Linda Burney (Barton, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Families and Social Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

. On Sunday I attended a Clean Up Australia Day activity hosted by Advance Diversity Services at Hogben Park in Kogarah in the electorate of Barton. In recognising this day, I'd like to also recognise the late Ian Kiernan, the founder of clean up Australia. Seventy members of the Nepalese and Chinese communities from Barton—grandparents, parents and children—all joined together to clean up the park. Of course, these activities were right across Australia. They collected many full sacks of rubbish from around the basketball courts, the creek and the children's play equipment. The morning also included cultural performances by local people from the Nepalese community.

Hogben Park is an important gathering place in Barton. It gathers together, morning and evening, Nepalese, Bangladeshi, Arabic, Thai, Chinese, Japanese and Indonesian families who have chosen the suburbs of the Barton electorate to live in. Every morning and evening, as you drive past the park, you can see social gatherings of people undertaking discussions, yoga, tai chi, meditation, basketball, football and many other activities. Sunday's activities were part of Advance Diversity Services' Waste Wise Project, which was funded by a grant of $19,000 or so from the Communities Environment Program. The aim of this project is to help educate and inform newly arrived migrants to the Barton electorate about how to reduce waste and litter through practical activities such as participating in Clean Up Australia.

Also on Sunday, the Cooks River Alliance and the Mudcrabs—very famous groups—helped Clean Up Australia around the Cooks River. Forty-five Mudcrabs removed 65 bags of mainly plastic rubbish from along the river, such an important part of the Barton electorate. This event also marks the start of the Cooks River Alliance Wurridjal Festival, which celebrates the mullet season in the Cooks River. The first fish enter the Cooks River during the pre-spawning migration along the east coast of Australia. And looking to the future of this country, this recalls a time which is fondly seen as 'in the past' today in the electorate of Barton.

Two weeks ago I attended the annual presentation day for Sydney Technical High School. It was wonderful coming together. I want to recognise the school captain, Eric Napper. I also want to recognise Wesley Yiu, Scott Lam and Miguel Mariano from year 12, who sang and played beautifully. I had the great pleasure of presenting awards to Lochie Bown, Minsu Jung and Mohammed Huta, who have ATARs of great importance and wonderful outcomes in their education. (Time expired)