Terry Young (Longman, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2023-2024. It gives me a chance to reflect on the contributions to the Longman community of the previous coalition government, and to highlight the lack of contribution that the current government is making to the people of Longman and to the people of Australia generally. There are many misleading, untrue statements and downright lies said in this place, and I would like to correct the record on one that has been bandied around—that is, the untruthful statement of $1 trillion of coalition debt.

The facts are these. Fact 1: the debt, as at April 2022, just before the federal election, was $885.5 billion, which is not $1 trillion, so by saying this Labor are simply lying. Fact 2: almost two-thirds of the debt was baked in from the previous Labor government before the coalition assumed office in 2013.

Fact 3: before the pandemic, the debt was $534.4 billion in March 2019, and the pandemic measures increased the debt to $885.5 billion by April 2022, which, again, is not $1 trillion. On this point, I want to point out that every person I speak to in the street agrees that money had to be spent over and above the normal during the pandemic. We can debate how much that should have been and how it was spent, but the bottom line is that extraordinary times called for extraordinary measures, and the Australians I speak to understand and accept that fact. Let me point out as well that Labor supported all these measures and in fact wanted additional measures and spending that would have added an extra $81 billion to the deficit. It smacks of absolute hypocrisy to criticise the debt after you supported it in opposition and in fact said it didn't go far enough. But what else would you expect?

Longman is one of Australia's fastest growing communities, with just over 25,000 people having moved to the area since I was first elected to the seat just over four years ago. The projection is that Longman will grow by at least 100,000 people in the next 15 to 20 years. The coalition government recognised this, and we proudly invested in the infrastructure that the community so desperately needs now and will need in the future. That's infrastructure like the $150 million overpass at New Settlement Road, Narangba; the $660 million upgrade to the Bruce Highway, where a third lane is being added between the Bribie Island Road exit and Steve Irwin Way; $30 million for Bribie Island Road; and $15.2 million for the D'Aguilar Highway. That's as well as numerous upgrades to local roads in partnership with the Moreton Bay Regional Council, including $320,000 for William Berry Drive in Caboolture South; $915,000 for upgrades around Gympie Road, starting at Alma Road and Marsden Road in Dakabin; and $2 million for McKean Street in Caboolture, just to mention a few.

I was also proud that, through advocating with ministers and regular meetings with telcos, thanks to the previous coalition government, the people of Longman have an additional eight mobile towers now operational, plus three more underway, under the Peri-Urban Mobile Program. This is in contrast to the zero delivered for the Longman community under the previous Labor government. One of the highlights for me was being involved in the development of the Peri-Urban Mobile Program, which allowed partial funding by the Commonwealth of mobile phone towers in those communities around the country, like Longman, where the city meets the bush and the population density is too low for telcos to invest in infrastructure but too high to receive regional black spot funding. Under this program, Longman received funding for three towers, located in Bellmere and Caboolture South. Sadly, the contracts were not prepared by the department before we entered caretaker mode before the last election, and my information tells me that at this moment, over 12 months since the election, the sign-off from the minister is still yet to occur. This has delayed these much-needed towers for at least another 12 months, which is simply not good enough.

The previous government also partnered with the local council, community groups, sporting clubs and the like for smaller but just as important projects under such programs as the Stronger Communities grants program, the Capital Grants Program, the Bushfire Recovery for Wildlife and Habitat Community Grants Program, the MUSTER grants program, Volunteer Grants, Powering Communities, the Building Better Regions Fund, the Safer Communities Fund, the Roads to Recovery fund, the Community Development Grants Program and the Regionalisation Fund program, which delivered practical items—everything from new carpets for sporting clubs to solar panels for community halls and petrol vouchers for volunteers. They funded programs for youth at risk and so much more. In all, the community of Longman received over $23 million for 238 projects. Sadly, this government has made the decision to scrap the Community Development Grants Program and Regionalisation Fund program, which means that these organisations that rely on government support will no longer receive that support, in tough times when these groups so desperately need it.

I waited with anticipation on budget night and in the ensuing days to find out when the commitments that Labor made during the election would be delivered for the Longman community. There were promises of $3 million for a new clubhouse for the Caboolture Snakes rugby league club; $3 million for the new clubhouse at the Narangba Eagles Football Club; $3 million for the water park at Centenary Lakes; $300,000 for lights at the Narangba Demons Baseball Clubs; and road projects totalling $589 million, which included increasing the Bruce Highway from six to eight lanes between Anzac Avenue and Uhlmann Road. There was not a mention of these things in the budget. They were just another broken Labor promise to go along with the other broken promises, including the promise of a $275 reduction in power prices, the promise of cheaper mortgages under a Labor government—yet there have been 10 interest rate rises in just the first 12 months—the promise that, under Labor, families would be better off and there would be a lift in real wages—not gross wages but real wages, the measure that actually matters—the promise that there would be a 24/7 nurse in every aged-care facility—all lies; it never happens—and the promise that there would be no changes to super—a broken promise again. The list goes on and on. How can Australians ever trust this Labor government? They promise a lot and they deliver nothing. They can't even keep their election promises.

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