Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Action, Environment and Heritage) Share this | Hansard source

Madam Deputy Speaker D’Ath, I understand that as a Queensland member your electorate was not untouched but that you and your residents regard yourselves as fortunate in comparison to the travails felt by others.

Just over two years ago I stood in the centre of what is East Creek, Toowoomba, to begin the coalition’s Murray-Darling Basin tour. At that stage East Creek was little more than a storm drain with a few puddles of water in it. East Creek was, as so many Australians now know, the epicentre on the western side of the ranges of the great torrents and inland tsunami which ripped apart the heart of much of Queensland. On the eastern side, of course, Grantham and Murphy’s Creek witnessed extraordinary tragedy and untold and unspeakable damage. But to have stood in a place such as East Creek, to have seen a part of Australia which was simply bone dry, to have at the time done a video blog which remains on my site today about it being the headwaters of the Murray-Darling Basin, to acknowledge and recognise the challenges that it faced and then, just over two years later, to recognise that this very selfsame spot was witness to the extraordinary scenes which travelled around the world—of vehicles, of trees and, above all else, of humanity being transported down that wave of raging water—is very humbling.

We know that the people of Toowoomba, the people of Grantham and the people of Murphy’s Creek have been the victims of nature’s most savage work. It is nobody’s fault. It was fast, rapid, dramatic and extraordinary in its consequence. On behalf of the people of my electorate of Flinders—the Mornington Peninsula, Western Port, the Koo-Wee-Rup swamp—which has had its own, albeit much lesser, travails—and the Bass Coast, I convey our support, our sympathy and our resolve to assist in the pathway forward.

These Queensland floods were, in so many ways, symptomatic of Australian history. They replicated that which has occurred previously. We have had previous tragedies and we will have future tragedies. From each one of these experiences, it is hoped that we learn, make things better and improve. The result of the 1974 Brisbane flood was Wivenhoe Dam both in its primary capacity and in its overflow capacity, designed precisely for events such as this. There can be no doubt that Brisbane, which suffered so grievously, would have suffered far worse had there been no Wivenhoe Dam. The nature of the operation process will be subject to inquiry, but had there been no dam there would undoubtedly have been a far worse outcome. Whether the outcome could have been better still is a matter for others to debate and discuss in coming months.

I want to make a few very brief points. Firstly, there was a terrible tragedy and we all play a part in having to deal with it. But this tragedy, which covered Toowoomba, Granville, Murphys Creek, Ipswich, the suburbs of Brisbane, Rockhampton and inland towns such as Dalby and St George, was accompanied by the very best we could ever hope for from the Australian spirit. My brother John, who lives in Brisbane, was fortunate that he and his family lived a little bit higher than the floods. They avoided the effect of the floods. He said the outpouring of humanity was one of the most positive experiences of his life. He said it was impossible not to be part of it—this volunteer army that took to the streets. He and his family played a very small part, in his words, and he wishes that he could have done more. But I suspect he did a lot more than he acknowledges. That was the common human response which defines who we are as Australians today. It makes me very proud and I know it makes the people on the Mornington Peninsula very proud of who we are—that this volunteer army emerged.

The spirit of Brisbane is something that will be talked about 50 and 100 years from now. People will invoke it. I hope they invoke it to good purpose and never for partisan purposes. I believe that that will be the case because it will be a symbol of recovery, response and, above all else, the common humanity which represents the absolute best of us. The spirit of Brisbane and the spirit of the inland towns—whether it is Theodore, Toowoomba or up the coast to areas affected by Cyclone Yasi, as well as Townsville, Cairns, Tully and Innisfail—is a guiding light for the way in which we have to try to live our lives. It is a sense of the very best generosity and humanity that is within our spirits.

It was also accompanied by the extraordinary work of the formal services: the volunteers of the SES who have spent hundreds of hours working; the volunteers who became attached to units such as that, bringing trucks or mops and brooms; and the police, ambulance and fire brigade workers who faced extraordinary shocks and risks and who carried on as resolute rocks for everybody. Sometimes we as a community can be a little bit cynical about our police force. We should not be. The way in which they conducted themselves puts them right at the forefront of community workers for any society in any place around the world.

We then go forward to the role of the military. The military—hundreds and even thousands of mostly young Australians who put themselves in harm’s way and waded through the mud in search of the lost day upon day upon day upon day—have again shown that we have defence forces that are also civil defence forces. In times of need and crisis, their role is profound.

I also acknowledge that all three tiers of government performed wonderfully. I think that we should be generous and recognise that it is not always thus. I have many great friends in America, but I know America—I have lived there—and we saw the chaos and breakdown of society post Hurricane Katrina and the relative failure of the state apparatus to deal with that problem. Neither the society nor the state apparatus failed us in Australia. The Brisbane City Council, the relevant local councils right throughout Queensland, the state government, the state opposition, the federal government, the federal opposition and all of the local members represented their areas with extraordinary alacrity, and they did it with compassion, decency and professionalism. So to everyone involved there has been great loss and great tragedy, but there has also been a sense of our better selves on display both to ourselves and to the rest of the world, and for that we will be better human beings. But, for those who were close to them, those who are no longer with us can never be replaced.

Having said this about Queensland, I say that in my own home state of Victoria we are so very fortunate that the great floods which affected us have not had the same human toll or human impact. They have had a major economic impact, but that is a gross state product issue. At the micro level of farmers and shopkeepers, it can be profound. Many farmers have seen their best crop in a decade gone. I, along with my colleagues Bruce Billson, Dan Tehan, Senator Scott Ryan and Alan Tudge, visited shopkeepers in towns such as Skipton. We spent half a day there and half a day in Beaufort helping the residents to clean up Sir Henry Bolte’s home, and then we worked with the residents and the shopkeepers. The shopkeepers had broken hearts because this was the second flood that they had faced and some of them felt that there was no way back. It was about giving people a sense of hope, of opportunity and of possibility and a sense that there was mutual support. I know that Skipton has again faced more issues over the last weekend. It is one town in a state which has suffered significantly, but it has thankfully had nothing like the tragedy which has faced Brisbane, Ipswich, Grantham, Toowoomba, Rockhampton and the great inland outback areas of Queensland.

That same spirit was on show in Swan Hill, in Rochester and right throughout Victoria. Coming closest to home, last Saturday night I received a call from my colleague Russell Broadbent saying that the town of Koo Wee Rup had just been given an evacuation order. Russell grew up in Koo Wee Rup and lived there for many years; he now lives just outside of the electorate in his own electorate. Koo Wee Rup is in my patch, and we were told that the town was to be evacuated and that it was facing inundation. We immediately dealt with the Prime Minister’s office, the Attorney-General’s office and Tanya Plibersek’s office, all of whom were very professional. I acknowledge the speed and skill of their staff and thank them for that.

We survived in our area by just a matter of centimetres. The levee banks which were built over decades and decades survived within a matter of two or three centimetres. So the town for the most part was fine, but the next morning, as we were out in the evacuation centres and then out in the farming communities, we saw farmers who had lost the value of their crop—they had had this season’s crop destroyed. Again, it is nothing compared with Queensland, and many of them said to me, ‘Yes, we have had losses, but we are very lucky compared with others.’ But they will need assistance. I acknowledge the work of our local police and the SES—I note they were military in preparation—as well as the Shire of Cardinia, the Premier and Peter Ryan and my state colleagues Edward O’Donohue and Ken Smith and our councillors, particularly Councillor Stuart Halligan. All of them were on the ground the next morning to deal with the problems faced by the farmers.

So from our own little area where we were fortunate compared to others, but where we did suffer loss particularly where there was a breach in the levy because of the failings of the desalination company to repair that work in time—and I have written to the CEO of AquaSure to seek rectification on behalf of the farmers—we acknowledge your courage and endurance. From our own little area in Victoria and the problems we faced there, going out to the great and profound and magisterial task facing Queensland and Queenslanders, they have made us better as Australians for having seen what they have been through. And above all else to those families who have been at the heart of it, I say on behalf of the people of Flinders: you have our sympathy, our support, our belief and our thanks for letting us glimpse and witness a spirit which is extraordinary, which 20 and 30 and 50 and 100 years from now will be a source and point of inspiration and uplift to future generations of Australians.

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