Victorian Premier Ben Carroll has met members of Melbourne’s Sri Lankan community at a dinner hosted by community leader Sinantha Jayathilake, weeks before the state election on 28 November.
Carroll, who took office in July, was joined by Lily D’Ambrosio, the retiring Member for Mill Park, the Daily Mirror reported.
D’Ambrosio served as Victoria’s Minister for Energy and Resources, Climate Action and the State Electricity Commission until July this year, and is described in the report as Australia’s longest-serving energy minister. The dinner fell in her final weeks in Parliament, after 24 years representing Mill Park.
Also present were Lauren Kathage, MP for Yan Yean, and Elizabeth Nealy, Labor’s candidate for Mill Park and a former Mayor of Banyule.
What the community raised
Community leaders, business owners and families used the occasion to put forward issues affecting Sri Lankan Victorians: small business development, skilled migration, education and the rising cost of living.
“The Sri Lankan community has helped build Victoria, from our small businesses to our hospitals and classrooms,” Jayathilake said. “Tonight was about making sure our voice is heard at the highest level, and I am grateful the Premier took the time to sit down and listen to us directly.”
Context
Victoria holds one of Australia’s larger Sri Lankan-origin populations, concentrated in Melbourne’s northern and south-eastern suburbs. Mill Park and Yan Yean, the two electorates represented at the dinner, sit in the city’s northern growth corridor.
The meeting is an electorate-level engagement rather than a bilateral one: it carries no announcement, no policy commitment and no government-to-government element.
Not reported
The filing does not give the date or venue of the dinner, say how many people attended, or name the community organisation involved, if any. It carries no quote from Premier Carroll and reports no response from him to the issues raised. It does not say whether representatives of other parties contesting the 28 November election have held comparable meetings. The report did not appear on any other verified newsroom at the time of writing.
