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Thursday, March 25, 2010
Adjournment
I rise to call on the Minister for Sport, Recreation and Youth Affairs to provide additional funding for young people, youth services and facilities in my electorate of Doncaster. This government's funding for Doncaster's young people is woefully inadequate. Much more should be done for our younger citizens. Youth workers tell me that funding from state government sources for youth projects is often not directed to Manningham simply because the need is not seen to be great. Yet despite that perception, young people in Manningham still face the challenges and issues of adolescence and early adulthood in the same way that young people across Victoria do.
As part of the Victorian parliamentary internship program I commissioned a report to study youth services and facilities in Manningham.
Chris Venus, my intern, did a great job and importantly highlighted in the report that because someone comes from an affluent background that does not mean they are immune from problems or have it easy. Manningham City Council has outsourced the provision of youth services to the Manningham YMCA. There are over 19 000 young people in Manningham, yet due to the level of funding the YMCA receives -- and therefore the range of services it is able to offer -- it is estimated that only 5 per cent of secondary school students have ever attended a local Manningham YMCA event.
The YMCA would like to do broader marketing, but that would mean that more young people needing support would seek to access services, and it does not have the manpower to respond to this unmet need. The YMCA's youth services director tells me that it is a priority to get the funding and to recruit a specific youth support worker to help young people who are disadvantaged and in need.
At the moment young people are referred to other agencies, often outside Doncaster, and the YMCA has no resources to follow up the referral or to provide additional local support.
The report showed that the lack of public transport, boredom, the lack of things to do and the lack of space specifically for young people are the major issues for young people in Manningham. The lack of public transport is acutely felt by young people aged 12 to 17, who are very reliant on it. It particularly impacts on their ability to access youth services, which are provided only in other municipalities and which they may seek out or be referred to. In addition the only youth-specific space in Manningham for young people to hang out in is the same room where the offices of the YMCA's youth workers are located, which is hardly conducive to encouraging young people to use it.
Manningham's young people have been forgotten by this Labor government.
Every young person deserves to have support and facilities which ensure that they can reach their full potential and, when there are bumps along the way, that they can access appropriate support. I call on the government to no longer overlook Doncaster but to ensure that we have the funding to provide appropriate and accessible youth services for young people in Doncaster.
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