Kylea Tink (North Sydney, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

When the people of North Sydney sent me to Canberra as their community independent, they did so because they believed our government would make better decisions if it could hear our true voice, rather than a voice distorted by political ideology. It's been a bold ambition which has required my community to stay engaged in our democracy on an ongoing basis. A shared commitment to this idea means my community is directly shaping government policy in this 47th Parliament. To date, this input has been gathered in a variety of ways, but recently we took a major next step when we successfully hosted our first Deliberative Democracy Forum to discuss the housing crisis.

The North Sydney Community Housing Forum brought 30 randomly selected but demographically representative ordinary citizens together to discuss what the federal government should be doing about the housing crisis. I wasn't part of the discussion; rather, participants spent the day reviewing public submissions and speaking to independent experts to come to a consensus. Ultimately, my community decided they want me to fight to get Commonwealth infrastructure funding tied to the state's agreements to prioritise the development of medium-density affordable and social housing for essential workers and those in need around public transport hubs—a policy that I can definitely get behind. I look forward to fighting for this and to hosting further North Sydney deliberative democracy forums on important topics of policy.