Mel Yuan for Brunswick

Climate Action Merri-bek in conjunction with Neighbours United for Climate Action (NUCA) sent a candidate survey and here are my responses. The questions have been paraphrased.

Climate Action Merribek has been informing the citizens of Merri-bek on candidate climate positions for the last decade. We have worked with Neighbours United for Climate Action, Brunswick Residents Network, Coburg Uniting Church in organising candidate forums on climate and sustainability in the past.

I am standing in the ward where I live. I have lived at the same address since 2002.

I accept the science on Global Warming.

I am in favour of “Triple Bottom Line” accounting which includes a broader range of accountability measures.

I am strongly in favour of Upfield Line improvements.

I am in favour of safer, more inclusive, more equitable and more sustainable modes of transport. I think the key here is governance – how does Merri-bek execute and deliver on these strategies? More should be done to make lofty ideals a reality. Initiatives should be delivered on time and on budget.

What will you do to address heat vulnerability? We have plenty of strategies but how is reality meeting these goals? What measures are we using to assess progress? Is it working? Are we getting value for money in these initiatives?

How do we improve residents’ sustainable waste practices? Council provide professional and available advice on better waste. We need evidence to assess if these are effective and where they are not.

What about energy efficiency and renewables? The energy market is changing rapidly. Solutions from even 5 years ago may not be relevant now. We are in a situation where renewables are being “thrown away” from the grid in times of excess supply. New strategies are needed.

How do we support businesses and environmental sustainability? Merri-bek may, not may not, be well suited to environmentally sustainable jobs – depending on what these are. Businesses are driven by cost. Council is limited on how it can address businesses’ behaviour to reduce emissions.

What about Food Security? I think Council’s strategy on this topic, while worthy, is more hope than concrete and meaningful action. Merri-bek is a highly urbanised area with no primary production space. At best, food production is limited to household or public green open space. Care should be taken in promoting solutions that are inequitable (expensive), inefficient (too small scale), or unsafe (due to urban waste & pesticides). Multicultural communities with their own food cultures do not need local government to patronise their cultural practices. Securing Australia’s food security requires, at least, national coordinated action between the primary industries sector, government, all planning frameworks, and trade organisations. People who experience food insecurity due to social disadvantage, low wages and high prices need significant social assistance, not a weekend farmers’ market with expensive organic produce. Scarce public funds should not be spent which effectively cross-subsidise more expensive food choices by the wealthy.

Buildings, Biodiversity and Urban cooling. I would like to see genuine outcomes from these existing Council strategies. Have any of them been implemented? Were the desired outcomes reached? We are entering a phase where solar panels are less economical for individual households and planning schemes are more scorecard-driven. I am critical of the tree-planting targets and their genuine effectiveness.

My top 4 priorities: (OK you got me there are 5)

• Addressing the new State Government planning frameworks which re-craft the role of local government in planning
• Better governance and accountability for the laundry list of existing Council strategies
• Keeping pace with needed infrastructure for roads, bike paths, footpaths, water-sensitive urban design, open space and other civic amenities with ever-increasing density
• Local economic development. We are not realising the economic, employment and social potential of much of our mixed use and commercial zones which could unlock more sustainable employment and greater social cohesion in the inner north
• Provision of social services for children, the aged and many other communities with specific needs

Single or multi-member wards? Single-member wards are specifically designed to hand local government into the hands of political parties. Anything which reduces the diversity in democracy is a retrograde step. This local council election cycle is a sad one for Victorian democracy.

Climate Leadership and Advocacy by Council. We are at an inflexion point in the energy market in Australia. The community need new messages about what their governments should, and can, do to address Climate Change. It is particularly concerning that many young people see the “Climate Crisis” as such an existential challenge that change is not possible and that their futures are out of their hands. Rather than motivating young people, the debate has scared young people into inaction.