Partnership must make difference

We look forward to a major gathering in Horsham Town Hall tonight to assess how the State Government’s Regional Partnership concept has evolved.

Importantly, does it work and will it do what it is designed to do going forward? We hope so.

The government, through Regional Development Victoria, created nine partnerships across the state last year in an effort to establish greater connectivity between regional communities and state governance and spending.

The partnerships involve community, industry, business and government sectors with representatives gathering at annual regional assemblies.

Tonight it’s the Wimmera Southern Mallee Regional Partnership’s turn to revisit ideas, concepts and critically, regional priorities identified in the hurly burly of a similar gathering last year.

There have already been 2017 Mallee and Ovens Murray regional partnership assemblies and a Central Highlands assembly, which involves Ararat, is scheduled for Ballarat on August 31.

The partnership concept, which demands ministerial attendance at the assemblies, has great merit.

In many ways similar to local government, it places decision-makers into round-table discussions with every day people where they must engage in grassroots discussion.

Last year, many ministers and senior government officials were noticeably weary from a busy schedule leading up to the Wimmera Southern Mallee Assembly. We hope they have taken this into account.

Assembly attendees keen to put their thoughts forward will expect full engagement from their government representatives.

We also wait with expectation to see how extensive the government response has been to the time and effort people have put into presenting their ideas, not only at assembly but also in follow-up dive-deeper workshops.

It is also important that we in the Wimmera and southern Mallee, dealing with a variety of issues day to day, make the most of opportunities of having the ear of government ministers.

There is an old saying that there is little point in having good ideas if we fail to share them.

We can perhaps go one step further and say it is always better to share ideas with people who can make them happen.

People who can’t attend tonight’s assembly can still have their say by visiting website engage.vic.gov.au/ wimmera-southern-mallee.