Leanne here. It was just great to meet with our local MP Kat Theophanous and Minister Anthony Carbines (who is also our neighbouring MP for Ivanhoe) on Friday with the other houses in the Darebin Neighbourhood House Network to ‘chat about our sector’.

Unsurprisingly my colleagues and I - none of whom are backwards in coming forwards - did chat a lot! As you know if you’ve been to our houses we do actually really love our work and our neighbourhoods and all the people in them … and we all have loads of ideas to keep improving things … and we’ve seen lots of changes and growth in our roles in the community throughout this COVID period … so … who better to impart our ideas and hopes and ambitions for our houses to than the Minister for Disability, Ageing and Carers and the Minister for Child Protection and Family Services. Don’t you agree? Poor fella! Haha. No - it was excellent.

Here’s a nice photo of us all after the meeting over at Bridge Darebin (he looks like he survived happily enough right?)