Happy New Year, inner-city locals

By Adam Bandt - Federal MP for Melbourne

As your local MP, I am thrilled to be able to contribute to the Hyperlocal News. 

The pandemic has impacted us all, and fundamentally changed our city, but it doesn’t all have to be for the worse. 

We need to rebuild our community, not just our economy. Recovering from the pandemic gives us the opportunity to tackle the long-term problems our country faces, if we’re prepared to invest in nation-building, planet-saving projects. 

I want to protect what we love about Melbourne. That’s why the Greens have a plan to revitalise our city, with rent reductions for innovative and creative businesses and steps to protect liveability. 

Ensuring we keep Melbourne liveable is just one of the challenges we face as a community. 

I write this as school is about to go back, and there’s still no national plan to keep kids safe at school. Teachers are buying air purifiers and ventilators. 

The Morrison Government has messed this up. They have abandoned the people of Melbourne.  

They haven’t abandoned their mates, their donors, or the big corporations and billionaires. But they abandoned us.  

Despite some of the toughest years we’ve ever lived through, with wages growth flatlining and the cost of living going up, many big corporations are now making record profits, often off the back of public handouts.  

Thankfully, there’s an election coming up soon. And this time, I think Scott Morrison is in trouble. 

This election, we are going to kick Scott Morrison out, and, with any luck, the Greens will hold the balance of power. 

When I was first elected in Melbourne, we made history by putting the Greens in the balance of power, securing world-leading legislation to tackle climate change, getting dental into Medicare for 3.4 million kids and securing massive investments in the Melbourne community. 

This time, if we find ourselves in the balance of power, we want to make the billionaires and big corporations pay their fair share of tax, so we can invest in the things that ensure everyone can live a good life. 

We’ll tackle the housing unaffordability crisis, by building and offering renters, first home buyers and people locked out of the housing market new, good-quality homes, in the areas they want to live in, for $300,000. This is part of our plan to build a million new public housing homes over 20 years to end homelessness, while also strengthening renters’ rights. 

We’ll finish what we started and push to get dental and mental health into Medicare for everyone. And we’ll create thousands of jobs rolling out renewables to fight the climate crisis and end coal and gas.

Melbourne’s values of compassion and equality have helped lead the country before, and this election they’re set to do it again.

Please stay safe, look after each other and, if you need any assistance, please contact me •

Contact Adam Bandt: [email protected] or phone 9417 0772