—3,000 push-ups and also coordinated his school in the 2023 push-up challenge for mental health. Nathan from Westall Primary School was school captain last year and demonstrated beautiful school values. We had another student who did something which was totally incredible to me: shaved their head, donated their hair and raised money for kids with cancer. Another student fundraised for the Royal Children's Hospital. We had members of local government youth advisory committees, we had captains and we had volunteers.

We deal with a lot of dark topics in the work that we do in this parliament. We're talking a lot about risk and threats, but let's not forget our beautiful country is in safe hands with these wonderful young people. They are motivated, they are absolutely patriotic and they are devoted to their country. I want to thank all of them for their efforts. I also met recently with Jack, Ava, Lily and Lulu, who are the sustainability leaders at the St Peter's primary school in East Bentleigh. I had a wonderful time with them, where they showed me very proudly the trees that they planted through the Queen's Jubilee Program, which I was able to support in my role as the member for Hotham.

I see also in my electorate incredible leadership in academics. I want to mention James Johnson from the Hotham electorate, who won a gold medal at the International Science Olympiads—so totally incredible. I also had two local students who were selected for the Curious Minds STEM program. I wanted to also mention that I visited Heatherhill Primary School in Springvale, one of my most loved primary schools in my electorate, and I gave leadership badges. I met one of the mums, whose daughter received a badge, and her older daughter also received a community spirit and leadership award. This hopefully gives you a sense of the enormously important and beautiful work these young people are doing in my electorate. I want to thank each and every one of them. It's a privilege to represent you in federal parliament.

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