Page 1232 - Week 04 - Wednesday, 7 May 2014
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provide a safe space, a safe space for men to talk about their lives and their concerns, in that shoulder-to-shoulder mode of operation, a way which is very attractive to older men.
Men’s sheds are also a great vehicle for spreading positive health messages and combating isolation, depression and illnesses of the older man. With this in mind, I and other Labor backbenchers have been meeting with men’s sheds representatives to discuss their needs as well as to hear what they do and what belonging to a shed means to them and their community.
As you have heard, we have arranged a recent roundtable-style forum where shed members were able to network and share knowledge on resources, activities, finding sponsors, gaining grants and recruiting new members. The ACT government is also preparing a report on men’s sheds and their needs.
The men’s shed movement began in the 1990s. The nation-wide movement is a wonderful self-help way of promoting social interaction and reducing depression in elderly men. It has evolved to include men of all ages, perhaps some of us here. Following the success in Australia, the movement has also gained momentum in Europe and South East Asia. What is important for men in the community seeking friendship and active interests is a space to meet. These gatherings give men the opportunity to be valued and to be valuable members of their community. It is also an opportunity to have a lot of fun and use and share skills learned over a lifetime.
Some sheds specialise in restoration and construction and helping community groups. Others concentrate on social and educational activities, though there are many sheds doing both and more. As well as meeting members of Canberra’s men’s sheds as a group at the Assembly, we have also been out visiting individual sheds in our constituencies.
I was welcomed at the Melba shed on a day of a downpour in April. Members had made valiant efforts to create stepping stones through the flooded footpath at the entrance to the shed. The president jokingly suggested I had come to open their new shed pool. Melba shed opened in August 2008. It was a joint initiative of the Rotary Club of Ginninderra and the North Belconnen Uniting Church. In contrast to other men’s sheds, Melba does not have a workshop, nor does it aspire to one. It is a talking shed.
One of the outcomes from the roundtable bringing together members of sheds from across Canberra was the invitations going back and forwards across the room between the sheds to visit and to use their equipment or to see what they do. Some workshops have basic tools. One specialises in woodturning, another has welding equipment and another has a program for a computer-controlled saw available to shed members, with the expertise to assist them to use it. The pooling of ideas and resources between the sheds was magnificent.
Melba shed representatives at the roundtable, Billy Williams and Ray Nelson, were especially proud of their shed’s IT group’s expertise, their email and online networking, and they offered mentoring in this area to the other sheds. The Melba
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