Wednesday, 17 May 2023

 Sarah MANSFIELD (Western Victoria) (09:52): Last week I attended the Real Deal forum for the Geelong community at the Cloverdale Community Centre in Corio. Eager and excited people from all over Geelong were literally packing the hall. It was initiated by the Sydney Policy Lab and inspired by the Global Green New Deal. The Real Deal brings together diverse organisations, including unions, faith groups, community centres and environment groups. With the support of locals like Sal Fisher, Colin Long and Liz Bonner, the project is empowering communities to plan for the future they want to see as we face the climate crisis. The Real Deal is deliberately in Geelong, which has experienced major economic transitions, to learn from the mistakes of the past, understand current community concerns and create a future that leaves no-one behind. Listening to the community for the past six months, the project has heard that the climate transition is more than new jobs – it is about habitable, affordable housing and the ability to afford a decent quality of life and access to basic services. Last week was the start of a discussion about potential solutions, such as rental reform, Geelong Sustainability’s climate safe rooms program and genuine access to public health and dental care. The best moment of the evening, however, was seeing so many people signing up to commit 1 hour a week to ongoing work on these issues. I reckon this Parliament should be paying attention.