Joanne Ryan (Lalor, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have the honour and the privilege to serve the community where I was born and raised and I work hard every day to serve that community, but I am lucky because my community make that easy. It is easy to get up in the morning and go to work every day fighting for a community filled with passionate volunteers and people who work so hard together to build a community. I remember Werribee when it was a small town. Now it is one of the fastest growing growth corridors in the country and a large city of over 200,000, but we still have not lost that sense of responsibility to and for one another that I knew as a child. People in my part of the world do not have a lot, but I think that makes them more generous. When you have gone without yourself, you are more likely to feel the pain of someone doing it tougher than you and give them a hand, and this is reflected in our community everyday.

Last month, I had the privilege of holding the third annual Lalor Heroes Awards, where we celebrated many of those local communities, and 27 members of our community who are active volunteers. I want to share those names and have them said aloud in this chamber: Sunil Abbot of Club 60 Tarneit Inc.; Greg Archer from the Rothwell Cemetery Trust and Little River CFA; Wesley Armstrong from the Wyndham Netball Association; Fabian Baynes from the Wyndham Ultimate frisbee; John Campbell of the Wyndham Environment and Community Park; Ritesh Chugh, Australia India Welfare and Cultural Society; Tim Daniels, Wyndham Environment and Community Park; Kerryn Flaherty of the Werribee Tennis Club; Sam Garrick of the Werribee Concert Bank; Wen Jian, Laverton Community Centre; Ron Jones, Carpet Bowles for All Abilities; Wendy Knight, Little River Lions Club; Jeffrey Lai, Wyndham Community and Education Centre along with Margaret Mahony; Trevor Murphy, Werribee Softball Association; Beverly Ahearn, Wyndham Diabetes Support Group; Geoff Parker, Wynbay Football Club; Vic Pilch, Vietnam Veterans Association Melbourne West Sub Branch; Les Porter, Wyndham Rotary Club; Penelope Renden, Wynbay Blue Light Disco; Bronwyn Riddell, Shoestring Gardening Inc.; Harold Rixon, Wynbay Football Club; Mathew Taylor, Werribee Concert Band; Madhav Vaddepalli, Australia India Welfare and Cultural Society; Glen Van Boven, Nippon Den Kempo Go Ju Ryu Karate Club; Steve Ward, Wyndham Environmental and Community Garden; and Leigh Younger, Point Cook Monkey Girl Guides.

These people were singled out on this very special night by their peers for their work—the work that builds community everyday by sharing their passion and passing it on, often to the next generation. We build community everyday in the seat of Lalor by sharing our experiences and working together to build that community.