John Cobb (Calare, National Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to talk on behalf of regional Australia. We have just heard the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government spend a lot of time talking about what we did but could not really put his mouth to anything that his government was doing in a practical sense. I recall that the very first thing the Minister for Finance and Deregulation did for regional Australia—probably by January of this year, two months after they were elected and long before the May budget—was when he decided to cut $640 million worth of programs from the existing budget, and guess where three-quarters of that money came from? About $400 million of it came out of regional Australia.

It is wonderful to hear the minister for infrastructure talk about all the things his government has done in 12 months. I will tell you something else his government did for regional Australia: he has been spending a lot of time talking about the National Party and Regional Partnerships. I travel a bit, and I was in Tasmania 10 days ago with Senator Guy Barnett. One of the things I kept getting asked was: how do we get the money to do a sporting thing for a school or help with a hall—whatever it might be—in a regional town? I said, ‘We can’t help you now; all those programs have been canned. The Labor Party doesn’t like anything that helps regional Australia.’ In fact, that is something the Labor Party really did for regional Australia. It got rid of the program that did more and provided more seed money for more programs than anything that had ever been done in this nation’s history.

To me, it is quite phenomenal that the minister for infrastructure could stand there a few minutes ago skiting about something he knows is a terrible lie. He talks about bad programs. He has not mentioned the fact that he had to admit to David Koch on the Sunrise program that he had not realised that there were a lot of good programs for regional Australia and that he would have to have a look at them. ‘I didn’t realise all these good programs were there,’ he said. Well, they are not there now because he cut them dead. The report he was talking about a minute ago totally ignored the evidence, totally ignored the fact that people want the same program as that which exists now. The government are saying that if they ever bring another program back it will not be for regional Australia; it will be for the whole country. And they want to have it in tight rounds, so it will only be so much money every three months, which means that Tibooburra will have to compete with Sydney. That means that Orange or Mudgee—or any country town—will have to compete with the city for money within that round. But that is doing something for regional Australia, according to the minister for infrastructure!

Let us talk about communications. Today during question time we heard one of the ministers opposite talk about broadband, as well they might—but not if you live in regional Australia. Next year, in 2009, virtually everybody was going to have access to broadband under the contract this government signed with Optus and Elders, but they have absolutely canned that. Now we have—what?—eight years before we might get something. In fact, they have done so much for regional Australia that they took back $3 billion which was targeted for regional Australia. They took $2 billion out of the Communications Fund, which was to keep regional people who were outside the competitive commercial area up with the latest, and another billion dollars from the contract with Optus and Elders which was going to provide broadband for nearly everybody by next year. Now, if they are lucky—after Sydney, after Melbourne, after Brisbane, after Perth, after Adelaide—by about 2015 regional Australia might get something. Mind you, the government does not know what it is going to do with broadband at this stage, and it does not seem to have anyone who wants to tender for it.

A short while ago you heard the Leader of the Nationals talk about water. These are more things that Labor have done for regional Australia. They are so good to us in regional Australia! They have now earmarked $3.6 billion to buy water out of regional Australia. And, yes, there will be people who will buy because, after six years of drought, a lot of them are in deep trouble—and, yes, they have banks on their back. Let us talk about that for a minute—about all these wonderful things the government are doing for regional Australia and how they are going to be situated. Yes, people may sell water—and they do not want a plan. They had an opportunity to do a plan. Now they are saying, ‘Maybe in 2011 or 2012 we will have a plan for regional Australia.’

Deputy Speaker, let me tell you something. They now only care about making Sydney and Melbourne once again think they are dealing with an issue of overallocation of water in the Murray-Darling Basin. They are simply buying. They bought Toorale Station—10 per cent of the turnover of the Bourke shire, four per cent of its rates. That is how good they are to regional Australia! Instead of that station being a bonus for that shire in western New South Wales, it is now a burden on everybody left to deal with it. That town has been hurt by drought for six solid years, it is in its seventh year of exceptional circumstances drought, and yet it has been totally devastated by that policy. As you heard the member for Wide Bay say a minute ago, the Minister for Climate Change and Water had no idea who she was buying the station from, what effect it might have on the town and what it would do. They are so good to us in regional Australia! They are going to buy the lifeblood of the Murray-Darling Basin. They are going to devastate towns. Instead of investing $11 billion or $12 billion to fix it, to make it better and to get savings, they are going to simply go out there and buy it and take it from people—not just the people who have the water who use it to produce the best food in the world, but everybody around them, the towns and everybody who lives there. They are so good to us out there! I just cannot believe how they are so proud of it.

I remember many years ago when Simon Crean became the minister for agriculture—he had come straight into parliament from being the unions’ secretary—and the then president of the New South Wales Farmers Association said, ‘It’s like putting Ned Kelly in charge of the banks.’ Well, I think having the current minister for infrastructure and transport responsible for regional Australia is like having Attila the Hun in charge of a nunnery. He is so good to us! And the Prime Minister and his colleague the minister for climate change are so good to us! If ever there was a time to invest in regional Australia it is now, as the world hits an equity crisis and a credit crisis. They are investing in the car industry, I notice—they found $6 billion for the car industry. Why wouldn’t you invest the $10 billion in the industry, in the water, to hold the productivity? Why would you not do that? You heard the member for Wide Bay, the leader of the Nationals, talking about health, and what he said is correct. He spoke on 25 August last year and said, ‘The buck stops with me on health and hospitals.’ I tell you what: not in the seat of Calare it does not; not in the Orange hospital—the only serious medical centre west of the Blue Mountains and from May to October they did not pay surgeons and visiting specialists. Yet when asked that question by the member for Parkes, what did the Prime Minister do? That is nothing to do with me: he ran a hundred miles an hour. We are so lucky to have you taking every damn thing you are taking out of regional Australia!

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