Adjournment Debate

Neighbourhood Watch

Mr WINGARD (Mitchell) (15:51): I rise today to speak about the Neighbourhood Watch program in my community, and some people who do some wonderful work who I would like to commend here. I have a number who are in my direct electorate and a few who spill over into outer regions of my community as well, which takes in the people who live in my area. The people who run these Neighbourhood Watch programs do a marvellous job.

I kick off with the Neighbourhood Watch program in Reynella, where Dianne Harvey is the area coordinator, Joy Rolls is the secretary and Melissa Worden is the police coordinator. I thank them for their work very much. They are very active in their community. They do a lot of work in that region, and the locals engage very well with that Neighbourhood Watch group.

I would also like to talk about the Seacombe Gardens group. The committee contacts there are Di Pearson and Pat Broughton, and Nick Wilks is the police coordinator. David Modra filled the role previously and did a great job. They are, again, working well in their community. They are having an Alzheimer's Australia forum very shortly with Rob Crouch speaking on dementia. They really are very active. If you need a lift to their sessions, they meet at the Sturt Police Station on Sturt Road and Di or Pat can organise a lift for you if you contact them. That's how community minded they area.

In the Sturt Neighbourhood Watch program, David D'Lima organises that and does a brilliant job. We help to print their newsletters from time to time and give them a hand, but David does a marvellous job with his group and keeps people very engaged with what is going on. He does a brilliant job in the Sturt area and we thank him for all the wonderful work he does. They also have a good association there with the Second Chances op shop, so helping out the community in more ways than one.

The other two that I will talk about cross over into my electorate. In Warradale, Bruce Hull is the area coordinator, and Senior Sergeant Kevin Carroll is the police coordinator. They currently have the secretary's position available and up for grabs so if anyone wants to come along and volunteer and be part of that group they would love to have you on board. They do over 2,100 newsletters delivered in their area to local households as well, so a big thank you to all the people at the Reynella Neighbourhood Watch program.

The other one that I share with the member for Bright is South Brighton, where John Wallace is the area coordinator and Sandra Lawson is a police coordinator, along with Marika Parrish. Marika does a marvellous job in this area. I bumped into her when I was out with my family the other night having an ice-cream at the local shop. She said she did it for a long time, volunteering and not realising that she did get a little bit of help for going out and helping. She loves it and is always recruiting her friends and trying to get them along as well. I have mentioned Marika in this house before and the wonderful work that she does in SAPOL and keeping our community safe.

Some of the things they do in Neighbourhood Watch I really enjoy—and I talked about the group at Seacombe Gardens and the fact they meet at Sturt police station—are they are also having an Alzheimer's forum, which I think is just outstanding. The other groups as well do many good things. In South Brighton, John Wallace and his crew that I talked about are often talking about security and safety around the local area. They outline the incidents that have happened in recent times. You can see what is going on in your area and know where things are going on, where things have been stolen from and where to keep an eye out.

The Reynella group are very active and they do a lot of work helping in the community. They look at reporting graffiti damage and the like in their area, so that is something they really take to heart. They are very big on stamping out graffiti in and around the Reynella area, which I do 100 per cent applaud. I mentioned vehicle security, and Reynella, again, are looking at that. Especially for tradies, we know they need to be very vigilant with their vehicle security. They often have a lot of money invested in tools in the back of their van, so they are very conscious of that as well.

I mentioned the Warradale crew are looking for volunteers. They do a great job with that, and Bruce there does try to attract volunteers wherever he can, because they have a big coverage. They are also very conscious about scams in the Warradale group. Their most recent newsletter talked about how to protect yourself against scams. I put in my newsletter, in fact, quite a bit of information about that as well.

There were quite a few people doing telephone scams in particular going around. We are very conscious of that, especially with older people in the community being scammed, with people ringing up wanting to get inside their house and/or trying to get hold of bank details. If you have anything like that come your way, of course, like the Neighbourhood Watch, I would very much recommend that you do contact the local SAPOL service.

Again, the Sturt Neighbourhood Watch do a marvellous job, and they too are very conscious of vehicle incidents that go on in their area. I know David talks about a lot of very friendly stories, and they also meet at the Sturt police station. Their next meeting is Tuesday 10 May between 7.30pm and 8.30pm. I thank all the people involved in Neighbourhood Watch in my community. They do a marvellous job. I encourage them to keep up that great work and to also try to draw more people into their Neighbourhood Watch programs wherever possible.