PRIVATE MEMBER'S STATEMENT: NATIONAL VOLUNTEER WEEK

I rise to acknowledge that it is Volunteer Week. I want to thank all of the wonderful volunteers in my region. On Saturday the Sunshine Coast is hosting Volunteer of the Year awards and there are many worthy recipients throughout the Sunshine Coast. I personally congratulate the three nominees from my region: Mr Norm Morwood from the Florabunda Bushcare group, members of which give up their weekends to remove invasive weeds and rubbish and plant natives around Petrie Creek, which flows through Nambour; Ms Lorraine Taylor, whose group Street Art Nambour paints murals throughout the town, and I invite everyone to come and have a tour, which is guided if you have the app; and Mr Tony Millroy, who volunteers at our library and archives our region’s wonderful history.

I cannot mention all of the great people and organisations throughout my region that deserve awards, but in the week before parliament I had the pleasure of meeting with volunteers from Red Cross, Meals on Wheels, the Yandina Masonic Lodge, the Nambour District Scouts, the Nambour Probus club and the Mapleton Rural Fire Brigade—and I thank Geoff Noble, the captain, for his invitation to see the new appliance. I am proud to be part of a state government that is supplying appliances and equipment to our RFB, and it is all kitted out in Crows Nest too, so it is Queensland as well. I also want to thank the Mapleton Hall trust and the Blackall Range Lions.

It is indeed a privilege being the local MP and interacting with the dedicated people who give their time and work so hard in so many diverse areas. These people enrich our community. Many of these people have already done many years of work and are retired. I cannot say enough about our volunteers and it is a wonderful thing that in our state and in our nation we are first and foremost about helping out our mates. Our society is the better because of our volunteers and the many organisations they represent. I would like to stand here and speak about all of the groups in my region, and I have probably only given the House about five per cent of them and I suspect it is the same for every member. On behalf of myself and the state government, I want to thank all of our volunteers