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- 20 October 2005
Wallsend Family Friendly Guidelines Launch
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Mr JOHN MILLS (Wallsend) [5.01 p.m.]: During National Child Protection Week early last month I had the honour and pleasure of launching at the Wallsend Employment and Training Centre the Guidelines for Family Friendly Business and Guidelines for Family Friendly Community Events. By coincidence, that Child Protection Week campaign was for the creation of child-friendly communities across Australia. The Helping Families to Grow in Family Friendly Communities project is funded by the Hunter Area Assistance Scheme and run by Newcastle Family Support Services. The project is known as BUDS. It recognises the important role a community plays in the health and happiness of children. The Wallsend and Blue Gum Hills area comprises new residential estates, as well as more established communities. The area is growing rapidly and is home to the highest proportion of children in Newcastle. It has a very high level of families.
With an emphasis on creating communities that are not just child friendly but family friendly, the program aims to assist the Wallsend and Blue Gum Hills areas become supportive and welcoming communities. Strong, creative partnerships between local business, government and the community are a key strategy in this. The approach is backed by Newcastle City Council's community plan research, which found that residents related primarily to shopping centres for the creation of community, and BUDS' own findings that local schools were increasingly being regarded as primary hubs of information and activity. BUDS components target key sectors of the community, including schools, business, shopping plazas, residential land developers and local families.
Central to the sustainability of the project is the creation of a Family Friendly subcommittee of the Wallsend Town Committee, the primary business group in the local area, to continue the local movement towards family friendly communities when the BUDS project finishes later this year. The BUDS components are: the production of BUDS' family friendly calendar—we are onto the second of those now—the development of guidelines for family friendly businesses and events, a poster and logo competition, and Communities for Kids, Wallsend Community of Schools' art project. At the launch two students from Plattsburg Public School made short speeches telling us what a family friendly community means to them. I want to quote some of what they said because they said it better than just about any adults could. Rebecca Alder said:
The other day Maureen from next door made some pikelets. They were delicious. We gave her some scones last week. We like sharing especially when Ernie's pawpaws are ripe. My sister, cousin and I also like visiting the mulberry tree man… He says he's glad we come over because he can't eat them all himself. Mum says that's part of what a community is. My sister forgot her key to the house one day after school. Our neighbours looked after her and rang mum. When we go on holidays people check on our house and we do the same when others go away. Dad says these are the best parts of being part of a community…
I love having so many friends living close by we do lots together. My sister thinks this is what a community needs... Being part of community is that feeling you get when you come home from a long trip... Being part of a community is a happy, safe, familiar feeling. Community is a sense of belonging.
James McMurray, aged 10, said:
I love living in Wallsend. Nearly everything I like is here. Great schools like Plattsburg, our own Plaza, my favourite shops, lots of parks full of things to do, places for emergencies, for entertainment, take away shops, the pool, the library. All of those places have nothing compared to the people who live in Wallsend, my neighbours, my school friends, strangers who greet you as you walk by, those groups who organise the Wallsend Winter Fair that really brings the people of Wallsend together. Why is it important for the Wallsend community to be family friendly? So that no one feels left out on their own or discriminated against, so that refugees can come here and feel safe and accepted, and so that kids can grow up feeling like they belong.
I have here the logo that won the competition. The winners of the logo and poster competition, which was supported by Landcom were: for the posters, Molly Soper and Sylvie Lord, from year 3, and Tirra Bradley Lyons, year 4; for the logo, Callan James, year 6. All are from Plattsburg school. Also present at the launch were Councillors Hornery and Eade, Cheryl Mills representing the town committee, Eric Johnson of Landcom, Sue Swetnam, principal of Plattsburg school, and the school's students. A family friendly business can get a logo to display if it can tick all or most of 12 points that are characteristic of being family friendly. Events can also get a logo if they can tick all or most of 16 points. I commend the BUDS project and Jenny and Melissa of Newcastle Family Support Services for a great community-building program in the Wallsend district.
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