Eatons Hill’s Lauren Leahy and Albany Creek’s Misty Foster met with Federal MPs in Parliament House in Canberra last month to bring attention to global poverty.
Not many Australians have the chance to walk the nation’s corridors of power, but two local women recently rubbed shoulders with Federal MPs to bring attention to the plights of people less fortunate than themselves.
Eatons Hill’s Lauren Leahy and Albany Creek’s Misty Foster were in Canberra last month as part of Voices for Justice, a gathering of supporters of the Micah Challenge, a global campaign of Christians speaking out against poverty and injustice.
“I’ve always been quite interested in social justice … and thinking more about people in other countries instead of just thinking about ourselves all the time,” Lauren said.
“There’s a lot that we should be doing here, like helping out neighbours like the homeless we have in Brisbane, but the scale of poverty in some other countries is something we’re quite oblivious to.”
Lauren said the Australian Government had not honoured its fiscal commitment to eight Millennium Development Goals, covering issues such as child mortality, gender equality, maternal health and environmental sustainability.
She said Australia’s commitment to International Development Assistance was half of that required to help prevent nine million children dying before their fifth birthday each year.
“Everyone’s talking about the financial crisis but the effects are so many times more devastating to these people in other countries,” Lauren said.
“The World Bank believes 200,000 to 400,000 more children will die if the financial crisis continues.
“It’s not their fault that they’re in this situation … what we have in this country we should share instead of watching them suffer when we really could help.”
Misty, who has undertaken mission work in villages and orphanages in Asia, said the Voices for Justice gathering was a good chance to see how social justice issues “impacts at the political level”.
“I can make a difference by going overseas but Australia, as a government, can make a bigger difference,” she said.
“It was a good experience to see how our voices can impact on a huge government and talking to politicians, most people view them as unapproachable but they were regular, really nice people who were willing to listen.
“I want to be a primary school teacher for the simple reason that education is such a vital key in actually getting children out of the circle of poverty.”