Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Hansard source

Tax cuts for small business, including Mallee, including all over Australia, are good for regional Australia and good for Australia in general. Income tax for hardworking Australians means they can have more money in their pockets to spend on themselves, on the things they want to do in life. More jobs for hardworking Australians, whether it's in the Mallee, wherever it is, means that there are going to be more people gainfully employed. We saw the employment statistics out today—unemployment down. We heard the Prime Minister in question time today saying that power prices are down and they are going to go down further. We are making sure that the economy is strong. When the economy is strong, when the economy is going well, you can provide more money for hospitals and more money for schools, and that's exactly what we're doing.

Mallee is doing it tough at the moment with the drought. Mallee is doing it tough, as are a lot of areas right throughout New South Wales, right throughout the member for Maranoa's electorate and right throughout Queensland. People are doing it tough with the drought. That's why we are providing more money for farm household assistance, more money for rural financial counsellors, more money for, indeed, mental health services to help out those drought-stricken farmers, to help out drought-stricken communities.

One example of a business which is doing particularly well, despite the troubled times, is Interlink Pumps and Sprayers at Mildura. It sells spot sprays, vine sprays, weed sprays and row crop sprays throughout Victoria and southern New South Wales. I know that it sells a lot of these sprays into the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area—that great food bowl in the member for Farrer's electorate. I recently met with the team in Mildura, alongside the member for Mallee. Its CEO, Peter McWilliams, who employs 28 people, said that the money that they'll be saving from the company tax cuts has not only enabled his business to do more in the innovation space, redirecting to further research for spraying technologies to reduce drifts in spraying, but, indeed, it has helped them to put on an extra employee. Isn't that fantastic—an extra employee despite the drought, despite the troubled times? He is taking confidence from the tax cuts and from the economy growing to put on an extra employee.

Throughout the Mallee, we are investing in infrastructure—economic-enabling infrastructure—with better roads and better rail: the Calder Highway, the Bendigo to Mildura upgrade, $10 million; the Murray Basin freight rail project, $240 million; the Western Highway, Stawell to the South Australia border upgrade, $10 million. We are investing in the infrastructure that our regions need, that our regions want, that our regions deserve. But we look at those opposite, who stand for higher taxes, higher power prices, less infrastructure. If they get into government, all that will go. All the money that we're spending on infrastructure will go. (Time expired)

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