Victoria’s City of Stonnington Council has joined with the local governments of Darebin, Hobsons Bay, Maribyrnong, Melbourne, Moonee Valley, Moreland, Port Phillip, and Yarra to form an alliance of inner Melbourne councils to collectively advocate for issues.
Made up of councils representing one-in-five Victorians and more than a third of Victoria’s gross state product, the alliance ‘M9’ is established with the objectives to:
- undertake strategic, evidence-based, targeted, and effective advocacy campaigns;
- engage strategically with key decision-makers to advocate on priority areas and build genuine partnership with government representatives;
- enable best practice to be shared across Greater Melbourne Councils;
- undertake joint partnerships and collective action, particularly where there are market failures and/or policy gaps.
To maximise effectiveness, M9 members have established six strategic priorities to ensure advocacy priorities were focused and clear:
- Active transport;
- Affordable housing;
- Economic recovery;
- Community resilience;
- Waste and circular economy;
- Renewable energy.
Stonnington Deputy Mayor, Melina Sehr, joined representatives from the partner councils last week at Victorian Parliament House to launch M9 (pictured).
The Council says it looks forward to working alongside its partner councils, with progress to be be updated on the M9 website.
