Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Hansard source

Rather than drafting motions and reading speeches into the Hansardin this place, the member for Capricornia would make better use of her time by standing up for her local constituents in and around Rockhampton. The many poor policy decisions of this government over four years—whether it be in health, education, the National Broadband Network or energy costs—all have had detrimental impacts on her local constituents, but we hear nothing about those. When the Department of Defence was trying to take land from her local farmers, she went completely missing in action. When Rockhampton residents were denied sufficient natural disaster relief funding following the cyclone, she was nowhere to be seen. In an unseemingly shocking attack that was trying to shift blame, Barnaby Joyce tried to blame the Queensland government.

The question for the member for Capricornia, which she did not go to, is: does she support the south Rockhampton levee or does she not? If she supports it, will she fight for Commonwealth funding for that all-important project? Taking the fight up on behalf of her constituents is what the member for Capricornia position is designed to do. It's not designed to move motions here in this place that are simply designed to trick people into believing her and her government are doing something. Yes, most her points in her motion, if not all of them, are no more than a lick and a promise. The member for Capricornia, again, has had four years to deliver for her electorate. But in this environment where increasingly the parliament looks like House of Cards, she now wants them to believe that suddenly she's going to do something. Well, I don't believe they believe her. These projects mentioned are all on the never-never.

The National Party's modus operandi is to (1) claim credit for projects initiated, built and funded by the former federal Labor government; and (2) promise loans on the existence of matching contributions. These loans, of course, are designed to fail. Barnaby Joyce likes to say, 'I have money on the table.' Fine, if people have matching funding to go with it. The National Party tries regularly to create the impression of action, but is doing nothing. They want state governments to fund or match projects before any of the economic or environmental assessments are made. This is not policy; this is just misleading local communities. It's a shocking way to run a government. All these stunts are designed, as I said, to demonstrate or to give the impression that they are doing something, but all they have is the next election in mind.

I'm bemused by point 6 of the member for Capricornia's resolution, because I challenge her to demonstrate where these infrastructure projects that have been delivered are. Maybe her colleague might help her there, when he jumps to his feet next. The member for Capricornia couldn't even secure one of the Deputy Prime Minister's boondoggles or pork barrels—whichever term you would prefer. The APVMA is not going to Rockhampton—no, no. The Regional Investment Corporation is not being established in Rockhampton—no, no. Instead, they are going to New South Wales National Party seats, where the votes are needed more. They're going to New England and they're going to Calare, despite expressions of interest from locals in Rockhampton. I assume that representations were made by the member for Capricornia, although maybe she didn't make any representations at all.

Labor's National Country Labor Forum will be going to Rockhampton in October. We will be consulting with local communities there about their real needs in Capricornia and we will be asking them about what they think about the member for Capricornia's performance over the course of the last four years. I suspect they will say, 'Well, she's talked a lot, she's promised a lot and she's says she's done a lot, but the reality is that she's done nothing for us.'

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