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Elizabeth Lee MLA
Member for Kurrajong
Shadow Minister for Disability
Shadow Minister for the Environment

Closure of SHOUT and the impact on its Member groups

 Last month, some board members of SHOUT came and saw me to discuss the plight of SHOUT and its future; the devastating effect it will have on SHOUT and their member groups and affiliates due to the refusal or failure of the ACT Government to guarantee funding to continue its operation.

 

This week in the Assembly, I moved a motion in the Legislative Assembly calling on the ACT Government to:

  1. commit financial assistance to SHOUT until 30 June 2019; and
  2. recognise that abandoning SHOUT will have massive flow on effects to dozens of other groups and they too will face a similar future to SHOUT.

In speaking to the motion, I outlined the valuable work SHOUT and its member groups do for Canberra families and the tragic consequences of them not securing ongoing funding.

 

I highlighted the numerous efforts that SHOUT had made from July 2016 to meet with the relevant Ministers and their directorates, of the vague promises they were given and the ultimate decision they took to close at the end of May 2017.

 

As I told the Assembly:

 

“So, Madam Speaker, despite all the briefings and all the apparent concern for the future of this organisation it seems that the ACT government has failed or refused to find out exactly what work SHOUT does, the extent of the impact of their work and the extent of reliance their member organisations have on SHOUT and their integral and unique place in our community...

 

“As Jon Stanhope AO, former ACT Labor Chief Minister and Patron of SHOUT says, and his previous role in this Assembly means his words do carry some credibility when he says this,

 

“Every government in Canberra since the 1980s has, for starkly obvious reasons, regarded the funding of SHOUT as a priority. The decision to cease funding SHOUT has, therefore, to be interpreted as meaning that the government believes that it is either now redundant or at best that its existence and operations are not now regarded as a priority.

...

The same government that yesterday, had its Deputy Chief Minister saying:

 

...we will not be forsaking the people in our community and we will not be ignoring our roles as leaders to bring the voices of some of the lowest paid young women and men in our community, our friends, their kids, people who live in our community...

 

Are the Canberrans who live with a disability or a health chronic condition not worth this type of passionate response from the government?

 

A full transcript of the debate can be found at http://www.hansard.act.gov.au/hansard.

 

We will continue to press the ACT Government on their refusal to support SHOUT and with it, its member groups and affiliates, at the time they need it most.

I hope that my efforts on behalf of the Canberra Liberals, together with wider community pressure, will convince the ACT Government that such groups must be supported.

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