Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am not going to finish, because I really think it is important that we push on with the yes case debate. While the member for Shortland would like me to finish, and while she would like to gag me as Labor did with the education bill earlier today, silencing me and nine of my colleagues, they are not going to silence me on this. I really want to emphasise the yes case.

I know that my colleague Senator Barnaby Joyce, hopefully the next member for New England after the 14 September election, very much supports the yes case. When he did a doorstop interview at Parliament House on 16 May he said that local government must stand up and mount their very best case. He is right. The Australian Local Government Association has put a lot of money into pushing the yes case. That money has come from councils and that money could have been, some might argue, better spent on the delivery of local roads, fixing potholes, and doing all the great things such as providing childcare services that local government does. Local government knows that it is so important to get recognition in the Constitution that it has spent a considerable sum of money pushing the yes case. As Senator Joyce said, it is now for local government to take up the cudgels, because it is about the future of local government. And he is right. Senator Joyce said:

I don’t know whether political involvement on a grand scale from Canberra is going to be of the sort of assistance that local government wants. I think the Australian people are going to be very interested in the discussion local government has with the Australian people on why they see this, what I even say, a form of housekeeping, is brought into place so you can continue with funding such things as Roads to Recovery, Black Spot and future Coalition policy, such as Bridges to Recovery.

They are all important things for local councils.

I know in Gundagai shire at the moment they have a huge problem with Gobarralong bridge, and they are lobbying for state funding for the repair of that bridge. Many of the farmers in that district are having to go the long way around because B-doubles are no longer able to traverse that piece of vital infrastructure. I know that Gundagai shire and certainly the mayor there, Abb McAlister, would very much appreciate receiving federal funding for Gobarralong bridge. Unfortunately, they will have to rely on either their own funds, of which there are not many, or state financial assistance to rebuild that hundred-year-plus bridge to a state where it can be used—

Ms Hall interjecting—

I only have a minute and 43 seconds to go. It is hard to read a bit of scribble when you are trying to push the yes case for something that is so important.

See this speech in context