Thursday, 12 September 2024

 Samantha RATNAM (Northern Metropolitan) (18:39): (1154) My adjournment matter tonight is for the Minister for Environment. Broadmeadows is one of the fastest growing areas in Melbourne. It is a vibrant community and an important service hub for the wider community, but it seems left behind in state government investments for improving amenity and services for residents. Hardworking local advocates and organisations like the Broadmeadows Progress Association have long held concerns about the lack of tree canopy and green open space available to residents. The problems are well documented by research on this topic. A study by the Victorian Council of Social Service shows a high correlation between disadvantage and the heat island effect in certain areas of Melbourne. Hume is the sixth-most disadvantaged Melbourne local government area and has the fifth-worst heat island effect. Broadmeadows has only 4 per cent canopy cover, far below Hume City Council’s goal of 20 per cent coverage. What is more, a significant proportion of residents live over 400 metres from the nearest green open space, while the planning scheme states that everyone should live within 250 metres of green open space. Professor Joe Hurley from RMIT’s Centre for Urban Research has stated that:

We are systematically developing inequitable cities in terms of resilience to heat and heat is the biggest killer of people in our cities in Australia, in terms of natural disasters.

Tree canopy is vital to making suburbs livable, comfortable and safe. Trees help reduce the urban heat island effect, which is only getting worse with climate change and a higher frequency of heatwaves. Tree canopies are especially important for disadvantaged communities because they reduce cooling bills in summer and support mental health and wellbeing.

Hume City Council’s climate action plan intends to increase the canopy cover of trees across the city. They have planted over 7000 trees this year, which is an excellent accomplishment and beyond the council’s target of 5000. But more needs to be done, and the state government has a responsibility to provide support. I understand that the Northern Councils Alliance, which includes Hume City Council, wrote to your government to request funding for a Greening the North initiative. It would do wonders to address the risks posed by urban heat and improve amenity for residents. It would support additional tree planting, especially mature trees, which have an immediate impact on canopy cover, improving existing green spaces, implementing passive irrigation and acquisition of land for new parks. It could also involve reserving Crown land that the state government wants to sell off for councils like Hume to use to build new parks and a review of the Victorian planning schemes to ensure that new suburban developments retain existing trees and increase the number of trees developers have to plant. My ask is that the Victorian state government support Greening the North to increase tree canopy cover and green spaces in Broadmeadows and the growing outer north to reduce the impacts of the worsening urban heat island effect.