Mark Coulton (Parkes, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I would like to comment on the remarks of the minister—and I thank the minister for being here. Without wanting to make this a tit-for-tat argument, I will remind the minister that two weeks ago he did open the Charles Sturt School of Dentistry, which covers both health and education. This was a project of the previous government and funded by the previous government. It is a small point, but I thought I had better make it.

I am pleased to see that you are getting to the pointy end of things with the RDA, but it has taken a long time to get it together and there has been quite a bit of frustration on the ground. My electorate actually has three RDAs either wholly or partly inside of it. I just wanted clarification on funding of projects. As you would know as a local member, you get all sorts of people looking for guidance. I am getting requests from aged-care facilities to go through RDA.

You have been very active with the Murray-Darling thing. While we do not have much dirt moved, I know that in my electorate there is a really good scheme—and I think it is on track—with the Nevertire irrigation scheme. Then we have got more traditional community projects like the rodeo ground at Coonamble and things like that. With all the regional funding that is bundled together to make it look really good in the budget—that there is a large amount there for health, education or whatever—I am just wondering whether the RDAs are going to allocate funding for aged care and all these others.

On another point, I understand that with the half a million dollars you are looking at the bigger projects, but there is still a capacity or a need for some of those smaller ones—for instance, Men's Sheds. They have been a great success, and I acknowledge that the government gave funding to Men's Sheds for start-up, business plans and things like that. Quite a few of them have actually grown beyond that. They are in town halls, supper rooms and, through grace and favour, someone's shed that they have given them. Some of them have outgrown that and they need some tenure. I am not saying that they should be given the money; I think it should go through local government so that the community actually owns it if that movement stops. I think there is a real need to recognise those lower level community type activities in smaller communities—the villages that are never going to get a university or a large sporting facility. For some of those smaller communities, a smaller amount like that can have a positive effect.

In closing I will make one more point regarding the next round of the hospitals fund. There was a lot of disappointment. Minister, you happened to be in Dubbo the week after the budget and the hospital announcement. There was a $57 million project. When the state government said that they would add another $50 million to it, the federal contribution came back to $7.1 million. I just want to make sure that there is still capacity in that process to continue that development. Obviously, it is going to be a staged development for that base hospital. With previous contributions, state and federal, they do now have $79½ million. They are going to make a good start but I just want an assurance that they will be able to continue to put those projects through.

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