Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Centre Alliance) | Link to this | Hansard source

Ten years ago today, the community of Mayo put their trust in me to represent them. I'd particularly like to acknowledge former senator Nick Xenophon. Nick Xenophon put his trust in me to represent his party. Nick only stayed in the parliament for a year after I was elected, but I greatly enjoyed that time I had with Nick Xenophon and with Stirling Griff, a former senator as well.

As a community, when I look at Mayo, we've achieved so much together. If I think of the funding that we've been able to get into our community, whether that be the South Road upgrades from Aldinga to Sellicks; Victor Harbor Road; Long Valley Road in Strathalbyn; or the freeway, with both the upgrades that are happening now and the new interchanges that are happening at Hahndorf and Mount Barker. I mustn't forget Kangaroo Island and upgrades to Hog Bay Road which have improved safety. We've had such enormous population growth, but there is so much more to do. There's always so much to do.

When I look at health, we have emergency departments that have been upgraded at Victor Harbor and a new emergency department in Mount Barker. It's hard to believe that, when I started as a member 10 years ago, we didn't even have an emergency department in Mount Barker for such a big population. There's been so much that's happened across our community—some big, some small—whether it's the Summit Sports Complex, or Mount Lofty football club, or Houghton and their sporting clubs and footy club, or the Gumeracha tennis courts or, indeed, the Aldinga Soccer Club. These have all been incredibly worthwhile and important projects that our whole community has backed in together. One that we've all really loved and enjoyed being on is the Amy Gillett Bikeway. That's now been extended from Mount Torrens to Birdwood. Sometimes these things seem like an overnight success, but they take many, many years to come together.

There's always more to do, and, every time I cross something off the list, I know that there's more that our community wants to add onto the list, and that's how it should be. We've gone through so much together. In my community, in the summer of 2019 going into 2020, we had bushfires across the Adelaide Hills and in Kangaroo Island. It broke our hearts. It's left scars on our hearts. But we came together because that's what we do in Mayo.

People often say to me, 'What's the greatest thing that you love about your job?' I would say—what I love the most is actually never in the media—that what I love the most is when my team and I can help somebody with their aged care issue or their NDIS package or a Centrelink problem. When people visit their federal member, often in their darkest hours, if you can help them, I think that that is the greatest joy of what we do. It never makes the media and nor should it, but, when you get a hug in a supermarket from someone who says, 'Thank you so much for helping my family,' that, to me, is the greatest joy.

I'd like to acknowledge my team. Another member of parliament once said that we're all like swans or ducks, just gliding across the pond, but it's those legs underneath us that are moving incredibly fast that are making it happen. For all of us, and certainly for me, that is my team members, and some of them have been with me for many, many, many years. Whether they've been with me for a short time or a long time, I've got to say that every single member of my team has been fantastic. They really have. I love the team of people I work with. It makes me smile just turning up every day.

I'd also like to acknowledge three members of my team who have passed. We lost Dale, we lost Taylor and we lost Melanie to breast cancer, and that's been incredibly hard for us as a community and as a team in my office. But it was a great privilege to know to work with those three wonderful individuals.

In closing, I should thank my family. My children were quite young when I entered parliament. My daughter was just 11; she's turned 21. My two boys were teenagers; they're now getting married. To my beautiful husband, Nathan, who has stood by me for these last 10 years: thank you. Thank you, Mayo.