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

As we stand in this place, once again, across my electorate of Forde and across the south-east of Queensland it's raining. I know that across the east coast, from South-East Queensland all the way down to the Victorian border, this rain is greatly appreciated. But, as famously immortalised by Dorothea Mackellar in her poem 'My Country', Australia is a land of droughts and, now, flooding rains, as we've seen up and down the east coast.

What these events show is the resilience of our communities and the willingness of communities right across the country to support those doing it tough. It reminds me of a time a couple of years ago when, across my electorate of Forde, we had some significant floods in both the Albert and Logan Rivers in the aftermath of Cyclone Debbie. Hundreds of residences and businesses across Forde in suburbs like Eagleby, Beenleigh, Mount Warren Park, North MacLean, Chambers Flat, Logan Reserve, Waterford, Cedar Creek, Carbrook and Yatala were affected and needed assistance. I vividly recall, when visiting people's properties and farms across my electorate whose homes were flooded and inundated with mud, rubbish and debris from the floods, the wonderful job done by our community. As we now again have flood warnings in our local rivers, and more broadly across the south-east, it's so pleasing to see people, once again, being out and about in the community seeking to help those in need.

In the lead-up to the weather events we're having in my part of the world, we've seen our communities locally do the same thing for fire-affected communities in New South Wales and Victoria. They so willingly want to get out and help, and do what they can to ensure that those fire-affected communities know they are supported by the broader Australian communities and are not suffering on their own.

I want to take the time to thank my community of Forde for its willingness to stand up in times of disaster not only to support their neighbours locally but also, more importantly, to support their fellow Australians right across this great nation in times of drought, fires or floods.

In closing, I'd like to remind my community not to take for granted driving through floodwaters and other things at this time. We've already had reports of people being rescued. Please take care.

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