Teresa Gambaro (Petrie, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Immigration and Citizenship) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Things have certainly changed since I stood in this House to voice my disgust at Labor’s blatant disregard for Queensland local communities through its forced amalgamations. The way has been cleared for the people of Redcliffe in my electorate to record their opposition to the loss of identity and local voice in the merger that has occurred with the Pine Rivers and Caboolture councils. Of course, it has taken the intervention of the Howard government to take a stand against this attack on local democracy. We gave people back their vote and their voice, in this terrible attack by Labor, and there was nothing but support from their federal colleagues. It was also we who stared down the Queensland government’s draconian threat to sack councils that gave people their say—a ridiculous circumstance that Queenslanders should never have imposed on them. With the way forward cleared, the Redcliffe City Council has now taken up the opportunity to pursue a vote, and that will be a red-letter day.

The other change has been the sudden departure of Peter Beattie, the main architect in this grab for power—the man who believed that he could rule for 100 years, who has the personal responsibility for all of these years of stuff-ups and who has left this terrible mess and plenty of other messes for someone else to clean up. I wish Anna Bligh well but, if she really wants to make her mark as Premier, she should wind back these terrible experiments called amalgamation. I join John Howard in calling for Anna Bligh’s first action in becoming Premier to be the repeal of the amalgamation laws. The existing boundaries should be retained for the planned March elections. This is the only appropriate course of action for the people of Redcliffe and the people of Queensland. Ploughing on against the wishes of the people will only show how undemocratic Labor is and that it never changes its spots, just like a leopard.

I say that because Labor’s form is predictable, in that it will cave in to the demands of unions on almost every single issue. This process has been driven to give unions more access to their local government employment sector to prop up their flagging membership. Labor has given its union mates a third of the seats on the transitional committees—that is right, 30 per cent of the transitional committees is made up of unionists.

The Labor candidate standing against me is, not surprisingly, an AWU unionist. She claims to have a Redcliffe background, but she does not get this issue. ‘People raise it with me, but not in the context that it is my fault and I should do something about it,’ she said to the Australian last month. Well, plenty of people having raised it with me, I have decided that I will find a way forward, and that are what being a member of parliament is all about. (Time expired)