Bert Van Manen (Forde, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is always a pleasure to rise in this place and talk about not only the achievements of this government but also more importantly the achievements of some of our local community leaders and volunteers. Before I speak on the Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2014-2015, as I would ultimately like to reflect on some of the achievements of this government over the past 18 months, I would firstly like to take a few minutes to reflect on the achievements of some of the wonderful members of our community, because without their efforts our communities would not be what they are today.

I recently had the pleasure of attending the Enable Dux Dinner. Now for those unfamiliar with this term, I am not speaking about the quacking kind, but rather the strategic leadership coalition of 13 state high schools in the Logan Albert Beaudesert and Boonah areas—otherwise known as Queensland's fastest improving educational region. I represent six of the 13 schools making up the coalition; including Beenleigh, Loganlea, Marsden, Shailer Park, Park Ridge and Windaroo Valley state high schools. Founded in 2007, Enable has grown into a dynamic educational network supporting educational leadership, research and best practice. Through working in different layers of collaboration, the Enable coalition is able to consistently provide professional development opportunities and deliver high quality programs to various school leaders, teachers, auxiliary staff members and most importantly students. Their efforts have resulted in a number of milestones, including significant improvements in academic performance of students; increased student retention and completion rates; as well as a sharp rise in the number of students graduating with vocational qualifications, their QCE and entries into tertiary education. I am very proud to support the Enable coalition and would like to acknowledge the Forde high schools duxes for their involvement; including Cecelia Liu, Maia Hokianga, Madison Elliot-Hicks, Joel Forrest, Amy Wigan, Lorenzo AH Siu, Taylah Magee and Nicholas Alcorn for their wonderful efforts.

Another event I recently attended was the Soroptimist annual changeover dinner in Beenleigh. Soroptimist's are one of our wonderful community organisations, along with Rotary, Lions and Quota International. The members of Soroptimist International in Beenleigh are one of our busiest organisations in Forde and are an absolute credit to our local community. A snapshot of some of the activities and events that the members participated in during 2014 include: raising awareness of settling genuine refugees into the local community, working on increasing awareness of domestic violence in the community through their Walk the Talk event, the Dating Game bookmarks and their photo exhibition. They started a reading program at Beenleigh Primary School, which initially was held once a month and has subsequently increased to a regular fortnightly basis. They have been assisting the Beenleigh ASDAN students with some funding work towards their travels to Canberra and helping state TAFE students with bursaries. They also introduced a sewing program last year for the grade 7 girls and they shared with me how much success and enjoyment those students got out of learning how to sew.

Sadly, last year, one of Soroptimist's oldest members, Stella Richoff, passed away at age 93. In her memory, Soroptimists will be giving out an award in her honour to a local woman within the Beenleigh community—a person who is an unsung hero. This person will be presented with this award at their next changeover dinner. Until then, I have no doubt I will be catching up with Soroptimists regularly through one of their many events that they have planned for the next 12 months.

I would also like to recognise the wonderful efforts of Queenslander of the year, and Braveheart's founder, Hetty Johnson, who is a constituent of the electorate of Forde and who was recently honoured with the highest local accolade for Logan residents, becoming the 16th inductee on the Logan City Council's Wall of Acclaim. The Wall of Acclaim recognises outstanding achievement, or a demonstrated commitment to excellence and outstanding contribution to our community. Hetty is a most worthy recipient of this recognition and a credit to not only the wider Logan community but also the entire country for the advocacy she has shown in championing on behalf of the most vulnerable in our society.

I would also like to take this opportunity to commend two of Logan's biggest advocates who were recently named Logan City Council Goodwill Ambassadors. Local businessman, Barry Lane and school principal and Rotarian, Tim Keeler, were both recognised for their commitment to our local community. Barry is a longstanding Logan businessman. He was recognised for his contribution to the local economy and his commitment to local schools, charities and community organisations and, in particular, his beloved Logan Chamber of Commerce, where is recognised there as a life member. Tim was recognised for his development and promotion of Logan through his roles in the Logan Rotary and the Logan Refugee Welfare Committee.

I think all of us in this place would reflect that one of the honours here is to be able to stand in this place and speak about the achievements and successes of those who contribute so positively to our local communities. I have been able to mention just a few today, but there are plenty more positives stories that I will have the privilege of continuing to share in this House in the future.

At the outset I mentioned that I would like to reflect on some of the achievements of the coalition over our 18 months in government. Firstly, I would like to reflect on some of our local achievements. This is particularly important because we made a number of local commitments during the election campaign that I can now proudly say have been fully funded and delivered or are in the process of being delivered.

Firstly, we committed $83 million to an upgrade of the Beenleigh CBD in conjunction with funding from the Logan City Council and the state government. This project is well underway, with about six months to go before reaching completion. We committed $1 million in funding for CCTV cameras in Beenleigh, Loganlea, Waterford West and Shailer Park. That project is also underway. The project at Beenleigh is being done in conjunction with the CBD redevelopment. We also committed $20,000 towards grants for our local SES to upgrade GPS units and education and recruitment resources. I had the pleasure before Christmas of attending a function to celebrate the receipt of those funds and that new equipment.

We also had a Green Army project on the Pimpama River, which I visited last week. The people taking part in that project actually graduated last Thursday. They thoroughly enjoyed the project that they undertook on the Pimpama River and should be thoroughly congratulated for the work that they did. In addition, they lost a member along the way because he picked up a full-time job as a result of his involvement in that particular Green Army project.

Additionally, we announced during the recent state election that we would partner with the Queensland state government to provide $10 million in funding towards an upgrade of Exit 54 in Upper Coomera. This is one of the biggest issues facing residents living in the southern part of Forde on the northern Gold Coast. But unfortunately the interchange at Exit 54 is not the only problem. There are a number of interchanges along the M1 between the Albert River and the Coomera River—Exits 38, 41, 54 and 57—which will need to be upgraded to deal with the increasing population growth on the northern Gold Coast using the Upper Coomera-to-Beenleigh corridor.

In addition to these interchanges, I have been working with my government colleagues and the Queensland state government to find a solution to the single biggest issue in the Forde electorate—and that is the congestion on the M1 between Loganholme and Daisy Hill. I have held a number of meetings with stakeholders in relation to securing the funding needed to widen the motorway. It is an issue that will continue to be at the top of my list of infrastructure projects. With a change of government in Queensland, I hope to establish a positive relationship with the minister responsible at the state level to ensure this project continues to be given the priority it deserves not only for people living in Forde but for the many thousands of commuters from the Gold Coast and other parts who travel that section of road every day.

It is fair to say that the bulk of the issues in the Forde electorate are centred around infrastructure failing to keep pace with the growing population. In order to address these infrastructure needs in the future, we need to fix the budget. That is what this government has spent the past 18 months been focused on. I think it is worth reminding the House of the problem that we inherited when we came into government. Labor's legacy to Australia was some 200,000 more unemployed, gross debt projected to rise to some $667 billion, $123 billion in cumulative deficits over their six years in government, more than 50,000 illegal arrivals by boat and the world's biggest carbon tax.

Labor's debt, which we inherited, has resulted in us being left with an interest bill of $1 billion a month. That $1 billion a month could be used for the upgrade of the M1 between Loganholme and Daisy Hill four times over let alone pay for many other infrastructure projects around this great country. No country can go on paying the mortgage from the credit card.

In that vein, I think it is also worthwhile looking at some of the other government achievements and plans that we have in place for the future of this great country. We all well know that we worked assiduously to get rid of that world's biggest carbon tax. We had the work that Scott Morrison did when he was immigration minister. That work and the work of the government as a whole succeeded in dealing with the issue of people arriving illegally by boat, thereby preventing deaths at sea and saving significant costs in the budget.

We scrapped the mining tax. Importantly, in view of my recent comments about infrastructure, we sought as a key plank of our budget last year to create the largest infrastructure package in this country's history. Part of that is being invested in Queensland with significant upgrades to the Bruce Highway and the Gateway Motorway and a number of other large projects. All of these will go directly towards our primary goal as a government, which is to create jobs, create investment and improve productivity so that we can compete in the global marketplace that we now face. Additionally, in approving over $1 trillion worth of major projects in terms of environmental approvals, we have started to create the opportunity for business to get on and do what it does best—that is, build the future of this country, free from government interference, red tape and roadblocks. We have cut some $2 billion of red tape to further enhance that.

For our business sector, we have succeeded, after 10 years, in achieving free trade agreements with our three largest export partners, who represent over 50 per cent of our exports—Japan, Korea and China. This means the opportunity for Australian businesses to compete in Asia, lower prices for consumers and better markets for our producers, such as our farmers and manufacturers. We continue to work towards dealing with environmental issues through our Green Army projects but also through our Direct Action Plan.

We are a government that is focused on the future of this great country. We recognise that we need to leave this country in a better environmental and economic shape for the future generations because that is an important responsibility of the current generation.

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