Aaron Violi (Casey, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for the Digital Economy) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In my community of Casey, it is vital we are prepared for emergencies. This is something I've been advocating since becoming a candidate in 2021. Solutions don't just come from parliament; they come from our community. It was fantastic to be in Lilydale on Sunday for the handover of the new power trailer from Buffalo Stand-alone Power Solutions to the Monbulk & District Community Opportunities Working Group, fondly known as MADCOW. This power trailer is a deployable back-up system that will be used to strengthen our local emergency preparedness during outages and severe weather events. It will ensure that local groups and community members have access to energy when they need it most in a crisis. Everyone that lives in Monbulk knows that, as when they lived through the June storms of 2021, they can be cut off from any other community for days and weeks. So this is such a significant investment in the Monbulk community.

It was wonderful to attend the Lilydale Football Club's men's mental health awareness games recently to honour club champions in the Steve Featherstone Shield and the John Crennan Trophy. Mental health support is so important, and sport is one of the best ways to provide positive mental wellbeing. In our community, accessing mental health supports can be a challenge, especially for our young people and those that are geographically diverse. According to headspace, nearly half of all young Australians aged 12 to 25 report high or very high levels of psychological distress. Two in five young people aged 16 to 24 experienced mental ill health within the previous 12 months. We're very fortunate to have headspace in Lilydale and in Knox doing great work to support our young people, but their services are often at capacity. It's time for the Lilydale hub to go from a part-time service to a full-time service five days a week. This June, I'm supporting local young people and our headspace centres by completing the headspace Push-Up Challenge. Registrations open on 14 April, and I encourage you to get involved or donate to a worthy cause.

We all know that so many people in our community are struggling. They are struggling today as petrol hits $3 a litre, but they have been struggling for so much more than just the recent crisis. This is what makes this price shock so painful—that it has been so hard for people for so long. John from Lilydale recently filled out my household budget survey. He said that, in the last six months, he has taken on extra work. He's had to dip into savings to cover everyday bills and delayed medical and dental appointments due to the cost. He wrote:

We have delayed multiple maintenance callouts due to the cost. We are living with no lights in one room, no working aircon and plumbing issues. We have tried to grow some of our own food due to the crazy increases at the supermarket.

This is the lived experience of John. It could be so many in my community. That's why it's so galling that, day after day, in question time we have to listen, and our communities have to listen, to a prime minister that continues to tell them that they've never had it better, that the economy is going great and that this government has got it under control. We have seen the same story from this government. The Treasurer talked about how the economy was going so strong for so long. Well, it wasn't and it's not for John and so many in my community.

The story is being played again with fuel. For weeks, the Prime Minister and Minister Bowen told members of my community: 'There is no issue. There is no crisis. They have fuel.' At the very same time, farmers in my community were getting messages from their distributors saying, 'We are not delivering fuel to farmers today.' At the exact same time, the Minister for Climate Change and Energy is in this House telling those people there is no problem in this country. Time and time again, this minister and this prime minister are late, and it's the Australian people that pay the price.