Andrew Wilkie (Denison, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Well over 10,000 disadvantaged people every year have accessed a total of 90,000 sport and recreation opportunities through Reclink Australia. This has helped greatly people reporting social isolation, alcohol and drug addiction, mental health problems, schizophrenia and depression, disability, repeat offending, abuse, and homelessness. But, regrettably, the loss of federal government funding in last year's budget has meant the closure of Reclink sport and recreation programs Australia wide and, for Tasmania in particular, the loss of valued sport and recreation programs to the most vulnerable.

Indeed, in Tasmania, Reclink had a very successful program where disadvantaged people participated in team sports on a regular basis, including basketball, volleyball, soccer and football in partnership with Basketball Tasmania and AFL Tasmania. At Risdon Prison, for instance, inmates participated in a valued Reclink program and, once released, were encouraged to make connections with Reclink community programs.

So, I suggest, everything considered, for a program that engages so many disadvantaged people with demonstrated outcomes, for a relatively small government investment, a decision to reinstate funding to Reclink should be straightforward, but it is not—a situation made all the more remarkable by the anecdotal evidence suggesting that investment in Reclink was returning a 10-fold benefit. In the circumstances, I call upon the Minister for Sport to immediately reinstate funding for the Reclink National Program.