Page 4775 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 10 November 2009
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While we have talked about the academic excellence and the acknowledged sporting excellence of Erindale college, let me just highlight the sporting achievements. Larkham Shield winners were Erindale college, winning 38-0 over Lake Ginninderra. In Futsal ACT in the girls division, the champions were Erindale, winning the grand final against Lake Ginninderra college 3-2.
All in all, they are great academic as well as sporting results from a very fine college in Tuggeranong.
Typhoon Ondoy
Gawad Kalinga
MR COE (Ginninderra) (4.54): During the August sitting, I spoke on the work done in the local community after the tragedy of Typhoon Morakot. I was saddened to see recently that another particularly devastating typhoon had struck. Typhoon Ondoy, or Typhoon Ketsana, devastated parts of the Philippines and Vietnam. In the Philippines, landslides and severe flooding resulted in over 300 deaths that have been recorded from this typhoon. President Gloria Arroyo declared it a state of calamity. Metropolitan Manila and 25 other provinces were impacted.
The Canberra Multicultural Community Forum reports that the scenes in the Philippines were horrible, with areas going under six metres of water. In addition to the injured and the dead, there are hundreds of thousands that have been made homeless by this tragedy.
Government-led relief efforts have been supplemented by those of non-government organisations. Some based in Canberra and the surrounding region are leading local efforts to ensure that non-government organisations have resources to help with the effort.
I would like to pay tribute to the Philippine-Australian Association of the ACT and the Monaro Region. The mission statement of the organisation is:
To foster and develop friendship, to give assistance where possible and to provide information and services for the benefit of the Philippine-Australian community.
On Friday night, the organisation did just that. They hosted the Typhoon Ondoy musical dinner night as a fundraiser to support the relief efforts. Steve Doszpot MLA and I were pleased to attend. We commend all those involved in organising the event. In particular, I would like to thank Toti Verzosa, Noonee Doronilla, Len Xyrakis, Roi Verzosa, Abby Schol, Francis Tankiang, Emely Mills, Kym Kunze, Zeny O’Reilly and Norma Velasco-Humphreys for a customary warm welcome. The Philippine community is a great part of the Canberra community, and I am always pleased to attend their events.
In the past, I have spoken of the work of Gawad Kalinga, meaning to give care, a charity that aims to help people stricken with poverty. Gawad Kalinga has launched a
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