Maria Vamvakinou (Calwell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to give a big shout out to the Dallas Neighbourhood House in Broadmeadows, which does a great job in helping those in need in our local community. I want to tell the House about their food parcel program, which I visited earlier this month. Whilst I was there helping them make the parcels and hand them out to my constituents, I got the opportunity to talk to those constituents about their financial difficulties and the challenges they're experiencing. They also expressed to me, especially, their deep appreciation for the food parcel program, which they and their families rely on on a weekly basis.

Since 2017, the Dallas Neighbourhood House has been helping my constituents who are struggling with the rising cost of living. Just to give an indication of how hard people are doing it in my electorate, last year the Dallas Neighbourhood House gave away over 3,000 food parcels to local Calwell families. The food parcels contained canned and frozen food, fresh food and vegetables, dairy and other daily necessities, and are donated by the Foodbank in Yarraville.

I want to thank Suzelle Allet, the manager of the Dallas Neighbourhood House, and her wonderful team of volunteers, managed by Fouzel Saboor Mohideen. Together, they sort out the bags and food items which make up the 65 parcels each week that are given out to help those who are doing it tough in my community. They do a great job, we're all indebted to them and I'm very grateful to be representing a community that cares so deeply about each other.