By JESSE GRAHAM
EILDON candidates took one last chance to sway voters last week, gathering for a special candidates’ forum to kick off the final week of the State Election campaign.
Six out of eight of the Eildon election candidates fronted the forum on Friday 21 November at Healesville’s Memo Hall, with over 100 people turning out for the event.
The forum was organised by Yarra Valley FM 99.1 and the Mail Newspaper Group, with the Yarra Ranges Council donating the venue for the evening and the forum was broadcast live on the radio station.
Each of the candidates was given five minutes to outline their policies and make statements about the election campaign, before Mail Editor, Melissa Meehan, posed questions to the candidates and mediated questions from the floor with YVFM Chairman, Rodney Ball.
In one of her first speeches as a candidate, after announcing on the 14 November registration deadline, Independent candidate Jane Judd urged political candidates to focus on addressing issues, rather than oppositional politicking.
Other candidates took the moment to talk about their key areas of concern, with Labor’s Sally Brennan raising education and economic growth and Independent Bruce Argyle bringing up local issues over party politics.
The Nationals’ Jim Child brought up Coalition initiatives such as the Warburton natural gas pipeline. Liberal Party candidate Cindy McLeish criticised the former Labor Government and praised other Coalition announcements, such as the East-West Link and the $7.8 million Healesville Hospital redevelopment.
The Greens’ Marie Sellstrom urged environmental action, and said she wanted to increase solar power use and the reinstatement of the Renewable Energy Target.
As with previous candidates’ forums, the issue of the Great Forest National Park proposal dominated conversations, with many passionate questions from the floor on the matter.
Mr Child, Ms McLeish and Ms Brennan all re-stated their opposition to the proposal, while the Greens’ Marie Sellstrom said the issue was ‘central’ to her party’s campaign.
Ms Judd and Mr Argyle both said that discussions about the park and its details needed to take place between all interested parties, and not be completely ruled off of the agenda.
Talk then turned to issues around mental health, drug and ice (methamphetamine) use and homelessness, and all candidates were in agreement that more needed to be done in the outer east.
Mr Child said that ice was an “absolute scourge” in communities, while Ms Sellstrom said it was a “hugely serious” issue in the electorate, urging for more outreach programs for people suffering mental health and living with substance abuse.
Responding to family violence was another key issue for the candidates, and Ms McLeish said it would be important to not only address homelessness, but the wider issues that can cause it, such as family violence and drug abuse.
Ms Judd said that families needed support programs when children were young, which would help to bring stability before children became older and more issues arose.
All candidates were in unison that local and accessible housing for homeless people was important – Mr Argyle said the first six weeks for people out of homes were ‘critical’ and that early intervention was needed.
A community member, who allegedly experienced childhood sexual abuse by a family member, asked each of the parties to support the introduction of a pilot program to address the issue and to pledge their support before the election on 29 November.
Ms McLeish and Ms Brennan both agreed to take the matter to their parties’ ministers immediately, and Ms Brennan said she would campaign for the pilot to go ahead, regardless of the election’s winner.
Ms Sellstrom said she could not make a pre-election commitment specifically, but that she would like to see the pilot become part of the Greens’ $100 million-per-year family violence prevention program if elected.
Mr Child said that, despite beliefs that one party or the other would win the seat outright, the vote for Eildon would “go down to the wire”.
The event was broadcast live on Yarra Valley FM 99.1, who ran the event in partnership with the Mail Newspaper Group – the Yarra Ranges Council donated use of the Memo Hall for the evening. All of the candidates for Eildon were contacted to take part in the event. Family First candidate David Prentice was not able to attend, due to prior commitments, and Jeffrey Leake from the Country Alliance failed to show up on the night, despite confirming his attendance to the Mail.
The broadcast of the candidates’ forum will be repeated on Wednesday 26 November from 7pm on Yarra Valley FM 99.1, and is available to download as a podcast at www.yarravalleyfm.com.
The Victorian State Election will be held on Saturday 29 November. For more information, and a map of voting stations, visit www.vec.vic.gov.au.
The Mail will be publishing questionnaires send to each of the Eildon candidates online at mail.starcommunity.com.au in the lead-up to the election.
