Kirsten Livermore (Capricornia, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Education) Share this | Hansard source

I am pleased to have this opportunity to participate in the debate on this motion in support of local government. This motion goes some way to giving local government the recognition it has been striving to achieve for many years, and I hope it is the start of a stronger and more direct relationship between the federal government and local governments around the country. That goal was certainly one of the messages that came out loud and clear from local governments throughout the inquiry in 2002. It is certainly the message that I get when I talk to mayors and councillors from the councils within the electorate of Capricornia. Those councils know the challenges and opportunities that exist in their communities and how much they could achieve if their role was properly recognised and resourced by the federal government.

Considering the level of support for the motion coming from the speakers from both sides of the House, one wonders why it has taken so long to bring the it before the parliament. After all, this motion comes from the inquiry into local government and the report from that inquiry that was tabled in parliament back in 2003. So it is a little disappointing that it has taken so long for the government to bring this motion before the parliament, particularly when the local government sector cooperated so constructively with the Hawker inquiry. From reading the report, it is obvious that the local government sector right across the country, through its peak body representatives, put in a concerted effort to raise its concerns. The sector also made it very clear that local governments are more than ready to work in full partnership with the federal government to solve issues in their local communities. Local government just needs the other levels of government to get on board.

This motion is part of that process. Even so, the recommendation in the report that this motion be put to the parliament was something of a compromise and less than the full constitutional recognition that local government deserves. It appears that the committee took the pragmatic view that, while constitutional recognition is desirable, the adoption of this motion by the parliament was accepted as a more achievable option. I note that my colleague the member for Grayndler has moved an amendment to this motion calling for a referendum to amend the Constitution and formally recognise the place of local government within our system of government. I agree. I join with the member for Hotham in his comments that we should be using this debate to further that argument and I want to place on the record my support for the member for Grayndler’s amendment.

I also want to use this speech to pay tribute to the councils within the electorate of Capricornia and the work they do to serve the communities of our region. The motion refers to the rich diversity of councils around Australia reflecting the varied communities they serve. That rich diversity of councils is apparent even within the boundaries of Capricornia. There are 10 councils contained within Capricornia and they range from the beaches of Livingston shire on the Capricorn coast to the proud old town of Mount Morgan and the booming coal communities of the Duaringa, Banana, Broadsound, Nebo, Bowen and Belyando shires. In between is the major regional centre of Rockhampton and the Fitzroy shire, which is at the very heart of the beef industry. There is certainly plenty of diversity in that list.

What these councils all have in common is that they are at the forefront of dealing with the rapid population growth and development that is sweeping through central Queensland thanks to the booming demand for our coal. Throughout the Hawker inquiry report there are quotes from councillors saying that they are in the level of government which is at the coalface of serving community needs and meeting community expectations. Nowhere is that more literally the case than in Central Queensland, where the coal boom is forcing councils to accept responsibilities beyond their traditional roles and frequently beyond their resources. While the federal government pockets—or some would say squanders—the dividends of the resources boom, the local councils of Central Queensland are dealing with the demands that the boom is placing on regional infrastructure, both physical and social. Councils are dealing with the enormous challenge of finding accommodation for the thousands of workers and their families who are pouring into the region to keep the mines cranking up production. Councils are trying to find ways to meet the social and recreational needs of all these extra people.

When the federal government thinks of the coal industry it thinks only in terms of the multinational mining companies, their development plans and the export revenue involved. But it is not that way for the councils. Of course, local councils have relationships with the mining companies and they are intimately involved with the developments that are going on in the Bowen Basin. But councils worry about more than just the mines; they also see the people. They see the people who work in the mines and their families. Importantly, they also see the rest of the community that supports the mining industry and its workers: the nurses, the computer technicians, the small business people, the cooks at the single persons quarters—and the list goes on. Where do all those people live? Can they find houses? If they find houses, can they afford to pay the rent if they are not earning a miner’s salary?

It is not easy living in a mining town if you are not working in the industry or some associated business. If you are a receptionist at one of the motels or an apprentice chef at the local pub, you still need a roof over your head and you are still paying the high prices for fuel and groceries without the salary that can compensate a little for the high cost of living in a mining town. The councils in the Central Queensland coal towns are stepping in to try to address the shortage of housing and, more particularly, the shortage of affordable housing. They have to do that to make sure that their towns can stay viable and to make sure that staff can be found to maintain all of the other services that a community needs to flourish. They also want to address the housing shortage so that they can preserve the communities that many of the councillors have been building for several decades.

The boom has brought with it many benefits and opportunities for the coal towns but also tensions over the influx of the hundreds, or possibly thousands, of short-term workers who fly in and fly out of the towns or, more often in Central Queensland, drive in and drive out between the coast where their families live and the mining towns where the workers are employed. Is it possible to maintain a sense of community in a town when there are hundreds of strangers coming in and out, with no connection to the place other than a job which requires them to work 12-hour shifts? When you are working 12-hour shifts and catching up on vital sleep in between, there is no time to make the social connections that used to characterise the mining towns of the Bowen Basin in the 1970s and right up to the early 2000s. Again, councils are dealing with those questions and trying to find ways to strengthen their communities in the face of the boom rather than allowing them to become no more than dormitories.

This brings me back to the point of the motion and the findings of the inquiry. We in the federal sphere of government have to do more to acknowledge just how much local government brings to our democracy and to our system of government. Local government is right where the action is, meeting the most basic needs of the community and often becoming aware of problems and responding to them much faster and more effectively than the more powerful and cashed-up counterparts at federal and state levels. The partnership between the federal government and local councils has to be made stronger and more equal so that when councils identify the services and infrastructure that are required there is a quicker and better targeted response from federal government.

Debate (on motion by Mr Neville) adjourned.

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