Wednesday, 15 October 2025

 Michael GALEA (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (09:53): I recently had the privilege of joining Victoria’s Maltese community to celebrate 61 years of Maltese independence, at the Maltese Community Council of Victoria. It was good to be there with Mr Mulholland from across the aisle for a terrific celebration of Maltese culture. We have well over around 20,000 people of Maltese descent living in Victoria, which made it special to join Antonia Camilleri, the president of the MCCV in Parkville, as well as Dr Gioconda Schembri, who is Malta’s consul general for Melbourne, and Mario Sammut, who is the Honorary Vice-Consul for Malta for the Latrobe Valley. It was a terrific night. It was great to be back at the MCCV, where many years ago I did some Maltese language classes, trying to reconnect with my heritage. I dusted some of it off but am certainly not going to win any awards for my contributions in Maltese. It was very special to see one of my old teachers, Edwidge, there at the event as well. It was a terrific event enjoyed by all.