Matt Thistlethwaite (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On 21 February this year, I was privileged to join the South East Neighbourhood Centre for their International Mother Language Day celebration at their centre headquarters in Eastlakes. The South East Neighbourhood Centre is a wonderful volunteer organisation with a simple yet vitally important mission—to help people in our community, particularly new migrants and the elderly. The centre provides volunteer services, including community transport, in-home respite, parenting groups, out of school care and family support, language classes and health and social activities. In August last year they celebrated 35 years of service to the community. At the International Mother Language Day local representatives from the Aboriginal community, from the Spanish, Bengali, Chinese, Japanese, Afghan and Indonesian communities and from local school students came together to perform poems and dance and to speak of the development and importance of their language to their heritage and culture. It was a wonderful celebration of multiculturalism and harmony in our community. I thank and congratulate all of the volunteers, the staff and the board of the South East Neighbourhood Centre. I am proud to be associated with them.