The Federal Government… meet Aloysius Snuffleupagus, or Snuffy for short. He’s Big Bird’s imaginary best friend, who no one thought was real for the first 15 seasons of Sesame Street. But, turned out to be a very, very real contributor, and a central character in the Sesame Street plot. Don’t you love that?

But we do need, on a serious note, to identify and support those federal politicians, and senior public servants who can champion this cause. Scotland has a very, very obvious example of this in the Deputy First Minister, John Swinney. John Swinney, 20 years ago, was the first politician in Scotland to take the pioneering social entrepreneurs in Scotland seriously. And now look what they’ve created. It’s a whole new economy approach to inclusion. So that is the challenge for us. It is to be much more able to connect with our federal politics, at that policy level nationally.

Okay, so State and Local Government, this is Snuffy’s little sister Alice. And the better news here, is that Alice has a quest to learn more about the world. And Alice does represent those great initiatives that are already being led by State and Local Governments.

So, on particular note, in the Victorian scene, has been the leadership around developing a state-wide strategy. The focus in working with Social Traders over many years, to be a sector development organisation, has been phenomenal. The social procurement framework, is so strong and potentially world-leading, and also support of the practitioner network, SENVIC, just to name a few, warrants a real mention.

There’s also the work of many local councils around the place, Parramatta, Sunshine Coast, Brisbane, Banyule. It’s hard to say their names because I’m sure there’s a hundred more, because the thing about this work, is that people get on with it. As David said, it’s a doing exercise. So, there is some great, great work happening. There’s a lot more to be done, but there are some really, really solid gains that we’ve made in the last 10 years in this area.

We’re onto the intermediaries. I’d like to introduce you to Gordon and Maria. They spent collectively, nearly 34 years on this show. Gordon and Maria support the Sesame Street community in all kinds of ways; access to learning and advice, supporting ways of doing things better for all the Muppets that live there. They are key players that are trusted by all, and they’re committed longterm to making the community better. And I feel like there’s some intermediaries that are really playing a strong role. We’ve talked about the philanthropics already; they’re so strong, and I’m really proud of them. But there’s Social Traders, who I’ve mentioned, who have done a brilliant job as well here in Victoria, and to share their knowledge and experience further afield as well. But it’s universities in Queensland, and I hope I don’t miss anyone out here, and Victoria that are playing a key role. There’s CQU and QUT and Swinburne. They’ve been on this path for a good while now. And their work really does need to be acknowledged.

But our sector needs go-to organisations, that are trusted by practitioners. And at the moment, that kind of structure and infrastructure, is sorely lacking. And let’s for a moment talk about that financial sustainability myth for a moment.

These intermediary organisations are generally only viable through winning contracts with government, to deliver on outcomes that governments want. Yeah?

So, if we want a vibrant sector, stop expecting intermediaries to be financially viable without any level of government support.

Hopefully we can achieve some maturity around this, just like Scotland has.

We’re going to move on to Gonzo now, and this is our relationship with risk. So Gonzo, also known as Gonzo the Great, known for his eccentric passion for stunt performance, aside from his trademark enthusiasm for performance art. Also another defining trait of Gonzo, is the ambiguity of his species.

His character really does represent the need for us to start taking risks on our crazy ideas, different ideas, things that are counterintuitive, and also people, that don’t fit the mould, who come at it from a different perspective, or through a different lens. And we need to sometimes suspend our unconscious bias.

It’s all right, we’re getting to the end of the story.

And developing talent. This is a really personal one for me, but I’ve chosen the two-headed monster. And the two-headed monster on the Sesame Street character list, teaches cooperation, while speaking in baby like gibberish, but with heavy accents.