Multicultural communities
Ms HUTCHINS (Sydenham—Minister for Crime Prevention, Minister for Corrections, Minister for Youth Justice, Minister for Victim Support) (09:45): I rise to update the house on a recent event I attended in Brimbank with the Honourable Bill Shorten, member for Maribyrnong; my colleague in the other house Enver Erdogan; and fantastic councillors from the north-west, including Crs Ranka Rasic, Sarah Carter and Lambros Tapinos. I would also like to acknowledge the event organisers, in particular Praveen Kumar, Dr Naveed Mughal, Hassan Shah and Chaman Preet. It was a fantastic event where I had an opportunity to thank a whole range of organisations that were in attendance who undertook really amazing feats for their community in staying connected during COVID and in encouraging their communities to continue to get vaccinations and to operate in a safe manner throughout COVID. In particular I would like to thank the Pakistani Welfare Association, the Nepalese Association of Victoria, AMAFHH, Sindhi Sangat Australia, the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre and MACE, which is the Multicultural Association of Community Empowerment. All of them and their work have been phenomenal, and it was a great opportunity to meet face to face and to celebrate on the night the fantastic community achievements of keeping people safe throughout the COVID period and for these communities to continue to thrive across our communities in the north-west.