Damian Hale (Solomon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to make my contribution to the debate on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011 and related bills. The Member of Parkes is a man I have a lot of respect for—because he has been able to drop weight quicker than I have!—and I certainly value his contribution. I agree with him on education but I think we have once again seen a member of the opposition miss an opportunity to talk their electorate up instead of talking it down. Unfortunately, I think we will have a standard type of speech from those opposite for the rest of the year. They will get in the party room and pick out all the bad things. But we have a standard speech in which we talk about the positives, and I am pretty happy to be able to talk about the positives to the good people of Solomon. I have been around and visited probably 25 schools and I have a heap of testimonials that the BER money has been very good. I acknowledge the contribution that the small business community has made. In particular, the builders have been fantastic in what they have delivered for our schools. We even had a father of a student at the Larrakeyah Primary School who is an architect and he did all the drawings for nothing to make sure that the school could stretch their money further. We have had some really good stories.

The member for Parkes also touched on the Indigenous community in his electorate. I am sure that Minister Macklin and Minister Snowdon would be more than happy to discuss those types of issues. The member mentioned suicide and dysfunction. I would encourage him to make contact immediately with the offices of those two ministers and I am sure that they will be more than happy to talk to him.

As a former mayor, the member for Parkes must be absolutely gutted about the position of the Leader of the Opposition on the community infrastructure program. That program has been fantastic in delivering federal money down to the community infrastructure level, basically through working with councils. The member for Parkes would have appreciated in the last 2½ years, as lord mayors in my electorate have, the infrastructure money that has come into communities. He is absolutely right—often we can bypass the state and territory level of bureaucracy and put the money into the community at the grassroots level, at the council level. I know my mayors have been very receptive to being able to get that extra funding. However, I will be pointing out to my mayors in the next three to four months that the sort of money they have received in the past would certainly be under threat from the opposition, should it become the government. There have been significant amounts of money, up around $8 million, for things like streetscapes, bicycle paths, revitalisation of the CBD area of Darwin and Palmerston and for Litchfield Shire Council roads. Councils have benefited for all sorts of stuff under this government and that is all under threat. I know that the member for Parkes would be very disappointed, in his former roles as a mayor and councillor, at that loss.

That brings me to update the House on some of the great stuff we were given in my electorate from the budget last year and that is now on track. I was happy to open the first stage of Tiger Brennan Drive on Saturday, so that is up and going. That is a $74 million commitment from the Commonwealth to end the blame game between the Territory government and the former Howard government about who was going to fund that project. It is now heading in the right direction. The two bridges will be completed by the end of July, and by November we will have a fantastic road that not only relieves the morning peak hour but lets families get home more quickly to their loved ones during the afternoon. It gives a seamless passage from the rural area into the port facilities, and that is all heading nicely in the right direction.

The GP superclinic that was long overdue in Palmerston is all but finished. It is being fitted out and by the end of July will be operational. The cancer care unit that Territorians have waited for for 10 years is now operational, fully staffed and working. People in the Territory are able to stay in the Territory and get cancer treatment and not have to travel interstate. I had the great pleasure of opening it with the Prime Minister. There have been a lot of other projects, as I alluded to, with the city council. We also have a number of defence projects, including major work that has been approved at Robertson Barracks. The member for Groom, who has just entered the chamber, was with me when we approved works for Robertson Barracks, the RAAF base and Tindal. They are all major pieces of infrastructure that we got out of the last budget.

Before I go on to talk about the budget this year, can I say it surprises me when the opposition talks about how poorly the economy is doing and talks about debt and deficit. When you look at what has happened around the world, our fiscal position is the envy of the rest of the world. I have graphs here that show that. One graph shows that our debt compared to GDP is the lowest. When you look at the net debt overall, this graph shows that ours is dramatically lower than that of any other country in the world. And of course our unemployment figures are the envy of the rest of the world. When you look at the figures and how we have come through the global financial crisis, Australia should be very proud of where we are placed. Obviously, as a result of our Treasury working with the government and with the Reserve Bank, we have been able to guide ourselves through a very turbulent time. We came into government with a lot of expectation placed on us and in October 2008 the global financial crisis hit. Other countries sat and waited. We moved quickly and, consequently, we have got through the global financial crisis in better condition than everyone else. When you look at what is happening in southern Europe, that is certainly the case.

We have also moved on in the last couple of weeks in the debate regarding the resource super profits tax. I will briefly touch on that because in my electorate of Solomon and in regional areas right around Australia and as the member for Parkes alluded to, regional Australia is crying out for infrastructure. I am very nervous about the fact that the mining companies are running a big scare campaign against the government and it will be regional and remote parts of Australia that will suffer. It will be us that will suffer if the tax does not go through because we have waited so long. The Tiger Brennan Drive extension, for instance, cost only $74 million and it waited 10 years. An oncology unit waited 10 years. The GP superclinic and the toing and froing between health services in Palmerston went on for eight or nine years.

I worry for the people in my electorate of Solomon because we contribute a fair bit through uranium mining by ERA and the mines that Xstrata have got down in the Borroloola area. We contribute a fair bit to this economy and yet we have not benefited one bit from it in terms of infrastructure. We have a port that needs about $300 million spent on it; we have an airport that needs to be upgraded. We have been able to give schools much needed infrastructure through the stimulus packages.

But I am really worried that should we be removed from office, it is already being made very clear by the shadow finance minister that there will be cuts. The Leader of the Opposition says exactly the same thing that there will be cuts. There will not be cuts in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane or South-East Queensland; there will be cuts to the regional parts of Australia where there are fewer votes, fewer people and less political clout. They are going to be the ones that will suffer at the hands of a Liberal coalition. We suffered for 12 years in the Northern Territory. I cannot think of one project that my predecessor actually delivered for the people in the Northern Territory. I cannot think of one.

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