INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY
Ms PATTEN (Northern Metropolitan) (09:51): Yarra city’s International Women’s Day awards is a special event to celebrate the unique and important contribution that women make to our community and culture and to progressive social change.
We celebrated it in its seventh year just last week. The awards are open to individuals and groups of people who identify as female, who live, work or study in Yarra and who have made significant contributions to the community through paid or unpaid work.
All of the nominees were deserving. There were so many winners. I will not name them here, but congratulations to you all. We were also privileged to hear from Nyadol Nyuon, who spent her entire childhood in a refugee camp in Africa. She now works as a lawyer in Victoria.
YOUTH AFFAIRS COUNCIL VICTORIA
Ms PATTEN: On another matter, I was very chuffed to receive the Youth Affairs Council Victoria (YACVic) Ending Youth Homelessness report this morning. The final report was handed to me and my colleague Dr Tien Kieu in our capacity as chair and deputy chair of the Legal and Social Issues Committee. The report details young people’s experiences of homelessness and their solutions to end homelessness in Victoria. I will speak more on this report at a later date. Thank you to all involved, particularly Taylor and Ari, who have experience of homelessness and who shared their stories with us this morning, and also to Katherine Ellis, the YACVic CEO, who has dedicated so much time to this issue.
