Thursday, 10 March 2022

Members statements

Sikh community

Mr ONDARCHIE (Northern Metropolitan) (10:08): I love multicultural Victoria, and this morning I rise to pay tribute to the Sikh community, who just do a wonderful job in helping Victorians. They helped with the delivery of meals through the bushfire period that Victoria suffered through, during COVID they were out and about, and today they are in New South Wales, particularly in Sydney and the lower New South Wales area, helping with the floods as well, and doing a great job.

On Sunday, 2 March, I was privileged to join the president, Gurinder Kaur, of Sikh Community Connections in Bundoora to celebrate International Women’s Day with many of the Sikh women there for that occasion, and also to launch the women’s badminton group, a very important group that brings Sikh women together for a sense of belonging, socially, and also to talk about the things that are important to them. We had lots of discussion during that International Women’s Day celebration about what is important to our multicultural women—how they challenge the current dilemmas they have with family violence, and that came off the back of a family violence forum we had recently with the Honourable Georgie Crozier. So I pay tribute to the Sikh community for the wonderful work they do in our community. In fact they are a very important part of the fabric of multicultural Victoria.