Troye Sivan’s Lovely Mum Is Petitioning Malcolm Turnbull To Save Safe Schools

When you’re so focussed on the vague concept of “jobs and growth” and scrambling to form something somewhat resembling a government, sometimes you let things slide. Maybe the dishes build up on the counter more than they should. Perhaps your bed is left unmade. And sometimes, just sometimes, you decide that the mental wellbeing of many school-age Australians is not really that big a priority.

Having controversially cut the funding of the Safe Schools program earlier this year, the Turnbull government is sending out the message loud and clear that creating an inclusive environment for young LGBTIQ+ people in our schools isn’t really a thing our elected officials are bothered about. Now, with the dust settled on the election, this is something many are asking him to once again re-consider.

Hi Guys please read my petition https://t.co/29w28TEGJA @ChangeAus thank you for giving me this platform.

— Laurelle Mellet (@mamamellet) July 19, 2016

Laurelle Mellet, the mother of hugely popular young Australian actor, singer and songwriter Troye Sivan — whose coming out video went viral in 2013 — has started a petition imploring us all to help save the program.

“Malcolm Turnbull hasn’t renewed Safe Schools funding,” she says. “Gay teens are 14 times more likely to kill themselves in Australia. Despite this, most schools won’t opt in to the program unless it’s made compulsory — it’s frightening.”

Mellet speaks about being nervous for her son when he came out, and worried about how schools often turned a blind eye to those in trouble. “My son Troye Sivan told us he was gay at 14,” she writes. “It made me nervous. I’d heard horrific stories of homophobic bullying and kids being suicidal at school. What’s worse is our education system won’t fight it.”

The petition calls for “Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Education Minister Simon Birmingham to extend the funding for Safe Schools and make it compulsory for all schools to have the revised program.”

Just to recap, Safe Schools is a program formerly in place across Australia which increases understanding of and creates a safer and more inclusive environment for “same-sex attracted, intersex and gender diverse students, staff and family”. Though the Victorian government made a big stand to keep it running, it’s not consistently present across all schools and its future federal funding is not secure — something which a growing community is understandably nervous about.

Since yesterday, Mellet’s petition has already gained over 4,000 signatures, underscoring just how important this program is and how many people feel passionate about it.

The need for the Safe Schools program is also currently being outlined in a series of personal accounts and pictures collated at the Safe Schools Story Project: a community-driven website with the goal of “elevating queer voices to support the Safe Schools Coalition program”.

” I am a 22 year old queer, transgender male who struggled for more than a decade to reconcile my female body with my male gender identity. I believe that this was largely due to having no idea what trans* was. The Safe Schools Program would have equipped me with knowledge regarding gender diversity. I believe that it would have set me on the path to transitioning sooner, and that I would have lived a richer, happier and more authentic adolescence as a result.” – Mairead, 22 #safeschoolscoalition #safeschoolambassadors #queer #rights #auspol

A photo posted by Safe Schools Story Project (@safeschools2016) on Feb 28, 2016 at 1:03am PST

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You can find the petition here.