Mark Coulton (Parkes, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Hansard source

I'm very pleased to back up my colleague and friend the member for Gippsland on this important motion. I'm a little bit confused by the contribution of my colleague the member for Robertson just then, because a previous member for Robertson who is now a senator for New South Wales, Senator O'Neill, came to my electorate a couple of weeks ago and said, 'We've stopped the rorts and the slush funds.' I thought: 'Good news! We don't like that.' Then I found out today that there's a Central Coast roads fund, for $40 million or something. With great respect to the member for Robertson, he could rollerskate across his electorate in a couple of hours. What is he going to do with all that money? It takes 13½ hours to drive across my electorate. There is no western New South Wales roads fund—oh, he's gone! That's the point exactly.

As a former mayor, I'm a great believer in the primacy of local government. There are about 536 local governments around Australia. I know that in my electorate there are 18 local government areas. We don't always agree on everything, but I certainly understand that those local councils are the primary representatives of those communities. The relationship that the previous government had with them through the Local Roads and Community Infrastructure Program was one of the most effective I've seen in my time in parliament. They know what their communities need. They employ locally. Quite frankly, of all the federal funding that has gone into my electorate, the Local Roads and Community Infrastructure Program is probably the best bang for buck for the Australian taxpayer.

I will give you a good example. I have got a village by the name of Goodooga. Goodooga is near the Queensland border. It is predominantly an Aboriginal community. Brewarrina Shire is the council area. They are a very good, proactive council. Through the LRCI, they had upgraded the local bore baths. They employed local people. Tommy Lukas from Brewarrina and his team employed a lot of local Aboriginal folk in working on that. In conjunction with some road funding they achieved, there's now a sealed road going all the way to Goodooga, which they built themselves. There was also some other funding they got from the previous government for a new supermarket and a petrol station. Now one of the most iconic and beautiful parts of New South Wales has access.

Deputy Speaker, I'm reminded of one of your trips north to go through there. It is a beautiful place, and there are up to 50 vans a night at those bore baths. That project wouldn't have been thought of in Canberra. That was something that the local people knew was needed. The local people were employed to build it and now the local people are getting the benefits of having those tourists come in. Their spending is helping keep the store viable. Otherwise, it might struggle with just a small community. That's a classic example. All over my electorate, those 18 council areas really worked closely with me and my office and got some great results.

I've already made a speech about Senator O'Neill's uncalled-for comments about ending rorts and slush funds. We had the sporting grants that went out but caught great derision from the other side. I want to ask the members on the other side: do they think it's inappropriate for the girls playing sport at Mungindi to have to get changed in the front of a vehicle because there were no change rooms for girls? They now have a just-about-completed sporting—

What are you talking about? There was no clubhouse for girls; now there is. That looks like a positive movement to me.

An honourable member interjecting—

Senator O'Neill will be up there! She's going to write her memoirs: 'My Time in the New World'. Anyway, this is an important thing. A little bit of advice for nothing to the members of the government: look after local government because, if they want to get the best bang for their buck for taxpayers' funds, they will do it through local government.

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