Peter Lindsay (Herbert, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Defence) Share this | Hansard source

In God’s country—I thank the member for Lowe. The member for Leichhardt and I are trying to ensure that we get the best roads we can for our people in the north. Last year the mayors alliance did a lot of good work in trying to convince the federal government that we should be putting more resources into North Queensland. In fact, we were successful, and we will certainly be doing a lot of work on the Bruce Highway between Townsville and Cairns.

In supporting the AusLink amendment bill tonight I want to observe that the bill does extend the Howard government’s commitments to delivering real benefits to the people of Australia, especially in North Queensland. The bill is going to amend the definition of ‘road’ contained in the AusLink (National Land Transport) Act 2005. This puts beyond doubt that projects for the development of off-road facilities used by heavy vehicles in connection with travel on the road may be funded, and it extends the Roads to Recovery program until 30 June 2014. That is a terrific outcome. Local councils all across this great land of ours have warmly welcomed the Roads to Recovery program, and they have done great things with it.

As was foreseen by the Howard government, the beauty of it is that the money is delivered directly from the Commonwealth to the local government, and we do not get money being hived off by those inefficient states along the way, as they do in so many other areas of federal funding. I am particularly thinking of health at this stage, in the way that bureaucracies in the states take a good percentage of the money that the federal government gives the states for health and use it to prop up the bureaucracies. In Queensland, of course, we have more bureaucrats in health than we have hospital beds. There is something wrong when you get to that sort of situation—but that takes me away from the bill.

I certainly welcome the extension to the Roads to Recovery program, but I am alarmed that the bill links funding for roadsides to the introduction of a new tax. Why am I surprised? For how many years did this country see no new taxes? There was budget after budget after budget with no new taxes. In fact, what we saw was tax cut after tax cut after tax cut for many years in a row. Suddenly, the government of Australia changes, and there are all these new taxes—$20 billion worth of new taxes. Surely the Australian people must realise that these new taxes were not talked about at the time of the last election. What was talked about was: ‘We are going to reduce your grocery prices, your fuel prices, your mortgage rates and all of that sort of stuff.’ People clearly saw that in the brochure that was distributed by the Prime Minister. They did not see—because it was not there—‘Oh and, by the way, we are going to increase taxes by $20 billion.’

People are waking up to that, and they are getting angry—and so they should. We are seeing one of those taxes in this bill tonight. I guess the government is embarking on a situation where they are endangering the lives of Australia’s truckies and road users by insisting that funding for the maintenance of roadsides be linked to the introduction of increased heavy vehicle registration fees—in other words, making the safety of Australia’s road users hostage to the introduction of a new tax. As a matter of public principle, that is shameful. The coalition will support the changes that this bill is making in the hope that the $70 million for roadside safety areas will eventually be decoupled from the new tax by the government. It may well attract the attention of colleagues in the Senate. I am particularly pleased, however, to support the extension of the Roads to Recovery program, and what a great program it is. Many great projects have been funded across my electorate, as they have in other members’ electorates. They have improved the safety of Townsville streets, and I am pleased to support the extension of the program.

I would like to draw the parliament’s attention to money that has come out of the existing AusLink program for very valuable projects. I know that a number of colleagues will speak about projects in their electorates. In my electorate, and in areas surrounding my electorate, we have probably got about $300 million worth of projects, which is a terrific result. We have got $120 million being spent in the Tully area on the Bruce Highway between Townsville and Cairns. There is more money being spent in the Gordonvale area, and north of Townsville we have got the $40 million that I secured for the Woodlands to Veales Road extension. This is going to four-lane the Bruce Highway in that location, and it is going to fix up the dreaded Mount Low Parkway and Bruce Highway T-junction.

I am particularly pleased that we will see the opening of the Townsville Ring Road, probably in November. It is well on track. We just need to lay the asphalt now. The earthworks have all been done. A bit of tidying up needs to be done on one or two bridges, then the asphalt will be laid and we should see that opened in November. It is going to complete the Douglas Arterial Road through to the northern beaches. It will allow heavy vehicle traffic to bypass the city of Townsville. It will take a tremendous load off Nathan Street and Woolcock Street and out of the suburbs of Heatley, Vincent, Aitkenvale, Cranbrook, Mount Louisa and so on, and those trucks will have a high-speed, motorway-standard bypass of the city of Townsville.

More than that, because it connects the northern areas of the city to the hospital, the university and Lavarack Barracks—which you are well familiar with, Madam Deputy Speaker Vale; they are very large employers in the city of Townsville—the high-speed connection will enable many more people to have different living choices. They will be able to live in the northern beaches and the emerging Stockland development up on the Bohle Plains and in the Bohle area. There are some 5,000 new house lots being proposed in that area, and people will be able to have very high-speed connections to their place of work and the hospital—although I might observe, with the way the state government has been going, if they go to hospital they will not get a bed. We had a code yellow last week—24 people could not get a bed in the Townsville Hospital. We had one cancer patient dying on a trolley in emergency—very sad indeed. It is such a pity that the Townsville Hospital should be in that perilous condition.

Opening up the Townsville Ring Road—a project of mine that I committed to the electorate that I would deliver—will bring a lot more traffic into the Douglas Arterial Road, and that raises the prospect of four-laning the Douglas Arterial Road, doubling it in size. That will proceed as soon as the Townsville Ring Road opens. I understand we are going to proceed with the duplication of the Douglas Arterial Road to four lanes. Again, that will be warmly welcomed.

The member of Dawson alluded, in his speech earlier in the evening, to the Townsville Port Access Road. That was a commitment of both sides of politics—

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