Lending expertise to Rosies street ministry

Published: 14 February 2010
By: Robin Williams

Dedicated volunteer: Margaret Harvey

IT is easy to hear the passion for social justice is Margaret Harvey's voice as she talks about the people she sees on the streets of Logan and Beenleigh.

Margaret, a retired psychologist, is the current coordinator of Rosies street outreach operations in the area and puts in around 30 volunteer hours a week.

Not that she is complaining.

She is quick to point out there are another 95 or so regular volunteers who give time to Rosies in Logan.
"I'm very lucky because the volunteers I've got down here are just fantastic," she said.

Margaret said they came from all walks of life right through to professionals such as school principals, doctors and solicitors.

"And they just work so well together and they've all given long term commitments and have been with us a long time," she said.

Margaret is a member of St Paul's Catholic parish, Logan and has been in the area for nearly 40 years.

"I moved here in 1972 when there was only a couple of houses, we came here from Rockhampton," she said.

Margaret was baptised a Catholic and went to a Catholic school, but has a mixed heritage in terms of religious beliefs.

"My grandmother was Jewish Orthodox and went to the Synagogue every week and my grandfather was Greek Orthodox so when my father moved to Rockhampton and met my Catholic mother and there was no Synagogue and no Greek Orthodox Church in Rockhampton, Catholic was the next best thing."

Margaret was educated at St Peter's girl's school in Rockhampton and then the Range College.

After finishing school she became a governess on a station near Longreach in the Channel country.

"The property was bordered by the Thomson River on one end and the Barcoo on the other and they used to fly the kids in, we were a long way from anywhere," she said.

Returning to Rockhampton, Margaret met her husband and started work in a hotel where she learned the ins and outs of the hospitality industry.

She continued in hospitality after moving to Logan working at the Park Royal and at Parliament House.
"We had a visit from the Queen (Elizabeth II) during Expo and my shoulders were aching so much I said 'this is no good for me, I can't do this anymore' so I went back to college," she said.

She said psychology seemed to fit in with what she knew.
"I'm hopeless with maths, fractions, decimals that sort of thing leave me cold, I knew I had very good people skills that I'd gained through the hospitality industry and my father who was a state union organiser," she said.

Finishing her qualifications, Margaret went to work for the Endeavour Foundation with people who were intellectually disabled.

"I was interested in the adult learning support services so eventually I got transferred to Ipswich to the adult training services where I was made manager," she said.
After a number of years she was headhunted by Keystone Disability Services run by the Lutheran Church.

"I was to be the face of Keystone, talk to employers, assess the clients that came in to see what skills they had and what they could learn and then talk to businesses about people with a disability and why they should employ them," she said.

During this time Margaret was also busy at home caring for a sick husband and her youngest son Brian who had been badly injured in a car accident.

"He was in a coma for six months and they didn't think he'd live," she said.

"He went to St Laurences College and the school was very good, one of the Christian Brothers there used to walk to the hospital every day and sit with Brian."

She said Brian came home after 12 months with short-term memory problems and organisational problems.

"You maybe got to sleep four hours in 24 if you were lucky," she said.

"My life had to be very organised and very ordered, everything had to be done at a certain time, and there was no such thing as being able to let something go.

"That's why these days people say I've got obsessive behaviour but I'd say to them no this is how my life works.

"If something extra came up it just meant you got up a bit earlier or went to sleep a bit later."

Margaret's work and personal history with son Brian gives her a keen understanding of many of the people on the streets of Logan.

"Our people we see here are different to what I've seen on the Gold Coast and in the City," she said.

"We see a lot of people who are marginalised rather than homeless.

"We do still have a lot of homeless, including families, go down to the Logan river of a night time and they are not fishing they are sleeping in their cars."

Margaret is concerned about the number of people who Rosies sees on the street due to the closure of mental health institutions.

She said technically such people had a roof over their heads, but in reality lived on the street.

"No one wants to have anything to do with them," she said.

"They live in group housing or units and the neighbours don't want to have anything to do with them and no one sees them from week-to-week.

"But we see them on a Wednesday and Friday night.

"We also have a lot of disabled people, particularly intellectually disabled people and these guys are stuck into a unit with maybe two hours support a week.

"They are given their pension to manage and of course they are a prime mark for anyone who wants to take advantage of them so they have money today and tomorrow they have none and would go hungry if they didn't come to Rosies."

Margaret also knows the value of prayer.

Her youngest son Brian was just 19 when he was involved in a car crash that left him fighting for his life and Margaret fighting to keep his life support from being turned off.

"The first couple of weeks when Brian was hurt and in the coma in intensive care and they wanted to turn his life support machine back and put him on minimal care, but I knew he was going to come through it," she said.

Margaret said at Brian's lowest moment when he endured an eight-hour brain operation she prayed all night and God answered her prayers.

"That night I really prayed and I knew somehow that it was being answered, it was just something you knew, you could feel it," she said.

Not only did Brian survive but he went on to win a gold and bronze medal at Paralympic Games in javelin in 1996 and 2000.

During that time Margaret drifted away from Mass until one day when Brian was around 26.

"It was just one day Brian just turned around and he said, 'you know Mum we should go to Mass'," she said.
"I've been going ever since."

It was a good call on Brian's part, it was while at Mass several years ago that Margaret saw the call for Rosies volunteers for Logan.

She had finally retired a good five years past retirement age and though, 'I could do that'.

"It was going to be one night a month for four hours," she said.

"At the same time the local councillor came to me and said 'Marg you're finishing work, I'm standing for mayor and if I get in I want you to come on the mayoresses committee with my wife'."

Margaret readily agreed as the committee had supported Brian in his sporting career.

These days she still volunteers with the mayoress's committee and volunteers dozens of hours a week with Rosies.

"She also does her share of grandmother duty to Brian's two young daughters but wouldn't have it any other way," she said.

"I'll keep on doing it as long as I'm achieving something."