Victorian Socialists

So, uh, I'll get into today's news bulletin.

So in national politics this week, the Victorian Liberal National Coalition has announced it will prioritize youth mental health services if elected in the November state election.

The Shadow Minister for Health said the opposition's planned investment in youth mental health includes $5 million to build a new dedicated youth mental health facility at Parkville, with up to 50 specialist inpatient beds for people aged 12 to 25, as well as prevention and recovery care.

Orygen Executive Director Professor Pat McGorry welcomed the policy announcements and told The Age Victoria is in the grip of a youth mental health crisis it has failed to respond to effectively.

A national YouGov poll commissioned by the think tank found 84% of respondents supported the move, which was inspired by New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani's policy.

79% of respondents said it was harder to afford groceries in the last year, and 38% had skipped meals or eaten less due to food costs, while Coles and Woolworths have each posted profits of more than $1 billion in the last financial year.

But on today's show, we'll be looking at the Greens' leadership shakeup, who their new leader is, what do we know about him, and how exactly voting in the Victorian election works, and why Labor is delaying upper house candidate announcements.

And then depending on whether our friend and I can get out of the lift, we may or may not have a third segment, but we'll leave that mystery till later in the show.

It was decided roughly by 200 votes.

Um, and I spoke to the Victorian Socialists candidate down there who it's the first time that they've run.

He had previously run as a Greens candidate, and he kind of said, this wasn't why he went to the Socialists, but one of the things that he said as an aside was after so much what he calls, like, negative propaganda about the Greens in Australia, he now finds door-knocking as a Socialist, he gets a better hearing than he did as a Greens candidate.

And, and if that's true, that is a very worrying state of affairs for, for the Greens.

That's extraordinary.

Hey everybody, we're on the show and it's the Greg Larsen Show.

Today's episode is an interview with Jordan Vandenlam, aka Purple Pingas of the Victorian Socialists.

And I want to start this episode with a disclaimer.

Vandy! Oh, what?

I recently, as in, I don't know, I want to say three weeks ago, maybe more, I joined the Victorian Socialists, the party, and I have decided that I will be giving them money, and I have given them money, and I will be voting for them in the next state election, and then in the federal election when that happens.

And the episode you're about to hear, I want you to know that I am a member of the party.

And I was when we recorded this episode.

And.

He does kind of community development work and he had all these ideas about what we could do if we win the seat.

But we, just before he left, I sat him down and looked at our incredible kind of mapping software that um the people who are doing tech for us have made and was like let's look at your building and let's work out in your building if there's other socialists there and he was like oh you know i mean i haven't seen anyone i don't know and we sat down and opened the map there was four people in his building apart from him who all were either members or had um volunteered victorian socialists and so we're looking through it and he's like oh I won't use their real names.

Oh, Zach, like he lives two doors above me.

Like, oh, I'll go and talk to him.

Dr. Reid's, this is just a funny detail, Dr. Reid's political activism started in his early 20s as a participant in the billboard utilising graffitists against unhealthy promotions group comically known as Bugger Up.

I want to give a shout out to the Victorian Socialists who showed some solidarity and posted, Victorian Socialists is saddened to hear of the passing of Greens member for Brunswick, Tim Reid.

Tim was one of the good ones, someone who voted, who worked for a fairer, more sustainable and more democratic, sorry, I'll start that again.

Tim was one of the good ones, someone who worked for a fairer, more sustainable and more democratic society at a time when capitalist politics is getting uglier by the day.