Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

This is a project that has been such a long time in the making. I'll take the interjection as to whether we got anything built, because that decision was made in March of this year. For a $3.2 billion project, the member would know that these things don't happen overnight, even as the minister told ABC FM just yesterday. But this is great news for the Sunshine Coast. Whilst I'm as crook as a dog right now, I am very, very excited about this project.

But the battle's not over. There's more work to be done. Whilst the Labor government has recommitted itself to the coalition's $1.6 billion in funding, we know that our initial costings for this project were around $2.9 billion. From a cost escalation perspective, we rounded that up to $3.2 billion. The coalition put $1.6 billion on the table when we were in government, and the Labor government has now committed to that, and I thank the minister for doing so. I have to admit, Minister, there were a couple of hairy moments there when I looked through the budget on budget night. I got to page 160 and couldn't see it there. You had me going for a while. I was pretty worried. I think there are a lot of people, journalists included, who were concerned that it had been taken out, but I am very, very pleased that the government has committed to it.

But we have a sticking point, and the sticking point is this: when we were in government, the state Labor Queensland government, who really is responsible for this project—when you look at a train, you don't see 'Commonwealth Rail' on the front of it; you see 'Queensland Rail'. Queensland Rail is responsible for this project. The Queensland government is responsible for it, but we stumped up 50 per cent of the cost. But to this day, Queensland Labor has been absolutely mute on whether the current Queensland government is going to match our funding. This is absolutely inexcusable. The two local state members for the Labor Party that are in the Labor government have been absolutely absent on this issue. Whilst the member for Fairfax and I have been banging on every door, arguing for this case publicly, doing petitions and listening posts, driving awareness of this program and, quite frankly, putting pressure on our own government when we were in government and, as you would expect, putting pressure on the new Labor government to keep that funding there, I have not heard boo from either of those state Labor members. Nothing.

The people of the Sunshine Coast elect their representatives to be their voices, and they are not seeing this. Consequently, what we've seen from the Labor state government is total inaction. Come October 2024, I think the people of the Sunshine Coast, particularly in the state seat of Caloundra and the state seat of Nicklin, will have a few things to say about this. So I would encourage very strongly that those two state members get on Mark Bailey's back—Mark Bailey being the state Minister for Transport and Main Roads. The ball is fairly and squarely in the Labor state government's court.

There is now a bipartisan approach in relation to the funding of this project at a federal level. But because of state Labor's inaction on this point, how much extra is it going to cost us as a country and as a state to deliver this project? Bear in mind that we don't have a lot of time. Due to the fantastic work of the member for Fairfax when he was the PM's envoy for the Olympics and the Paralympics, we've secured those games. We know that in 2032 we are going to get an explosion of people coming to the Sunshine Coast. We are host to all sorts of games and events. Now that there is a bipartisan approach at a federal level to build this, it would be absolutely inexcusable, absolutely untenable, for the state to hold out. Does the state seriously think now that they have any cover? They have no cover. It's time for them to stump up and put up this $1.6 billion that they must commit to this project.

Turning to the bill, I want to say that I think this bill is a good thing. This bill is a good thing. I support high-speed rail. I support the establishment of an authority. I encourage the minister, to the extent that she can, when she is in discussions with Mark Bailey, to have in mind our project, the Sunshine Coast rail project, from Beerwah, Caloundra, Kawana, all the way through to the city centre in Maroochydore. Nothing less is viable; nothing less will be accepted. I encourage the minister, to the extent she can, that the design of that part of the works should be done as a high-speed project. We have a corridor that has been set aside. Very few resumptions will be required to be undertaken. The corridor was put in place 20 years ago, so it's effectively ready to go, unlike other parts of the main line, the existing line—parts around Eudlo that are like a snake because of twisting etc. The CAMCOS corridor is a relatively straight stretch of line. I encourage the minister, when she's speaking to the Queensland minister, that this section should at least be designed to be capable of carrying fast or faster rail. This is important because the speed at which the current train operates on the existing line, Minister, is 56 kilometres an hour, as an average. As I understand that that is slower than the trains used to travel when they were coal-fired locomotives.

The time has come for faster rail to the Sunshine Coast. This project will absolutely put pay to what the local council wants to do, which is to put in light rail between Caloundra and Maroochydore, not connected to Brisbane. That's what the council wants to do, but almost every one of my constituents I talk to are against light rail. When the minister was speaking to ABC Coast FM—this is not a criticism—she actually let slip and talked about light rail. I assume that was a slip of the tongue; I think it was. There is absolutely no support for light rail on the Sunshine Coast amongst my constituents and the constituents of Fairfax.

This is a great project. It's a project that we can all be very, very proud of on both sides of the House. I want to acknowledge in particular the work done by the member for Fairfax. I want to acknowledge the former minister for infrastructure and cities. If you had not had stumped up and listened to our pleas, we really wouldn't be here today and there wouldn't be pressure on the existing government to deliver the project. From the bottom of my heart, on behalf of all the members and people in Fisher and Fairfax, thank you so much.

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