Wednesday, 14 May 2025

 Anthony CIANFLONE (Pascoe Vale) (09:49): On 27 February I had the honour to officially help open the Essendon Fields new Hart Precinct. Established as Melbourne’s first aerodrome in 1921, over the years Essendon Fields has gone on to welcome generations of migrants and is now becoming the jobs hub for Melbourne’s north-western region. Today home to 330 businesses and 6000 jobs, the new Hart Precinct’s anchor tenants are supporting a further 350 jobs, including via Modscape, a prefab builder; Dutton Wholesale; Prestige Cars; Autex acoustic panels; Elenium, a global leader in self-check-in kiosks for airports; Leonardo, an Italian global aerospace engineering company maintaining our state’s emergency services; the air wing; and Green by Nature, a national landscaping business. I commend Essendon Fields CEO Brendan Pihan and the entire Essendon Fields team for the delivery of the new Hart Precinct and the fantastic community event and open day that we celebrated.

I have been directly involved in the evolution of Essendon Fields over many years, including having been long-time Wills federal MP Kelvin Thomson’s community representative on the airport’s community consultative committee, which worked to introduce one of the earliest Fly Neighbourly agreements in the country, solidified the existing curfew arrangements and helped support the airport’s ongoing engagement and consultation with surrounding residents.