VOLUNTEERS

Mr PICCOLO (Light) (15:19): Thank you, Mr Acting Speaker. Today I wish to speak briefly about two aspects of volunteering in this state. First, I would like to bring to the attention of the house the appointment of a new ministerial advisory group for volunteering, which I have the pleasure of chairing, and I thank the Minister for Volunteers, the Hon. Ian Hunter, for reappointing me to that committee. The new members of the volunteering advisory group, in no particular order, are:

Claudia Cream. Claudia has quite a bit of experience in working with CALD communities and a lot of experience in the legal profession. She is a founding member of the Chinese Chamber of Commerce.

Michael Feszczak, who has experience in local government. He is formerly a volunteer development officer with the City of Onkaparinga—I am not sure which council he is with now—and he has quite a bit of experience in volunteering services through local council.

Emma Gillett, volunteer with the City of Onkaparinga Youth Advisory Committee and peer educator.

John Haren, who I have known for many years, in fact we used to work in the same organisation some years ago, has extensive experience in organisations which provide welfare and support to community services. At the moment he is State Manager of Orana Incorporated. I think he was previously with the St Vincent de Paul Society.

Georgia Heath, currently Manager, Women's Information Service, Office for Women.

Sabah Izzett, General Manager, People and Culture, St John Ambulance Australia.

Con Katsambis, Manager, People Relations, Qantas, and is experienced in business.

Sophie Larsen, Employment and Volunteer Coordinator with the Adelaide University Union. She has experience in journalism, business management and HR.

David Mitchell, President of Trees for Life and management committee member of Friends of Parks. He has experience in the environment area.

Lisel O'Dwyer, who has an extensive academic background in social sciences. She prepared a report, The Economic Value of Unpaid Work (Caring and Volunteering) for the Department for Families and Communities.

Evelyn O'Loughlin, who would be known to a lot of people. She is currently the CEO of Volunteering SA&NT and has extensive experience both in academia but also in policy and planning regarding volunteering.

Jan Sutherland. Jan is the CEO of SA Sports Federation Incorporated. Probably one of the biggest areas of volunteering in this state is in sports and Jan brings that whole experience and knowledge to the advisory group.

Wayne Thorley, who has experience in emergency services. He has skills in leadership and advocacy for the volunteer sector, particularly in emergency services and the CFS.

Sonya Weiser, President of Women in Innovation and Technology. She has extensive board experience and professional expertise in strategic planning and management consulting.

Last but not least, Mark Whitfield, Executive Manager, Spencer Gulf Rural Health School.

You will see from that list that there are a whole range of backgrounds and experiences and I am very confident that this advisory group will be very active and have productive discussions. The advisory group's role is to advise the Minister for Volunteers on a whole range of policy areas to improve the volunteering effort in this state. It does that of its own volition but also provides specific advice based on what the minister requires. I look forward to working with the advisory group members. We have our very first meeting next week. I would like to reinforce that the group is not a representative group as such, it is a group drawn from people with relevant experience, training and background to bring a whole range of different perspectives and skills to the committee.

The reason I mention this today is because the volunteering effort is very important in this state, not only in the sense of economic benefits but also in terms of providing a lot of support in communities. That is particularly true in rural and regional communities. One has to look at rural and regional communities like my own where very few things would actually occur if it was not for the contribution made by volunteers. So, it is very important that as a government we have the best advice on how to improve that volunteering effort, and this group does that.