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Tuesday 9 November 2021
5974 9000 or email: team@mpnews.com.au www.mpnews.com.au Get on board: The mayor Cr Despi O’Connor and Mornington Community Information and Support Centre manager Stuart Davis-Meehan in front of the installation at the Mornington Village Shopping Centre. Picture: Supplied
Campaign highlights housing need By Stephen Taylor MORNINGTON Community Information and Support Centre is in a campaign to lobby the state government to build 7000 houses a year for homeless people over the next 10 years. The campaign: 7000 Origami Houses for 7000 Homes, is being run by Community Information and Support Victoria. To raise awareness of the need for more social and public housing the group has made 7000 origami houses for a display at Mornington Village Shopping Centre that represent the 7000 homes that need to be built every year for the next 10 years. They are asking the state government to commit to building 70,000 homes in total - and that number covers the existing applicants plus the expected rise in people waiting for social housing. The campaign was launched by author and journalist Benjamin Law on 26 October at the centre and will go on a travelling show after it leaves Mornington. The Mornington centre is working to address the peninsula’s housing crisis by providing short-tomedium-term accommodation to the homeless as well as a hot shower, lockers, back-pack beds and food and financial support. Manager Stuart Davis-Meehan, who is also chair of the Mornington Peninsula Housing Network, supports the move by the Morning-ton Peninsula Shire to declare a housing crisis. (“Peninsula facing housing crisis” The News 2/11/21). “We are seeing more people experiencing homelessness and with more complex needs than ever before,” he said. “The simple answer to homelessness is to build more homes!”
Support promise for storm victims Stephen Taylor steve@mpnews.com.au RESIDENTS affected by the Friday 29 October storm which caused the state’s largest single electricity outage on record may be eligible for payments of $1680 per week, per household, for up to three weeks. The Prolonged Power Outage Payment aims to help families “buy the basics, find alternative accommodation and get through this difficult period”. Residents in United Energy’s
distribution area – which covers all of the Mornington Peninsula – are able to claim the benefit if they were without power from 12.01am, Friday 5 November, due to storm damage. But this means they would have had to be without power for a week – an inconvenience that rankles Cr Antonella Celi. “The delayed reaction by the state government to provide power outage payments and support to our community means that many households will miss out despite being left without power for up to seven days before the payments become avail-
able,” she said. “This isn’t the first time our community has been inconvenienced by power outages because of a sub-optimal supply causing severe disruption. “Power suppliers have known for a long time that the peninsula urgently needs infrastructure upgrades to the grid so that our community can receive a consistent and reliable supply of electricity, especially during peak summer periods when demand increases and outages occur more frequently.” More than 526,000 households – or
nearly one quarter of all Victorian homes – were due to be contacted by electricity company staff yesterday (Monday 8 November) to be offered the payments. The government was also offering the use of generators, with priority given to customers expected to be without power last weekend and into this week due to the extensive damage caused by 100km winds and hundreds of falling trees. Customers can call the DELWP customer contact centre on 1800 518 123 to apply for a generator, which provides enough power for basics,
such as lights, microwave and a small heater. Minister for Energy, Environment, and Climate Change Lily D’Ambrosio said on Friday she was “working with the Commonwealth on support for businesses still without power”. Residents in the hardest-hit areas, such as Red Hill and Mount Eliza, were fed up after a week without power and feeling especially vulnerable, with big trees weakened by the wind threatening to topple or drop branches at any time. Continued Page 3
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