By Renee Wood and Parker McKenzie
Four Casey candidates have shared why they are putting their hand up to represent the electorate at the Healesville Meet the Candidate event at the Memo Hall.
The night, organised by the Yarra Valley Anglican Church, gave Labor’s Bill Brindle, Liberal’s Aaron Violi, Greens’ Jenny Game and Independent Claire Ferres Miles the opportunity to speak to a packed audience.
Mr Brindle, who was picked at random to start first, shared his call to arms to join the Labor party when Prime Minister Tony Abbott was in power.
“I could no longer stand these people running the country quite frankly, I wanted to be part of a movement that looked after people.”
The Tecoma resident of 15 years said he was looking to call out imperfections, have full transparency, with no interest in political game playing.
“Good policy can be produced by any party or member and my assessment is if it is good policy, I’ll back it.”
The Labor candidate believes one of the key issues Casey faces is a lack of mental health services and announced that getting an acute facility in the region will be at the top of his agenda if elected.
“This can’t be an election promise, but it’s something as an MP I will be fighting hard for, having experienced mental illness in my own family. Through my kids, I know the importance of facilities.”
Disaster resilience, solar power, supporting the ABC, climate change, addressing the rising cost of living and domestic violence are other areas he wants to address.
Mr Violi followed next with his designated eight-minute speech time, starting by imprinting his third-generation Casey residency on the crowd.
Mr Violi said he’s stepping up for Casey because of his young children.
“You’ve got a responsibility to serve and when you believe you can make a better future for your community and your nation, that’s why you put your hand up,” he said.
The Lilydale resident believes the county is facing national security challenges while looking at continuing to build a strong economy and stamping out domestic violence.
“There’s no doubt about it, whether it’s national security, the economy and a strong economy allow us to fund programs that we all want to do, whether its health or education.”
A plan to mark the electorate under a designated area migration agreement, allowing more agriculture workers to come to work in the Yarra Ranges is already in the works, Mr Violi said.
Ms Ferres Miles was third off the rank to speak to the audience, sharing her decision to quit her job as the Sustainability Victoria CEO because she was ‘sick of yelling at the TV’.
“We are here today because we believe our current federal politics does not represent who we are and our values. Our voice has been silenced,” she said.
The Independent candidate has a history in local activism being part of several groups fighting for change, including the ‘No Macca’s in Tecoma’ campaign.
“Some of my happiest and rewarding hours spent has been as a community organiser of the school council and community meeting table.”
The Upwey resident has a strong stance on climate change and building a renewably energised country, supporting a 50 per cent reduction in fossil fuels by 2030.
Her four key policies include federal integrity, climate change, a national resilience plan and a safe workplace and society for all – while being led by the Casey voice, rather than political party beliefs.
Ms Game was the last to take the stand, expressing her desire to run for a second time due to climate change and protecting the native environment of the Dandenong Ranges.
“The Greens are the only party in Australia not ambivalent on this point. Australia can and must become a renewable energy superpower,” she said.
If the Greens gain the balance of power in Parliament, Ms Game said they would tax billionaires to pay for social programs.
“We will make billionaires and big corporations pay their fair share of tax.”
Ms Game spoke about seeing more support for the arts, social justice policies and First Nations policies while supporting the Greens’ push to see dental added to Medicare.
The candidates received four questions decided by the organisers after speaking to the crowd.
Q: What do you think are the most pressing issues for young families in the Casey electorate?
Jenny Game:
“Free childcare certainly, but I also think housing is a massive issue – affordable housing. The greens are really keen on the government playing a role in building public housing,” she said.
“What we’ll be fighting for is that both mental health and dental care will be free under Medicare…And if the large corporations paid their taxes we could afford it.”
Claire Ferres Miles:
“Cost of living pressures – they want incentives in terms of renewable energy, how they get clean energy to the house, fuel, bills – where’s our electric vehicle market?” Ms Ferres Miles said.
“Families that I’m speaking to, they want really good decisions now that will address some of these issues, but they are very concerned about immediate action on climate change.”
Aaron Violi:
“Cost of living is a huge one… The fuel excise is significant but also looking at other initiatives to allow them to continue to send the children to school, afford the bills, and have fun.
“Housing is a massive issue – We’ve [the coalition] looked at the Home Guarantee Scheme, Home Builder, the First Time Home Super Saver Scheme.”
Bill Brindle:
“Biggest one has to be housing and the cost of housing… We’ve got a $10 billion plan to build social housing over the next five years. 4000 of those houses will be solely for women and children.
“[Also] preparedness for emergencies… I’ve been working with Dr Lewis Hughes from the Dandenong Ranges on a brand new emergency system that is completely community-driven.”
Q: What do you hope Australia will be like in 20 years? What should be its character and reputation? What sort of nation should we have become?
Aaron Violi:
“That we’re a caring nation that looks after each other, and that really about community… Community spirit in the last few years has been tested, talking to community groups numbers are down.
“So I really hope that we can bring that community spirit back here in Casey and across the nation because when we look out for each other, we care more for each other.
Bill Brindle:
“[Creating more services] I’m talking about medical services, I’m talking about emergency services in the medical field, we’ve discussed mental health, I’d like to see the NDIS working as it should.
“I’d love to see a community that’s well and truly embracing the cheaper renewables that are available now and the ones that are going to come in the future.”
Claire Ferres Miles:
“When I think of Australia in 20 years’ time there are three words, I would like to describe our country as having integrity, being compassionate, and all of us being proud to be Australians.
“People want an integrity Commission… they want an integrity commission that has public hearings and is retrospective… Our country at the moment in our treatment of refugees is cruel… When I watched COP26 in Glasgow, I was not proud to be Australian, I was embarrassed.”
Jenny Game:
“Are we going to be good ancestors because in 20 years, this earth is going to be on fire… I mean are we even gonna be here in 20 years, or are we just gonna have a country that cannot be insured.
“We’ve got to do the right thing and fight the climate, so I would like this to be a place that’s also thriving with renewables because that’s the future, we’ve got the technology we should really be a superpower.”
Q: What do you believe is Australia’s reputation internationally? And what changes would you make to improve it?
Claire Ferres Miles:
“[Regarding refugee treatment] When I was in Denmark, the questions that people were saying to me was, I can’t believe how you treat people in terms of your country’s policies are cruel.
“And also that basically, we’re just going to invest in coal forever, and that we don’t care about anyone else in terms of making a contribution to climate action.”
Jenny Game:
“I think the COP was embarrassing… We’ve got the reputation now, for a nation that doesn’t care about refugees. We don’t care about animals not care about the environment.”
“What changes would you make to improve it? Well, how about we stop burning coal and gas? How about we phase out native timber logging forests, how about we look after our cities, our forests or animals.”
Bill Brindle:
“We need to act as adults. We need to have good relations with our neighbors. We need to have a reasonable foreign aid program. Have a reasonable foreign vaccination program.
“I think we need to build friendships, good trade relations, but that does come in terms of some foreign aid span, which we always did in this country, and we seem to have chopped into that”
Aaron Violi:
“Australia’s registered reputation internationally. I would say it’s as a trusted partner with the facts. We have a privacy and national security crisis, the facts are we’ve signed an agreement with the United States and the United Kingdom, giving us access to nuclear-powered submarines, which will give us defense capability.
“We’re also trusted as trade partners. Since the Liberal government came to power, around 30 per cent of our trade was under free trade agreements. We’re now at approximately 80 per cent.”
Q: Many Australians are disillusioned with politics and politicians. Is our democracy working? What would you like to change about our political system?
Bill Brindle:
“We need a federal ICAC that has retrospective powers that has public hearings, and we need to think in place by Christmas.
Jenny Game:
“I know that people return worried about it by saying that the dream is you know tied to the free education and all the benefits and I’ll give you the backside of that definitely getting more engaged.”
“The biggest thing that needs to change is political donations with a lot more transparency within the integrity commission.”
Aaron Violi:
“Democracy is still strong, but we do have an absolute obligation to protect it as candidates and as MPs if we’re successful and that starts with us setting the standard.”
“So I have been asked this a lot and I do support a corruption commission in federal parliament, but what I would also say is we need to make sure the legal framework is correct because people’s lives are impacted by this.”
Claire Ferres Miles
“The other part of it is I do believe that we need to return all politicians to return to the principle of civic service and not personal gain. And we have now a system where a politician to become a politician is a career and it should be a vocation. I support fixed 10 years in terms of representatives.”
