Barry Haase (Durack, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is a parliament of firsts. On the occasion of the Governor-General’s speech at the opening of the 43rd Parliament, we had a remarkable situation. For the first time in 30 years the chamber was no longer blessed with the presence of the Hon. Wilson Tuckey. This parliament is worse off for his absence. It is true: you do not know what you have till it is gone. It is also the first time we have had a woman elected as Prime Minister of this country and, at the same time, a woman representing Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia. I note also that we have a hung parliament.

It is with mixed emotions I stand here today. I am not new to this House; in fact, this is the fifth time I have been elected to represent people of Western Australia. What is new is that today I stand here proudly as the first member for the new electorate of Durack. For 12 years I represented the people of the Kalgoorlie electorate, or 91 per cent of Western Australia, and now, due to the electoral boundary changes, the Federation seat of Kalgoorlie is gone—it no longer exists. They say change is like a holiday. Let me tell you, this change has been akin to holidaying in the salt mines of Siberia. With the boundary changes I have moved office from the city of Kalgoorlie-Boulder to the city of Geraldton-Greenough, from the rich red earth to the bright blue Indian Ocean. Moving office was not as easy as I had envisaged.

One thing that has not changed is the ongoing support I have had from constituents, volunteers and staff—staff that worked relentlessly in an election campaign knowing that in the end they were out of a job. They are valuable staff—staff that have endured me, I might add, for many years. I acknowledge and thank the ever-suffering Linda Crook, Pam Foulkes-Taylor, Nikki Fleming, Samantha Jones and Jacki Green, staff I was very sorry to leave behind in Kalgoorlie. It is not easy to maintain a team when you move the office 1,000 kilometres. I thank the hundreds of volunteers who manned the 108 polling booths across Durack and I thank the constituents who put their faith in me and cast a vote in my favour. The election outcome in Durack was decisive: a clear indication of the rejection of minor parties and a rejection of homespun parties that would not support a conservative coalition in Canberra. I thank all Liberal supporters for contributing to that result. I thank my son, Shane, and his girlfriend, Kate. I am greatly indebted to my brother, Murray, my sister, Dianne, her husband, Ken, and Sue Ellen and Clive for their years of unwavering support and hands-on help given whenever needed.

The new electorate of Durack, just 63 per cent of Western Australia, covers an area of over 1½ million square kilometres, or about a quarter of Australia. Durack is 61,068 times greater in size than the electorate of Wentworth and is made up of 43 local government areas, including the Shire of East Pilbara, the largest shire in the world, comprising an area of over 371,696 square kilometres—larger than the state of Victoria—from Kalumburu in the north to Merredin in the south, with Geraldton-Greenough being the major population centre.

Western Australia continues to lead the way as Australia’s premier resource investment destination. There is currently more than $150 billion worth of projects either committed or under consideration for the state during the next few years, the majority in Durack. The Chamber of Minerals and Energy of WA estimates that an additional 38,000 employees will be required by the minerals and energy sector in the next three to five years. Total direct employment in the minerals and energy sector currently stands at about 85,700 people.

In the waters off the Durack coast from Exmouth to the Northern Territory border we are blessed with natural gas resources which are the envy of the world. The 2009 total known resource is 151.7 trillion cubic feet. The Gorgon project alone will generate $40 billion of taxes over the next 30 years of operational life. The resource contains about 40 trillion cubic feet of LNG. That is enough to power a city of one million people for 800 years. LNG processing at Barrow Island Onslow, Devils Creek, Burrup Peninsula and James Price Point will employ thousands of Australians and contribute billions of dollars to our balance of trade.

Whilst mining and petroleum are an integral and highly valuable part of the electorate, they are only one aspect of Durack. The greatest part of the western rock lobster industry, the most valuable fishery in Australia, is between Cervantes and Kalbarri. In a good season WA produces about 80 per cent of Australia’s export grain and 70 per cent of that comes from Durack. Including all other agricultural pursuits our annual production is worth $1.9 billion.

In this newly-defined electorate of Durack, the range of resources and activities is breathtaking: iconic places, high-cost infrastructure, natural treasures and amazing people. The Argyle Diamond Mine, located in the East Kimberley region south of Kununurra, is by volume the largest producer in the world. It is a significant source of pink diamonds, producing over 90 per cent of the world’s supply. Lake Argyle, with the largest freshwater storage in mainland Australia and more than nine times the water volume of Sydney Harbour, produces water for the Ord River Irrigation Area; 14,000 hectares producing a range of horticultural products, tropical fruits, chia and sandalwood. And now, thanks to a commitment by the Howard government in 2007, stage 2 is underway.

South of Halls Creek is Wolf Creek Crater, the second largest in the world at 850 metres in diameter. Also in the Kimberley are the World Heritage listed Bungle Bungle Ranges in the Purnululu National Park. In Kununurra, Lee Scott-Virtue, founder of the Kimberley Toad Busters, and her band of over 5,000 volunteers have contributed over 1.5 million hours of volunteer time. They have removed from the environment over 500,000 cane toads in their effort to slow down the advance of this toxic pest. The Kimberley Toad Busters’ Caring for the Kimberley Environmental Forum and the ‘what’s in your backyard?’ program were recognized in the 2010 International Year of Biodiversity schedule of events calendar. These are the only Australian events to be awarded this status by the United Nations.

Well-known tourist destination Broome, home of the now famous South Sea pearls is a perfect stepping off point to explore the Kimberley wilderness. In 2009-10 Port Hedland, Australia’s largest tonnage port, had a record throughput of 178.6 million tonnes. The Dampier archipelago off Karratha, home of the Woodside LNG processing facility, is also home to an extraordinary collection of ancient Indigenous rock art. It is highly regarded as the largest concentration of petroglyphs in the world. The port of Dampier, constantly vying for record holder status with Port Hedland due to Rio Tinto’s iron ore exports, also hosts Dampier Salt, the world’s largest exporter of solar salt with 9.5 million tonnes of salt each year.

Recently there has been much local excitement created in the town of Exmouth—originally constructed in 1964 as a support town for the United States naval communications station, Harold E Holt—by speculation that a US space communications system will be housed there. Ningaloo Reef is the great attraction that brings thousands of tourists to Exmouth and Coral Bay each year. Challenging the Great Barrier Reef in its diversity, it deserves to be overwhelmingly more popular due to its ease of accessibility: drive to Coral Bay, step off the beach and it is right there.

Away from the coast, in the Murchison, we have the nation’s second-biggest uranium deposit, Yeelirrie, and, on Boolardy Station, the perfect site for the next generation radio telescope—the Square Kilometre Array. Further analysis and research continues in our bid to win this billion dollar international project. Carnarvon, at the mouth of the Gascoyne River, boasts not only a horticultural district with world’s best practice drip irrigation systems but an extremely lucrative seafood industry. The extensive iron ore deposits, both haematite and magnetite, of the Murchison and mid-west are the commercial justification for the construction of the Oakajee Port and Rail project. This deepwater port, 25 kilometres north of Geraldton, will create diversity of employment which is vital in an agricultural area suffering the vagaries of climate change.

Situated 25 kilometres south-east of Merredin in Western Australia, the Collgar wind farm project is the largest single-stage wind farm development currently under construction in the Southern Hemisphere. The wind farm will generate approximately 792,000 megawatt hours of renewable electricity per year from 111 wind turbines, enough to power 125,000 homes. Unfortunately, the central wheat belt region has this season suffered a severe shortage of rain, and we are all very thankful there is already some degree of alternative commercial diversity. For many years Merredin has been the site for airline pilot training and it supplies China Southern Airlines with flight training for hundreds of pilots a year. In addition to such diversity, we now have Globe Drill, a highly experienced exploration drilling company, testing their new GT3000 drill on the western outskirts of Merredin. They are putting down a three-kilometre test hole through granite bedrock. This will be the deepest hole attempted onshore in Western Australia and, when proved successful, the rig’s revolutionary design will slash the costs of geothermal exploration for a green-energy-hungry world.

In addition to reflecting upon the vastness in my electorate, I need to address the Governor-General’s speech. The office of the Prime Minister prepares the Governor-General’s address, outlining the government’s plans for the next three years. The people of Australia would expect to hold dear the words of the Governor-General. However, if we reflect upon the speech delivered by the Governor-General on 12 February 2008 for the opening of the 42nd Parliament, a speech we now know was littered with propaganda and false promises, we get an understanding of how much faith to place in the stated plans of the 43rd Parliament. The government was committed to a plan to build a modern Australia equipped to face the challenges of the 21st century. History tells us that the modern Australia the Labor government built was fraught with waste, incompetency and additional tax proposals.

Let us compare the outcomes versus the commitment of the 42nd Parliament, led by Prime Minister Rudd. The government committed to implementing major changes to Australia’s education system, with the aim of achieving higher standards and better results at every level of education from childhood to mature age. They committed to build 260 new childcare centres on school, TAFE, university and community sites. Only 38 were built—not one in regional Western Australia. They steadfastly said they would increase focus on high-quality child care, yet now they are seeking to reduce the maximum per child amount of childcare rebate to $7,500 per annum and suspend indexation until July 2014.

The government said they would invest $1 billion to provide computers for all years 9 to 12 students and faster broadband connections to schools. Only 345,668 new computers are on students’ desks, and none of them have been connected to fast internet. At this stage the promise of one million computers for one million students by the end of 2011 will not be fulfilled until 2016. The government committed to funding of $2.5 billion, to be provided for secondary schools to build or upgrade trade training facilities over the next 10 years. Before the 2007 election they promised one trade training centre for every one of the 2,650 secondary schools across Australia. Lo and behold, at the beginning of the current school year only one was fully operational.

The Labor government’s commitment to implementing major changes to Australia’s education system in order to achieve higher standards and better results, including mature age education, did not mention that you needed to live in the cities to be part of this achievement. They put a large group of students through emotional hell whilst they fought politically to disadvantage rural students qualifying for independent youth allowance. The $42 billion Building the Education Revolution stimulus package as part of their education commitment contained a centrepiece building program worth $14.1 billion that sought to add a new iconic building to every primary school in the country. True to Labor tradition, of course there was a cost blow-out this time to the tune of $1.7 billion. Perhaps it would have been more fiscally conservative to add the words ‘value for money’ at the time of writing the guidelines, not seven months down the track.

The government committed to a plan to reform health and hospital systems. This has not happened. In fact they are still arguing about it. It is apparent now that the government will have to reform the GST also. The government said they would also work with the private sector to build a high-speed national broadband network, the critical infrastructure platform of the 21st century, with the capacity to fundamentally transform business to overcome much of the tyranny of distance and to boost productivity growth. That has not happened. Even if it does, only 93 per cent of the Australian population will benefit and guess who the seven per cent are who miss out—it is the very people who need it most, remote Australians. There is $43 billion of further debt without any meaningful cost analysis. No astute business would do it and that, we are told, we should not worry about.

The government committed to assisting small businesses wanting to develop family-friendly practices. In fact, they imposed 9,997 new or amended regulations in less than three years—hardly family friendly. In 2008 the Governor-General told us that the government considers climate change represents one of the greatest long-term economic and environmental challenges. This turned out to be perhaps the greatest international embarrassment Australia has ever suffered. An absolute lack of global support for the government’s climate change ideology amounted to a total failure on this commitment. Now, with the failures and broken promises of 2008 in mind, let us take a look at the 2010 Governor-General’s address to the 43rd Australian Parliament.

The government say they will facilitate the creation of a parliamentary budget office and a new role of parliamentary integrity commissioner. That is quite a blatant admission of the failure of the last three years of the Labor government—a government who governed in their own political interest, not in the national interest, and treated Australians with contempt. The address speaks of:

… the need to build a high-productivity, high-participation, high-skilled economy that delivers sustainable growth for all Australians

That is a lofty aspiration. Now to balance the books they want to hit the mining industry—the saviour of the Australian economy—and rob royalty payments from the states.

We were told that in this term of parliament the government will continue the rollout of Australia’s greatest ever infrastructure enterprise, the National Broadband Network, at a cost to us of $43 billion. They talked about this last time and what has happened? There is still no transparent cost analysis and questions are emerging from consumers regarding affordability.

The government have committed to pursuing measures to increase workplace participation by disadvantaged or disengaged groups including Indigenous Australians. There is still nothing tangible being proposed to improve school attendance to ensure an education as a foundation on which to build job training. The Governor-General’s speech said:

Indigenous communities will benefit from the government’s continued investment in housing, health, early childhood, economic participation and remote service delivery …

The original promise was to build 750 new homes, rebuild 230 homes and deliver 2,500 refurbished homes. The Labor government took nearly two years to build the first house and spent more than $45 million before the first house was even finished. The address states:

… the government seeks to remove the incentive for an asylum seekers to undertake dangerous sea voyages to Australia …

What we do have is record arrivals, universal rejection of an offshore regional processing facility and still no mention of temporary protection visas.

So there we have it, my parliamentary friends—two Governor-General’s speeches, two Labor governments all interwoven with the same thread of hypocrisy. In addition, the barbecue-stopping programs, home insulation, solar panels—

Chris Hayes (Fowler, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy Speaker, on a point of order: I draw your attention to standing order 88:

A Member must not refer disrespectfully to the Queen, the Governor-General, or a State Governor, in debate or for the purpose of influencing the House in its deliberations.

Barry Haase (Durack, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw. So there we have it my parliamentary friends, in addition to all of that we have the barbecue-stopping programs of home insulation, solar panels, ‘cash-for-clunkers’, GroceryWatch, FuelWatch, the Green Loan Scheme, exploding debt and borrowings to the tune of $100 million a day. How long will Australians tolerate this bungling and continue to be hoodwinked? The new paradigm of transparency is a complex recipe for inertia achieving much glory for individuals in the short-term and nothing but disaster for Australians in the long-term. With Labor in government but the Greens in power we will continue to ventilate many issues but get nowhere in reducing the cost-of-living blow-out caused by Labor’s financial mismanagement. Merry Christmas.

Peter Slipper (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for Durack. Before calling the member for Shortland, the Government Whip, the Clerk just mentioned to me in passing that her daughter Hannah visited Broome last week. The question is that the address be noted. I call the Government Whip, the honourable member for Shortland.

Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I commence my contribution to this debate by thanking the people of Shortland for the confidence they have placed in me. I thank them very much for supporting me in the last federal election. I make a commitment to them that I will serve them and respect the great privilege and honour they have placed upon me.

I also thank many other people for helping me in my re-election. I thank all the members of the ALP who worked tirelessly. They made an enormous commitment because they believe in what the Labor Party stands for. They ask nothing more than to have a Labor government and a Labor member of parliament representing them in Canberra. I do appreciate the effort of each and every one of them in working towards having myself and the Gillard government re-elected.

I cannot ignore the contribution of my family. They made an enormous contribution to my campaign and made enormous sacrifices, particularly when there was some illness in the family at the time of the campaign. They still put in big-time and helped have me re-elected. I sometimes wonder why they do that. The families of each and every member of parliament make enormous sacrifices in having us here. We are quite often absent from many family functions and we are often not there to provide the support that is the usual expectation within a family. Overall, I want to put on the record my appreciation for my family and particularly my husband Lindsay.

We had a fantastic campaign team. I would like to acknowledge their contributions as well. Chad Griffith, who stepped into the breach when illness hit; he really was the spearhead of our campaign. He worked very hard and put his life on hold just to be my campaign manager. I thank Chad very much for his contribution. Don and Maggie Bowman—if anyone in this parliament wants to know how to conduct a postal vote campaign then Don and Maggie are the ones to go to. We had a fantastic formula and I thank Don and Maggie for their tireless work and the contributions they made to my campaign.

I also want to mention three other people. Paul Daley, who, I think, I totally exhausted with letterboxing. One day he just could not come out in the afternoon. He has worked tirelessly for me over a number of years in campaigns, along with John Goverd and Kevin McFadden and many other workers. I would just like to particularly single out those people.

I thank very much the people who worked on my booths. I thank the people who worked on pre-poll for the time that they put aside to do that. I thank the people who had my signs in their yards, and I particularly thank those who constantly had them removed and had to have them replaced. I thank Graeme Hamilton and Beryl Bridgefoot for the help that they gave me on street stalls for a number of months and I also thank members of the ALP from North Lakes who helped out as well. I thank my wonderful, wonderful staff for the enormous contribution that they made to my campaign. Kay Fraser would get up early in the morning before she started work and go out and letterbox. It was the same with Mark, Chris, Vicky and Kathy Tudor. I really appreciate the enormous effort that they put in. Thanks also go to Jan, Catherine and Melanie, who worked in the office during the campaign and took many phone calls, and we all know the number of calls that come in during an election campaign.

So I thank my staff and everyone who was involved with the campaign. These are all dedicated people who help me represent them in this parliament because they believe in what the ALP stands for. Some of those values are fairness, equity, inclusiveness and a society free from discrimination. They are the values that drive me as an individual and are the values that drew me to the Labor Party in my early years. I believe we should have a society in which every member is valued, where every child that is born has the same opportunity. Unfortunately, it does not work like that, but I believe that this government has as its goal to try and bring that to fruition. It will not happen in one term, it will not happen in two terms, but it is a goal to work towards. When there are two babies in a hospital, their futures are nearly determined the day they born. I think it is the role of government to help address that inequality and create a system where they have the same opportunities as each other.

Before I move on, I would like to make one other point. One of the things that I find most gratifying as a member, on election day or even after the election, is when you meet with a constituent and they come up to you and say, ‘I voted for you.’ When they say that, they are not saying, ‘I voted for you, so give me this.’ It is as if they have given you one of the greatest gifts that they could give you. I think that goes towards what democracy is about. As a democratic society people have that right to vote, and when they cast it for us in this place we are very privileged.

Shortland is a very environmentally sensitive coastal electorate, and as such climate change is a very important issue within the electorate. Rising sea levels could see the majority of the electorate go under water. Therefore it is really important for this government to address the issue of climate change. During this next term of parliament we must really work on this issue. I implore members of the opposition to acknowledge the fact that climate change does exist and I encourage them to work with the government to put a price on carbon and put in place other policies and laws that will ensure that electorates like Shortland, including many held by members on the other side, are not decimated as a result of climate change.

The demographics of the Shortland electorate are quite interesting. It is an older electorate; according to the 2006 census, it is the 11th oldest electorate in the country. Because it is an older electorate, health is a very important issue. With an ageing population, you need to make sure that you have proper health infrastructure in place—that there are sufficient numbers of doctors, that there is access to hospitals and that the support services are there on the ground for people as they get older. The Gillard government has put in place health and hospital reforms that will very much benefit the people of Shortland.

We have had a chronic doctor shortage for a very long time in Shortland. When the Howard government were in power, I stood up time and again here in the parliament to raise the need for more GPs and a much larger, stronger health workforce. Unfortunately, those words fell on deaf ears. Under the health and hospital reforms and measures that have been put in put in place by the Gillard government and the Minister for Health and Ageing, there are more doctors being trained, there are more nurses being trained, there are more allied health professionals being trained and there is more money going into our public hospitals. There has been a mindset to actually address the issues that surround health and ensure that we have a hospital and health system that can cope with our needs in the 21st century.

Education is an issue that is very important to all members on this side of the parliament. In the Shortland electorate, the Building the Education Revolution has provided much-needed resources, upgrades and capital works in schools. I have listened to members on the other side speak disparagingly about the program in the House and I can only say that the schools in my electorate have embraced it. The opposition call it the ‘school halls program’. Yes, there have been some school halls built within the Shortland electorate; but there have also been many classrooms built and a multitude of other capital works projects that have taken place through the Building the Education Revolution program. I will share with the House the fact that, at the beginning of the 42nd Parliament, I visited Gwandalan Public School, and the principal and the president—

Peter Slipper (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Deputy Speaker Bird, I seek to intervene.

Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Will the member for Shortland accept the intervention?

Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No. I visited Gwandalan Public School, and the principal and the president of the P&C showed me the school’s classrooms. There was mould on the floor. There was rotting carpet and mildew. The roofs leaked. But the Building the Education Revolution has now delivered new classrooms to this school, and the school is so proud and happy with what is taking place. The rooms are not quite completed but when they are they will be classrooms for the 21st century with smartboards and every other educational aid needed for student success. This is a far cry from what happened under the previous government.

It is important to recognise that the Building the Education Revolution was also about creating a stimulus for the economy. I have had a number of construction companies come and talk to me about what it has meant for them. They have been able to keep their workforce intact as opposed to having to shed the jobs of construction workers. It has been a big boost for those companies. Instead of only one or two people remaining employed, the three companies who talked with me have managed to retain the workers employed by them—16, 50 and 80 people respectively.

Under the previous government, there were plans to build an Australian technical college on the Central Coast. There was a lot of talk but there was no action. Under the Gillard government, Australian technical colleges have been devolved to the local high schools. Northlakes, Gorokan and Lake Munmorah High Schools in the electorate of Shortland now have Australian technical colleges. In addition, they each have trade training centres. They have state-of-the-art training centres for young people prior to their entering the workforce. This is a great boost for young people in an area where there is a very high level of unemployment. There is 40 per cent youth unemployment. Furthermore, young people have great difficulties with travel because the area is made up of a series of little villages. Now those students can get the education they need in their local school.

The Gillard government delivered a Medicare office for Belmont, one that the Howard government closed and ripped out. The Howard government refused also to give any money to the Fernleigh Track, whereas under the Gillard government we have now concluded the track, taking it to its end. It is nearly 20 kilometres of cycleway and walking track and the Gillard government has put $2.85 million into it.

The Shortland electorate is an electorate where people live. Young people attend university in Newcastle, and the government has put a lot of money into Newcastle University. Belmont Hospital has benefited under the health and hospital reforms, and enormous amounts of money have also gone into John Hunter Hospital, Wyong Hospital and Gosford Hospital—all hospitals that people in Shortland electorate use and that will benefit from this extra money. The Gillard government has also put money into the Hunter Medical Research Institute, which is delivering to people within the Shortland electorate, and the CSIRO. These are all investments that benefit the people of Shortland electorate.

The main sectors of employment for people in the Shortland electorate are: retail, construction, light industrial, service and health. The commitment of the Gillard government to apprenticeships will definitely benefit the young people in Shortland electorate. We can see that there is a need for young people to be able to train and to develop skills, and that will address the skills shortage that was allowed to develop under the Howard government.

The Gillard and Rudd governments have delivered a strong economy to the people of Australia. Australia has one of the strongest economies in the world, and that is something that we should all be proud of. We came through the global financial crisis with flying colours. It was because of investment in programs like Building the Education Revolution that this came about.

What we on this side of the House want to see develop is a fair and resilient society, where people with disabilities have the kinds of opportunities that other people have and where older Australians can actually get the services they need and not be discriminated against. We make a commitment to look at putting in place policies and programs that will help people with mental illness and people that are disadvantaged. I remind the House of the additional money that the government gave to pensioners and of the paid parental leave scheme.

I believe Australia is a nation with a great future, a future that all Australians can share in. The role of the government is to see that this comes to fruition. I seek to table a list—it is not an inclusive list by any means—of investments that have taken place in Shortland electorate under the Gillard and Rudd governments.

Leave granted.

Peter Slipper (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a great pleasure to join the address-in-reply debate in the Main Committee of the House of Representatives. It is a great privilege and honour for all of us, all 150 members, to be elected to serve in the people’s house, the House of Representatives of the Parliament of Australia. In the period since Federation only a relatively small number of Australians have been granted this privilege, and I must say that I believe that most members, regardless of their political stance, are elected to parliament for the right reasons, not the wrong reasons. We all seek to make our electorates and the nation as a whole a better place. It is a great responsibility to be given the task of drafting and formulating laws, and of course all of us have the opportunity to stand up and oppose those initiatives which we believe are unhelpful and support those which we consider are in the national interest.

I have been privileged to be returned as the member for Fisher on eight occasions—in 1984, 1993, 1996, 1998, 2001, 2004, 2007 and 2010. I want to thank the residents of the electorate of Fisher, in its many manifestations, over that period for showing their confidence in me so that I am able to be their effective representative in the Australian parliament. There was one election I did not win and that was in 1987, when Michael Lavarch narrowly defeated me. The newspapers contacted both of us after the election, and my first response was that I was ‘quietly confident’. When they did a recheck of the votes and extra votes came in, I was reduced to being ‘cautiously optimistic’. When it looked pretty grim, I was, when the media contacted me, ‘hopeful’. Then, shortly after that they had the declaration of the poll, and I was history! I must say that when I came back six years later—I served the first three years as a member of the National Party then came back as a Liberal in 1993—I think my expectations were much more realistic and I believe that I have been a much more effective member for the experience of having received six years in the sin-bin when I was not in the Australian parliament.

For the last couple of years I have served as a member of the Liberal National Party of Queensland. I suppose I have served in three parties in the Australian parliament and, apart from Billy Hughes whose portrait proudly hangs in my office, I do not know whether any other member has had that particular privilege.

Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You’re no rat!

Peter Slipper (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am not sure whether that is an interjection I should recognise, but I do feel particularly honoured that my friend the Chief Government Whip, who really should be a minister in this government, has come in to listen to this contribution. Obviously, one does not get elected to the Australian parliament on so many occasions without the support, not only of the electorate but also of very many people who work hard to achieve the electoral outcome that has seen me in this parliament. I would like to thank my wife, Inge. She has been incredibly supportive in every respect. I want to also thank the many volunteers. We have hundreds of people turning out on polling day, as happens in other electorates, and also during the election campaign. It is really humbling to see that so many people, who do not seek anything in return, were prepared to work extraordinarily long hours at the last election with a view to changing the government.

I would like to thank my Acting Campaign Director during most of the campaign, Greg Robinson. The Campaign Director Michael Bloyce was a great tower of support, but he had a long-planned holiday to the United Kingdom. I do not know whether he had a window into the Prime Minister’s mind as to when the election was going to be held but it was called when he came back. I would also like to thank the Sunshine Coast regional zone Chairman of the Liberal National Party, Greg Newton.

Other members of the campaign team were: Ken Hinds; Belinda Howard; Rob Matchett; Mark McEwan; Helen Sava; Jenny Sinclair; Val Bradford; Peter Pollock; Colin Caudell, who was a former member of the South Australian parliament; John Tusler; Arthur Walton, and so many others. It is always dangerous to highlight the efforts by certain persons because inevitably people who should be included are omitted.

I would like to thank my staff—Tim Knapp, Michelle Ellis, Melissa Ellard, Bill Van Motman, Nicky Fisher and Richard Bruinsma, and of course my son, Nick, and his wife, Ashleigh; my daughter, Alex, and her partner, Ben; my parents-in-law, Rob and Bev Hall; and, as I mentioned before, I would like to thank my wife, Inge.

We were very much supported by the staff at the Liberal National Party headquarters. They put in incredibly long hours to make sure that the LNP in Queensland achieved a strong and positive election result. The LNP was led by Campaign Director James McGrath; Cameron Thompson, who honourable members would know is a former member of this place; and James Mackay. I would like to thank the LNP President, Bruce McIver, Vice-President Gary Spence, and state Director Michael O’Dwyer for their leadership over this period and in the years since the merger which has helped to ensure that the Liberal National Party has grown to become a respected and trusted political force in Queensland.

Since the merger of the Liberal Party and the National Party in Queensland, the LNP has proven to all Queenslanders, and in fact to the nation as a whole, that it is a positive political force, and I am very pleased to have been associated with the party in a positive way right from the beginning. When one looks at the website of the Australian Electoral Commission and at the party’s success in a numerical sense, one will see, I think, that the Australian Labor Party has 72 members, the Liberal Party of Australia has 44 members, the Liberal National Party of Queensland has 21 members, the Nationals have seven, and then of course there are the Independents and Greens and so on. Had the conservative forces done as well in other states as we did in Queensland, then we might well have had a situation where there was a change of government. It almost happened but did not quite occur.

I would also like to thank the parliament for entrusting me with the role of Deputy Speaker. I want to thank publicly members of the Speaker’s panel, including you, Madam Deputy Speaker Bird. We work very well as a team. All of our members are dedicated with a view to ensuring that the parliament delivers to the Australian people in the way that the Australian people would like.

The challenge in future parliaments will be to preserve as many as possible of the positive changes which have occurred in this parliament, brought about by the necessity to negotiate and cobble together a government with the support of members who were not actually elected as members of the government party. I believe that the reforms that will succeed into the future will be those reforms which are seen to be objectively good. While we all collectively have our training wheels on, there will be a lot of positive outcomes from this parliament, not the least of which is that parliament is seen to be more cooperative. It is not a case of winner takes all. The Chief Government Whip would know that, every time there is a vote, he and the Leader of the House have to work to ensure that, on that particular vote, they have the support of the crossbench members. We will find that there will be many fewer guillotines applied. We will be talking more. Members will have the opportunity to express their views and the views of their electorates on so many areas. I see this as being a good thing.

Obviously both major sides of politics would have liked to have won the election outright, but every cloud has a silver lining. The parliament is now a place for debate and a place where decisions are actually made. We have the capacity to take some power back from the executive, and I think that is a good thing. It is great that we are voting on some private members’ bills and motions so we are able to display to the people of Australia where we stand on important issues and not just on the issues that the government of the day deems to be important. I am pleased to see the Chief Government Whip nodding in agreement on that. There has had to be a high level of cooperation—perhaps an even higher level of cooperation—between the government whips, the opposition whips and, for that matter, the crossbench members in this parliament. That not only taxes the ability of the people occupying those whipping positions but also means that they are able to achieve positive outcomes consistent with what some people refer to as the new paradigm—I must say, I hate that expression, and I suspect it will probably disappear soon enough, because it has become one of those words that seem to be repeated over and over again.

In the time available to me, I wish to mention that the Sunshine Coast is one of the fastest growing areas in Australia. It is an area where a lot of people move to from the rust belt areas of southern Australia. It has a wonderful climate and a welcoming population. It has easy access to and from the capital city. But we do have major problems as far as our infrastructure is concerned. The state government is seeking to dramatically increase the population of the Sunshine Coast even without the satellite city south of Caloundra, which contains some 50,000 people, and even without the Palmview development, which will have some 16,000 people. We are, as the Sunshine Coast, going to have our population close to double over the next 10 to 15 years. This means that the infrastructure in so many areas will be taxed.

We need to upgrade the Bruce Highway to six lanes all the way from Brisbane. The Howard government upgraded the Bruce Highway to six lanes as far as Caboolture. That removed the worst bottleneck between Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast at the time. But, as population continues to grow and as traffic continues to become heavier, we now need the extra lanes between Caboolture and the Sunshine Coast itself. At the present time it sometimes takes two to three hours to travel to Brisbane, whereas at other times you might get there in an hour and a half. If we are going to achieve our full potential as a region, we do need to upgrade the Bruce Highway to six lanes. The official population of the Sunshine Coast is up from about 247,000 in 2001 to 322,000 in 2009 and it continues to grow as many people make the sea change move to our coastal communities or the tree change move to our lush hinterland villages and towns. I must say that, on occasion, we do not really seem to get our share of infrastructure spending. I certainly want to give the Leader of the House notice that I will be coming to see him in relation to a number of projects that we really need, and need now, on the Sunshine Coast.

We also need a major international entertainment centre. In the election campaign I was able to promise that an Abbott government would give seed funding of $10 million in relation to this arts and exhibition centre, and that would have been enough to get the project off the ground because the state would have kicked in and the council would have done their bit. Unfortunately, we did not win the election and we have a situation where we do not have that funding allocated, so at the present time the arts and exhibition centre is quite some distance away. We do have a number of smaller entertainment centres in places like Caloundra, Kawana, Nambour and so on, but the region lacks an international facility which has the capacity to host world-class entertainment shows and major conventions. For too long, local residents have had no choice but to travel to Brisbane on our inadequate highway to attend major entertainment events.

Also during the election campaign, I launched four pledges in four weeks. We were aiming to improve infrastructure—and I mentioned before the upgrading of the Bruce Highway. I would like to see the building of the Sunshine Coast University Hospital advanced. The state government promised it prior to the last state election and then delayed its construction by two years. I would also like to see the Sippy Downs Town Centre master plan developed, along with the business and technology precinct adjacent to the University of the Sunshine Coast.

Also, we need to make sure that we are no longer categorised as metropolitan with respect to decisions made by the department of health. We need to attract more general practitioners to the Sunshine Coast, and we need to get the coastal part of Fisher classified as an area of need so that qualified overseas-trained doctors are able to work there. It is always important to recognise that mental health is a really important issue, and we need to expand front-line services. Certainly we need extra facilities in this area on the Sunshine Coast.

I also believe we need to foster employment opportunities on the coast. One of the frustrations for families on the Sunshine Coast is that, when their children finish school, sometimes they can go to the University of the Sunshine Coast but it does not always offer the particular courses that people need, and then young people have to leave the Sunshine Coast to get a foot on the employment ladder. I would like to see more industry on the Sunshine Coast, particularly clean and green industry. If we could achieve more of that, more families would be able to stay intact; their kids would not have to go away. I think that is a matter of vital importance.

The Sunshine Coast, though, is a wonderful place to live. Lots of people are moving there. We need to promote projects which will encourage the ambience of the area, which will make sure that we preserve the atmosphere on the Sunshine Coast, which is the reason that so many people have chosen to move to the Sunshine Coast.

I would like to take this opportunity to wish all honourable members a happy, safe and holy Christmas. This has been a very interesting and historic year for all of us. We all continue to learn. Our life, I suppose, is a collection of experiences, and we are the collection of our life’s experiences. It really is important to take a break at Christmas. I hope that everyone takes that opportunity so that we have a chance to recharge our batteries in readiness for 2011. The sitting program which has been announced is obviously a demanding one. Given the reform agreement, it is important that the parliament sit more, and we are obviously sitting longer, but I think it is vital that we take the opportunity over Christmas to spend time with family and friends. Some people ask me, ‘What are you doing for Christmas?’ I say, ‘I’m staying home, and it’s really quite exciting to be home because it is that time of the year for friends and family.’ I hope that people recognise that.

As Deputy Speaker I would like to officially thank all honourable members for their cooperation since my appointment to that position—a moment ago, I thanked members of the Speaker’s panel. It is a very great privilege to serve in the Australian parliament. It is a privilege which just over a thousand Australians have been given in the years since the colonies in Australia came together to form the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901. The electorate of Fisher was created in 1948 and was named after the Rt Hon. Andrew Fisher, who was a Labor Prime Minister of Australia. I went to a commemoration of Andrew Fisher’s prime ministership a couple of years ago and found that his descendants, as you would understand, are still very much resident in this country. Australia is a great democracy; we are a young country, but an old democracy. We have a singular—shall we say—opportunity in this parliament to make a real change. I thank honourable members for accepting this challenge and this responsibility, and I hope that during this parliament all of us will make a contribution towards making Australia an even better place than it is today. We are the lucky country, but we can do better.

Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a great pleasure to follow the Deputy Speaker and member for Fisher. He reflected somewhat on his time in this place and the electoral success he has had over many years, albeit with a short time in the sin-bin. I think that reflects the conscientious way in which he approaches his work in the electorate. He is doing a great job as Deputy Speaker helping to settle the parliament down and playing a positive and progressive role, and the government appreciates that. I make these remarks very genuinely, Madam Deputy Speaker, not just to ensure that when I go to the Deputy Speaker’s drinks tonight I get a glass of one of the Hunter’s finest reds.

It is true that this has been a very tumultuous year. I am sure that, when the history of Australian political life is written in future years, there will be much reflection on 2010. There was a fascinating and somewhat strange election campaign in late August followed, of course, by a very long 17-day wait for a determination on who might form a government. And now there have been almost five weeks of parliamentary sittings under—and I will say it only once, for the benefit of the member for Fisher—the new paradigm. It is an environment in which things are much different for all of us, but I welcome the fact that it is an environment in which the parliament is operating very, very effectively. I am obviously in a position to observe that very closely. Just as importantly, if not more importantly, to the Australian people, the government is functioning very well. It is getting on with its progressive and forward-looking agenda, and I know that will be welcomed by many people.

We will never know why the election was so close, in many senses. It is difficult, despite all our capability through opinion polling and other research, to get into the minds of every one of the 10 million or more voters in this country. If there is a lesson to be learned, I think it is more likely that none of us—neither individuals nor the political parties—can assume that they will be returned to government just on what they have done; they will need to demonstrate what they intend to do. It is an interesting thing to analyse, because there is no doubt that the first-term Labor government, the one elected in 2007, was a successful government. It had many, many achievements under its belt, not least the way in which it protected us from a global contagion, the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, and indeed in those first three years created 650,000 jobs—a very, very significant achievement.

Then there was, just to name a few, the apology to the stolen generation, long overdue and long called for by people on my side of the parliament. There was the signing of Kyoto and what we did in significantly increasing the mandatory renewable energy target, now known as the renewable energy target, to 20 per cent. Of course, there was the Building the Education Revolution, much criticised by some, an ongoing program which is transforming the way in which we deliver education in our country in the 21stcentury. Then there is the new industrial relations system. It is strange how quickly we forget how bad our system was not all that long ago, and there has been a bit of a debate about that this week. It is interesting to note there was no equal pay case under the old regime; that has only been facilitated under this architecture. One achievement very close to me is the defence white paper, the first one in more than a decade—long overdue. There has been pension reform, with pension increases. Under family assistance more generally, paid parental leave has been a historic reform. Health and hospital reforms are still rolling out. Just one aspect of that is 20 new cancer centres throughout the country. Our GP superclinics are making a difference in local communities. There is money for childcare support. The list goes on and on.

It is funny to me—for want of a better word—that, in a sense, we did so much that it was all too much for some people to absorb. Too quickly, the media moved on to the next subject. Of course, our ambitious program continues. There are big challenges now and what people will be looking for us to do is to get on with the National Broadband Network. People want it, we need to deliver it and others should get out of the way. There are also the ongoing reforms in health and hospitals.

We need to tackle climate change, of course, but the community and business are simply crying out for certainty. The overwhelming majority of Australian people recognise that climate change exists, that it is a problem, and they want government to do something about it; and, again, people who want to interfere should simply get out of the way. Tax reform will be important, and I should have included in the list of successful reforms under the last government what we did in terms of a more focused, equal and profitable mining tax—a way of returning the dividends of the mining boom back to the people and back to the infrastructure which supports their local communities.

I want to turn back to the BER for a second, because one of the things that made us even busier than usual during the election campaign was the time we had to allocate to opening new facilities in our electorates. I have now opened a number of facilities in my local primary schools. I am delighted, as are my school communities, that every local primary school in my electorate now has a new facility—a new school hall, a new library, a multifunction centre, whatever it might be. Despite the criticisms from those opposite and some criticisms from the media, I can guarantee members of the House that my school communities—Catholic, public, Christian, you name it—are absolutely overwhelmed by the difference it has made in their capacity to deliver 21st century school programs.

Indeed, I was talking to the director of Catholic schools for the Hunter region—and the member for Newcastle will be interested in this—who pointed out to me that, not long before we made the announcement about the BER and the schools program, the Catholic Schools Office had sat down to work out how much money they would need to bring the infrastructure in all the Catholic schools in the region up to an acceptable standard, a 21st century standard. I will not share the numbers for fear that they are not for public digestion, but they did the sums and sat back in distress, recognising that they could never hope to secure anywhere near that amount of money and therefore lived in forlorn hope of ever achieving their objectives. Of course, as a result of the BER, they got almost exactly the amount of money they had calculated they needed in that difficult and challenging exercise. So that is a small example of the difference the program has made.

Sharon Grierson (Newcastle, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

And they’ve been wonderful to work with.

Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They have been wonderful to work with—absolutely. So it is an overwhelming success. People can sit back and criticise, of course, when you are spending so much money so quickly—remembering that, as I heard the member for Shortland say, this was an economic stimulus package first and a schools program second. It was a good choice to spend the money on schools, because that is where it was needed most. If you are rolling out money that quickly, of course there are going to be examples of mistakes, cost overruns et cetera and maybe, in a small number of cases, value for money not being delivered—the Orgill report has identified those—but overwhelmingly the program has been fantastic and has worked well.

That leads me to my electorate. Like any electorate, my local area has many challenges, and I will go through some of them. Interestingly, our biggest challenge now, in my view, is the tightness of our labour market. If someone had told me when I was first elected in 1996 that the Hunter region’s unemployment rate would be five per cent in my lifetime, I would have laughed at them. Maybe I need to be more ambitious, but I could never have conceived it. It is ironic that, in my view, one of the biggest challenges facing the region now is to ensure that we do not fall short on the skills front and, in fact, on the labour participation front. I was talking just last week to a local publican. As you do, I said, ‘How’s it going, mate?’ He said, ‘It’s going well, but my biggest problem is that I can’t get staff.’ Despite having an unemployment rate around five per cent, we still have these huge pockets of unemployment, typically among young people who lack the skills and wherewithal to take up these job opportunities, and still among some more mature former blue-collar workers. This is the biggest challenge for government in our local region.

Sharon Grierson (Newcastle, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ms Grierson interjecting

Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I hear the member for Newcastle agreeing. We cannot afford to allow people to continue to lie dormant while we have this inflationary effect in the local economy and while we have so many employers unable to get the people they need to fill the jobs they need filled. Of course, that is a brake on our growth, because we cannot grow more economically if we continue to allow people to lie idle.

Dealing with those already sitting in those pockets is one thing, and that is a speech for another day. It is a complex issue, but we cannot allow another generation of young people to come in and fall into that same trap. That is what our trade training schools are all about. That is what our science labs are all about. That is what the $600 million the government is spending on skills is all about. It is what the Apprenticeship Kickstart program is all about. Trades training centres will intervene early and get kids worked up to the skills they need to take up those opportunities. I will continue to pursue that as an issue and to support the many very strong programs the government is rolling out to address those problems. I will just mention that we spent $7 million on Kurri Kurri TAFE as part of the stimulus package, a sum which does not come along every day.

It is amazing how good can come out of adversity. We had a global recession. The government found it necessary to spend money to keep us out of recession, and we are getting all these benefits that one would not have dreamed about. I could run off a list of community projects in my electorate which were not gold-plating; they were infrastructure projects that were required and that would never have been built if it had not been for what was a very well targeted economic stimulus package.

I want to stay on growth but turn to some of the impacts on infrastructure. In my region the biggest impact—in addition to child care, doctor shortages et cetera—is road infrastructure. When I leave this place, rightly or wrongly, probably my greatest achievement will be the $1.7 billion Hunter Expressway, which will do more than anything to clear the traffic nightmare through the Hunter region between Newcastle and the Upper Hunter, along with the third river crossing, in Maitland—I congratulate the state government on that. It will certainly reduce the congestion in Maitland, which was the second fastest growing city in Australia last time I checked. Maybe it is now the fastest, but it was second to Mandurah, in Western Australia, last time I checked.

These infrastructure shortfalls need addressing. I put my own government on notice again that I have a very high expectation that the proceeds from the new mining tax will be redirected into mining communities, into infrastructure projects in those regions—including my own—and into road upgrades in addition to the Hunter Expressway, such as a bypass of the townships of Singleton and Muswellbrook. In addition to millions of tourists, many coalminers drive through the Hunter’s wine country to get to work as they move further into the Upper Hunter region and we have to do something about our vineyard region’s roads.

Sharon Grierson (Newcastle, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ms Grierson interjecting

Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Newcastle enjoys coming to my electorate for a bite to eat and a nice glass of the world’s best wines. She acknowledges that you cannot have tourists coming from Sydney and elsewhere having to drive on goat tracks. It is obvious to me that the state government does not have the capacity, even though the roads are its responsibility—if I had time I would say something else about that. The federal government will have to give some assistance. We already do in a modest way, but we are going to have to see some of the mining tax go into projects like the vineyard roads. And we will need to see money going into the Scone level railway crossing overpass, which I almost forgot to include in that list.

The state government spends about $200,000 in the Cessnock LGA on what I still call regional roads—roads that are basically a state government responsibility—including Broke Road through the wine country. That is $200,000 a year. Obviously Cessnock Council does not have the resources to do the work. Someone is going to have to help, but the state government, of any political persuasion, is going to have to do much, much better.

The other big issue in my electorate is of course land use conflict. Mining is growing and growing. It covers a fairly small area in geographical terms, but many would argue now that we have overdone open-cut coalmining in particular. There is a growing and changing mood about this. People understand and appreciate the wealth and the jobs coalmining has brought—not just to my electorate but to all electorates in the region. There is no shortage of appreciation, but many people are looking at air and water quality issues and, of course, at the impact of mining on sustainable industries—viticulture, agriculture more generally and the thoroughbred breeding industry, which is  very important to the region as well as a critical employer. So this community is showing not a change of heart but growing concern about the impact of mining on sustainable industries. Thankfully that concern is now starting to seep through to the state government, and a subcommittee of the state cabinet is looking at these issues. I urge them to focus intensely and to start to restore more balance to the ecology of our local region.

Another factor now is the emerging coal seam methane industry. Again people will listen and will welcome the opportunities for more long-term jobs and more wealth in the region, but we cannot look at short-term benefits without looking at potential long-term harm to sustainable industries. Coalmining has been great; coal seam methane can be great and will be great for some regions. But we cannot grow further an industry that might last 30, 40 or 50 years at the expense of industries that we would like to think are going to sustain the local region for hundreds, if not thousands, of years—if that is not looking out too far. So we must get this balance right.

On state government issues, I simply appeal to the state government to sort out its long-term power contract problems with Hydro Aluminium in my electorate. It is a complex issue I know, but there are jobs and people’s livelihoods at stake here and we cannot sit back and play with them. I am taking Minister Burke to the plant next Wednesday where he will officially open a reprocessing centre, a reuse facility for spent potline waste. I would dearly like that issue to be resolved before I take Minister Burke there to open what is an environmentally friendly project and a great initiative of Hydro Aluminium. It is a great company, a great corporate citizen and a great employer, and we need to get that issue sorted out. If I can play a role—I send this statement to the state government—I would be very happy to do so.

Last but not least, like the member for Fisher and the member for Shortland before him, I would like to thank all those who supported me in my re-election. Not even those of us in the safest seats get more than six out of 10 votes, so none of us are universally popular, but I am very pleased that a sufficient number of people have decided that I have done enough to be returned to this great place. It is a great privilege and specifically I thank all those who directly supported me, my family first of all, but as part of my campaign team there were all those people who worked the polling booths on what was, I think, a fairly difficult Saturday and, of course, they had to enjoy a glass of beer or wine or soft drink late into the night, quite uncertain about the outcome. They are great troopers and we appreciate them very much. We could not get ourselves elected to this place without their help.

I thank all those who have worked cooperatively with me on both sides of the parliament in making the new parliament work. It has been difficult for us all. We have our disagreements and we are always running interference on one another behind the scenes, but overall people have come to the arrangement in the right spirit and it is good to see the parliament working well. (Time expired)

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise this morning in this address-in-reply to the Governor-General’s speech on 28 September when the 43rd parliament was formed. Her speech talked about the parliamentary reform of the House of Representatives, including the changes to question time to make it more effective. I certainly welcome these changes and we will see with the passage of time how well they will work but, in fact, in the last parliament I submitted a proposal to the Procedures Committee calling for a restructure of question time. I had received so many complaints from my own constituency who quite understandably thought question time was a complete joke and that much of the behaviour of members of parliament—and we all fit into that category, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I do not cast aspersions on you in the chair—was embarrassing and certainly not befitting for the titles that we hold in this place.

Until 1989 the average length of question time was 45 minutes and by mid-2008 the average length of question time had doubled to almost 90 minutes. I also proposed in my submission in the last parliament that a limit be put on the time of an answer to a question. Until very recently there had been no restrictions on the length of response to a question and answers gradually became more combative and political. I think that there were many Australians who wondered what we got paid for when they watched question time. I certainly welcome the fact that this new reform has been put into place and that there are restrictions on the length of questions and responses. I think it has allowed us to re-establish some integrity into our parliamentary process, particularly that of question time which becomes a very public face of all of us in this place.

I want to turn to my electorate now and I want to speak about the CSG—as I heard the member for Hunter spoke a little bit about it—and the LNG projects, coal seam methane gas and liquefied natural gas which is converted from coal seam methane gas. Both these projects, which have recently been approved by the Minister for Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities, have a significant stake in the landmass across the Surat and Bowen basins, particularly the Surat Basin in my own electorate.

The issues are of concern to many of us, the landholders who hold the title deeds for the above land activities. We do have concerns about the coal seam gas process. This has been ongoing for some years. In fact, in 2008 I put together a mining expo, a ‘meeting of mines’, a meeting of those people in the mining sector and the concerned citizens at the time. Since that time, we have seen a number of farmer groups, citizen groups, local governments and agricultural producers come together because they feel that there is a juggernaut of mining operations that are rapidly developing in my electorate. I am certainly not against mining, but I do believe that we must ensure the legacy of these prime agricultural lands, which, if ever mined, would never be able to be fully rehabilitated to the quality that they have now. I will talk a little bit about food security later.

Since the minister’s approval of these CSG projects, the one-offs I referred to—Santos and British Gas—we have seen tabled in the Senate a number of documents from the Water Group, which raises concerns about the long-term effects of CSG developments and their impact on the Great Artesian Basin. I want to refer to these documents. The first one is the Water Group advice on the EPBC Act referrals, the QGC referral 2008/4399 and the Santos/Petronas referral 2008/4059, and comments on the AP LNG referral 2009/4974. These comments are based on information provided by the proponents up to the close of business on 3 September this year. These are the comments by the Water Group, which were provided to the minister from within his own department prior to making these decisions.

This is the concern I have with the comments that have come from the Water Group—and I know they are in draft form. The comments say:

From all the information provided to date, including that from AP LNG, there is no indication when any of the systems affected by the CSG developments will return to pre-CSG conditions.

What they are referring to is when the underground water aquifers will return to their condition pre-CSG activities. They continue:

QGC—

Queensland Gas—

states that the WCM—

the Walloon Coal Measures—

(this includes the Springbok Sandstone) will not begin to recover until 70 years after CSG production ceases.

Seventy years after! They will only then begin, according to this report, to recover, not fully recover. It says the data also:

… shows that the Springbok, Hutton and Precipice Sandstones will not have recovered after 200 years.

I have to say that this is very alarming stuff. It goes on:

Whilst the residual drawdown is modelled to be quite small, a simple extrapolation for the Hutton Sandstone—

which is a further sandstone aquifer, deeper down than the other ones I just mentioned—

would indicate that recovery will take in the order of 1,000 years.

Interesting also is that:

… Santos has requested that their modelling in the EIS not be used and its new modelling was not provided in time to be included in this assessment …

I wonder why they did not want their modelling that they put in the EIS to be used. Have they found some new data? Is the science not that good? It raises these concerns. This is an alarming comment:

From the AP LNG modelling—

this is modelling that they have looked at and reviewed—

the Gubberamunda Sandstone (the lateral equivalent of the Hooray Sandstone) will not have returned to pre-CSG levels by 3100.

Therefore it can be concluded from the proponents’ modelling that the legacy effects of the CSG developments are considerable, with at least 1,000 years passing before this part of the GAB—

the Great Artesian Basin—

will return to pre-CSG levels.

Those are not my words; they are the words in this report from the Water Group, which was provided to the minister prior to his making those decisions.

Madam Deputy Speaker Bird, as you would be aware, the Great Artesian Basin is the lifeblood of so many towns in western Queensland. When we talk about the Great Artesian Basin we talk about all of the different sandstone formations. It is the lifeblood of the towns, for stock and domestic household use. This report really should be ringing alarm bells in the minister’s office. Whilst he has put on a number of significant restrictions and caps and taken what he would call, I suppose, a cautionary approach to his decisions, I think the minister needs to explain why it is that this has been provided to him in draft form and yet he still has approved these projects with those conditions. I know that my communities out in western Queensland are not convinced. When we read these reports, page after page after page of documents that have recently been tabled in the Senate, more alarm bells will ring.

My communities are not against these projects. In fact, we want to see the new wealth, but we also want to make sure that the wealth is not at the expense of our Great Artesian Basin. Without the Great Artesian Basin, if they do not recover, we will lose some communities out there and, if we lose our underground water, we will lose some towns as well. So we have to make sure it is not mining at the expense of communities and agriculture. That is why I will continue to call for the science, that the ministers both state and federal rely on a peer review by an independent panel of experts. It will not take long. They are out there. But let us have it, Ministers. I do appreciate the significant economic benefit these projects will have on our regional communities across Queensland, but we have to make sure that the Great Artesian Basin is not the victim of new industries coming in and the environmental concerns as well relating to some of the contaminants that have been registered recently in the underground water of western Queensland and up around South Burnett as well. As to the conditions that the minister has proposed, whilst they are welcome, I think he really has to make sure that there is an opportunity for peer review of these documents that we have recently seen tabled in the Senate.

Recently the Queensland government also approved Xstrata’s coalmine at Wandoan, which I am sure you would be well aware of, Madam Deputy Speaker. This mine is predicted to extract some 30 million tonnes of coal per annum over the life of the mine, which is about 30 years. It is estimated that it will be the biggest coalmine in Australia. It is going to bring enormous revenue to both state and federal governments. I understand also, from the briefings I have had, that Xstrata are planning to buy more farmland, both cattle and grain farms, so that they can continue to develop the mine to this capacity over the next 30 years. If they do go ahead and buy this land that will mean Xstrata will be the largest landholder within the Maranoa Regional Council. Xstrata, a mining company based in Switzerland, is the largest landholder in the Maranoa Regional Council. We have to ask ourselves: is this absolutely right? There has to be a better way in relation to dealing with landholders and taking out of production for a significant period of time some of the best cattle country in that part of Queensland.

This is a major concern, I have to say, and I know the public debate will continue to go on, but people are not happy. Unfortunately, the landholders do not have as many rights as the mining companies. If the mining companies go to the land court they will ultimately get access to privately held land—the landholders who pay the rates today. These are families, and we have to make sure there is a better process. I really am concerned about the extent to which these companies want to buy the land. They have the resources, and after 10 years of drought, with the weakened bank account of a farmer, many of them are feeling very much under threat. If the CSG projects—coal seam, methane, gas and mining—in my electorate do come on stream, the CSG alone will generate some $800 million a year and go to the coffers of the Queensland state government. That is all going to end up in George Street. As we all go home to our electorates and see the development in South-East Queensland, we know where the money is going. What I say and what my communities say is that we should be sharing in this in our part of the world. There should be a third of the wealth coming back to the community where the wealth was created.

I looked at this during an overseas study trip 18 months ago. I went to Wyoming in the United States of America where there are agreements between the federal government, which owns the resources, the state of Wyoming and the county council. A third of the tax revenue or royalty revenue goes directly to the county council. They are building hospitals, better roads and sporting facilities with it. The liveability of their communities is being improved. That is the sort of model that we have got to have. The model that I saw in Wyoming in the United States of America should be overlaid in our situation in Queensland because these communities are feeling the juggernaut of the development out there.

I come now to the Warrego Highway, which is an absolute disgrace. These projects are all approved and the development is going ahead, but there has been no money injected into the Warrego Highway and there is no second range crossing. All the additional traffic, including the people going to and from work and the subcontractors, is putting enormous pressure on the Warrego Highway. Prior to the last federal election, we committed some $150 million for this highway. Unfortunately, the government did not commit anything. That really concerns me. They are prepared to take the wealth of the income tax revenue that comes from this, but they are not prepared to invest in this very important road.

I have one point that I am sure the member for Bonner would appreciate. The Clem Jones Tunnel in Queensland is a $3 billion project for five kilometres of road. To put that in context, $1 billion in road funding would build a road from Brisbane via Alice Springs to Perth. I am not against Brisbane getting this sort of development—we see it going on around the south-east corner—but let us see some of this money being directed out into the regional areas and particularly to the Warrego Highway, where these mining projects are going ahead at breakneck speed. That also is a concern.

I am disappointed, though, that the money that former Prime Minister Rudd committed before the 2007 election, some $55 million, has not proceeded rapidly. We have seen the first $5 million or $6 million rolled out now between Roma and Mitchell, but there is some $10 million for passing lanes in the corridor east of Dalby on that section of the Warrego Highway not spent and there is $5 million for some truck stops still not spent. I ask the question of the Minister for Infrastructure and Transport: when in this AusLink term will you spend this money on this highway? I understand that the minister ticked it off, but when will the state government get on with the job, through the Queensland Department of Transport and Main Roads, of rolling out this project? Passing lanes are needed today, not next year or the year after at the end of this program. We need it now, along with the $5 million for the truck stops. We need that money now. It will bring some relief to the highway and the travelling public. It will not be enough, but at least it will be something given it is a commitment of this government. They have still not spent this money.

I would also like to talk about the Landsborough Highway, which you, Madam Deputy Speaker, would be well aware of. It runs from Morven right through to Cloncurry. There was no commitment from this government in the last federal election. It is the major arterial route from South-East Queensland, from southern Australia, right through to Darwin. There is no money committed to the Landsborough Highway. It is a critical road. It is also one of the great defence links between southern Australia and South-East Queensland and our defence bases in the Northern Territory. During the last election campaign we committed some $57 million to the Landsborough Highway, with $7 million to begin in 2011. Unfortunately, that is now history because we did not win the election. I am so disappointed that the Labor Party did not listen to the Remote Area Planning and Development Board and the submission they put forward to the Labor Party. The Labor Party did not listen to them. The coalition did; we understand the need for this.

I now go to the Birdsville Track. Only this morning I met with the Minister for Regional Australia, Regional Development and Local Government, Mr Crean, on this issue. The Birdsville Track is south of Birdsville in South Australia. It goes into unincorporated land areas where there are no local governments. It is an important strategic highway that could be further developed. From Cairns to Port Augusta via the inland through Birdsville is some 500 kilometres shorter than going further east through Bourke and Broken Hill. That is the sort of development we want to see. We are seeing money going into places like the Clem Jones Tunnel and ring roads around cities, but in this new paradigm of the parliament—and we have heard the Prime Minister talking about this being a parliament for regional Australia—here is an opportunity to put some money into regional Australia. We need this money for the Birdsville Track. I must admit that Minister Crean gave me, along with Rowan Ramsey, the time to discuss this only this morning. I appreciated his time and I think he could see what we were talking about. We will continue to bring forward a proposition to the minister as well as to the state governments of South Australia and Queensland.

I want to touch quickly on interest rates. I travelled my electorate in the last few weeks before this last sitting fortnight and I have never felt such despair among the small businesses in my community. The latest interest rate rise seems to have just stalled local economies. Small businesses are telling me they have had their worst November trading ever. Here we are pre Christmas, and across my electorate it is probably one of the best seasons we have seen in decades, yet some trading houses are closing their doors while others are telling me that, since that interest rate rise, they have seen the worst trading environment since they have been in business. This really is a major concern to me. I am encouraging people, in the lead-up to Christmas, to shop locally. Please, wherever you are, shop in your local community. By shopping locally, you are supporting your local community. If you are serious about your own communities, buy your Christmas presents and all your Christmas cheer locally; do not look outside your communities, please. It creates jobs in your community. Shop locally as we head for Christmas this year.

Finally, I wanted to quickly say that I will continue to push for optic fibre cable in the Diamantina and Barcoo shires. It is a very important part of what I would hope the minister is listening to in relation to his proposition and the NBN project. We do need this optic fibre cable going into these remote communities. It is about building the nation’s infrastructure and the backhaul, and I just hope that the minister, who met recently with the mayors of Barcoo and Diamantina and the RAPAD Board, understands the need to push this money into outback Queensland. (Time expired)

Warren Entsch (Leichhardt, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What an outstanding contribution from a fine regional and rural member. Madam Deputy Speaker Bird, when I made the decision some three years ago to stand down from this place, I never believed for one moment that I would be standing here again before you today—

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We did!

Warren Entsch (Leichhardt, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

delivering another speech. Interestingly enough, I cannot now call it my maiden speech! Nevertheless, it has been quite an amazing journey and I am very, very privileged to have been given a second opportunity to represent my electorate in this place. As I have said previously, when I made the decision to quit politics I did so because of a commitment to my son, who at the time was becoming a teenager. As I am sure many members would appreciate, it was not possible for me as a dad to give him the time necessary while continuing to serve in this job. It was a difficult decision but it was the right decision, and I have enjoyed the now four years that my son has lived with me—something that I would never have walked away from. He is 17 years old now and he has finished his secondary education, so that frees me up.

Initially, I was happy on the farm, but I have to say that, as I watched many of the achievements that I had been able to secure for the region over the extended period of time since 1996 that we were in government being eroded, there was a rising level of despair. Eventually, when approached, I made the decision to recontest the seat. Some of the things that upset me were relatively small in the overall scheme of things, but one of the things that pushed me over the line was the state government’s decision to push forward with the wild rivers legislation, because of the impact that was going to have not only on the Indigenous population of Cape York but also on the broader community. That of course has continued to happen, but I am hopeful that we might be able to at least fire a shot across the bows, because what we see there is an unelected group called the Wilderness Society driving the government agenda. We have to get back to the point where governments actually govern for the people and do not allow themselves to be pushed aside for unelected interest groups to, basically, control their decisions.

But there are other things as well. The prohibition on alcohol in Cape York was introduced by the government, but they did so without any support mechanisms. One of the few mechanisms that we had in Far North Queensland was the Aboriginal and Islander Alcohol Relief Service. That was defunded by this government after many, many years of operation. Rose Colless and her team set that up and operated it for many decades. It was a very successful place where Aboriginal and Islander people with alcohol problems or substance abuse problems could voluntarily go, pay for the service and have a chance at rehabilitation. We now have a situation where the closest service is based in Townsville and I have been encouraging Aboriginal people from Cape York to travel as far south as the Gold Coast. It is just a joke. Not only that, 30-odd Indigenous people were put out of work. Some of them had been working for 25 years for this organisation and suddenly they were back on the unemployment queue.

Another issue was the contract for the naval vessels that had been awarded to NQEA. That was a great opportunity for Cairns and for NQEA. That decision was not supported by the state government and was not supported by the local federal member, and the contract was transferred to Victoria. In spite of the fact that NQEA had had two amazingly successful contracts in the past, one with the Fremantle class patrol boats which they built and the second with hydrographic ships, they missed out. The contract went to Victoria, and we have seen the dog’s breakfast that has been created by the component that was built down there. It is an absolute waste of money, and of course they are having major problems because of the quality of workmanship. That had a profound impact on Cairns. We lost over 300 jobs as a direct consequence of that.

Of course, there was more. The Dr Edward Koch Foundation had carried out outstanding suicide prevention work in Cairns for many, many years. Suddenly they lost their funding. The money had gone to a middleman, if you like, a carpetbagger in the southern part of the state. The services provided by the Dr Edward Koch Foundation have been lost. We are still trying to recover that. We are talking about areas where there is a huge incidence of suicide, particularly in our Indigenous communities, and this support mechanism is absolutely critical. The memorandum of understanding, the working arrangements, that the Dr Edward Koch Foundation had with the police, with Indigenous communities and with many other organisations meant that they were very widely accepted and were very much needed and appreciated by these communities. But, rather than keep that going, the government has put the money into a middleman who creams off their bit and feeds out bits and pieces to regional areas. I think that is something that we need to look at very closely.

Probably one of the most ridiculous and unbelievable decisions that was made caused the loss of our Cairns Youth Mentoring Scheme, where $50,000 or $60,000 a year had a profound impact on young people’s lives. It recognised that there are a lot of single mums out there with boys who do not have a good male influence or who have limited male influence and they need to have some sort of male mentoring arrangement. I established the organisation back in 1998. It was run by the community for a minimal amount of money with wonderful mentors. Both the mentors and the kids got a huge benefit out of it. The government decided that they could not afford to pay that $50,000. It was just unbelievable. So the Cairns community went begging and these kids have no alternative, nowhere else to go.

During the last time I was in the parliament, we established the Marine and Tropical Sciences Research Facility—MTSRF—in Cairns. It was a $40 million investment in our community. Unfortunately, with the change of government, bureaucracy took control. They not only broke it up and tried to send part of it to Townsville; they took the rainforest component and tried to impose it on Darwin, in spite of the fact that the Darwin community said, ‘We do not have any rainforest up here and we would much rather not have to deal with it.’ Work is ongoing to try to recover that but it has had a huge impact. We have lost a lot of jobs.

Then, of course, we had the Coral Sea marine park, as proposed by an organisation called Pew, an American based group. This is another case where an outside organisation is controlling decision making in government. Not only did they decide to turn the whole of the Coral Sea into a marine park; they also decided they wanted it to be totally shut down for all forms of fishing—recreational, sporting and commercial. Sustainable commercial fishing has of course been an important part of the Cairns character.

When you look at these collectively, suddenly you can understand why we ended up with over 14 per cent unemployment in an area that was absolutely vibrant only four years ago. You can see why we are, economically speaking, on our knees and begging for support. We are looking for some way of making things happen. Many of these government decisions—both state and federal—have caused large areas of diversification in our region to shut down. And then when this happens they come back and criticise the community and say, ‘The problem with the community is that it needs diversification.’

We also had white boats. We used to service these large privately owned white vessels but unfortunately, through lack of government support and as a result of the state of the economy, the last major slipway has gone into receivership, so we have lost that as well. Then there was the stimulus package—and we have all talked about the resulting debacle over the home insulation scheme. Not only did we lose a life in my region through electrocution but sadly many legitimate businesses have gone to the wall because of the unfulfilled government promises. Business geared up and supplied the services as requested at the time and then, when the government made the decision to shut the scheme down because of mismanagement, those businesses were left holding huge amounts of stock that could not even be given away. Many of these businesses have folded, some of them with the promise that there is going to be some sort of compensation—but that has unfortunately not eventuated.

The school hall debacle situation also affected us. A $240,000 school hall was delivered to one of my small community schools on the same day it was announced that it was going to be shut down. That sort of thing does not instil a great deal of confidence in a community that is trying to find opportunities to start moving forward and that is doing all sorts of things in order to return our region to prosperity—and all this is of course on top of the fact that there has been a significant decline in tourism in the Cairns region, a region known for its tourism industry.

They are all the negative things that have been causing a great deal of grief in our community—and this is a community which has been known for its resilience. It is known for never depending on government handouts to survive. If we need something to happen, somebody in private enterprise has always put their hands in their pockets to make it happen. But work is needed in Port Douglas now—and in all the years I have been a member, going back to 1996, it has never been the case that they came to ask us for some support; the business community always went ahead and made it happen. But all these government decisions have impacted on our community. It is time for government to have a look at this and say, ‘There is a special circumstance here and we need to begin to make special concessions to offer support so that we can get the local economy back up and running again.’

There are a number of things that can be done in the regional development area and I am encouraged about that. We lost our area consultative committee; that was another government decision, of course. But a new regional development organisation has been set up by Minister Crean, and I am hoping that we may have an opportunity through that to put up some of our projects and get them up and running. While we have been suffering for a long time, we have not been sitting down and doing nothing. We have been looking at opportunities and I have been working with the community to look at ways we can start diversifying our economy but also taking advantage of the infrastructure and industry that we have, which of course is primarily in tourism. I have been working now with the community for some time to establish a sports and cultural precinct in Cairns. There was a commitment for some $240 million for a performing arts centre. I have argued very strongly that, while we certainly need a performing arts centre, the money could be spent on a broader infrastructure project that would include the international sporting facilities up there and would become the tropical campus for the Australian Institute of Sport. There is work being done on that at the moment. We are putting together a group of business leaders and sporting leaders with the intention of putting forward a plan that we could submit to Minister Crean’s department for consideration. We are looking at a waterfront project for Port Douglas; again, the business community is taking leadership on that. Hopefully, we can get that up and running as well. We are also looking at a marine gateway project for Weipa; again, the business community up there is looking at that and seeing what we can do to make it happen.

In the Torres Strait there is a rather interesting situation. There has been a commitment for building infrastructure on islands like Saibai, but these islands are actually being washed away at the moment because of the deterioration of their seawalls. It is aged infrastructure—some of it is over 40 years old. The commitment by the current government is to put a health centre there—but, unfortunately, if you are going to build something in these areas you have to make sure you have a solid foundation. Rather than putting in $400,000 to measure the tides, I would humbly suggest it would be better to invest $20 million in rebuilding the seawalls so that we can then put down the foundations to make sure the buildings survive. If we do not do that then we are going to have to forcefully remove at least half a dozen communities in those Torres Strait areas and relocate them to other areas because we have failed to assist in providing them with the appropriate infrastructure required to maintain the integrity of their communities. So this is another project that I would dearly like the minister to consider as a way of helping to rebuild these communities and provide additional opportunities so we can re-establish ourselves in these areas. There is a lot of potential in the region. We have some wonderful people up there who do an outstanding job in providing these opportunities. I would very much like to think that we can work with the government in making these things happen.

During the election campaign there were many small issues I was working on that had affected our communities. They are still works in progress. We had major issues with, for example, the medical colleges and the medical registration board. Unfortunately, through that process, we have lost one of the most wonderful cardiac specialists who has ever been in our region. That is a work in progress. We are still trying to recover the Marine and Tropical Science Research Facility. As part of the campaign the opposition committed to funding the first stage of the Australian Institute of Tropical Health and Medicine. Our promise was not matched by the government, but I will certainly be encouraging the government to do that through James Cook University.

We want the Cairns Youth Mentoring Scheme back up and running again. As I said earlier, we want the performing arts centre but we would like to see a sporting precinct as well. Another project we had committed to was COUCH, which was for an oncology unit or wellbeing centre; again, the government had not committed to that but we will be encouraging them to do so. There are issues in relation to the southern access road in Cairns that need to be addressed and I will continue to campaign on those as well.

Supported accommodation is desperately needed there, but during the campaign we were fighting to try and stop inappropriate public housing being put into areas, squandering public money, when in fact it would have been better done by putting in supported accommodation. It is my intention to continue to fight for that and eventually to return the integrity of those communities, sell those inappropriate buildings and do what we can to put that back into supported accommodation.

Turtles and dugongs were also a major issue up there, and I would hope that the government will eventually have the courage to put in a full moratorium, to stop all taking of these creatures until we know the numbers that we have there so we can appropriately manage the area. I recognise Colin Riddell for the outstanding work that he has done in raising this issue, and also James Epong, a traditional owner, who has already put in place a moratorium in the area in which he is actively involved and which his traditional group represents.

In closing, I will say that I would not be here if I had not had some wonderful people in my campaign. I recognise Trent Twomey, my campaign manager, and Dennis Quick. I have Danae Jones here, who was assisting me with my media. But there was a whole raft of other people who did an outstanding job in assisting me during the course of this campaign—far too many to be able to note in the very short period of time I have left. Nevertheless, I thank all of those people who were involved very much for their outstanding contribution.

I look forward to serving my community as I move into my next opportunity in this place. As I said on the night, we have suffered very much over the last three years in our community from a dreadful case of laryngitis, but I can assure you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and my constituents, that Cairns has now, well and truly, like others, found its voice. (Extension of time granted)

I appreciate the extension of time. It is something that I have never experienced in all these years!

I will just turn to one area here that is particularly bothering me. I mentioned it earlier, in relation to wild rivers. I noticed that in the national papers on the weekend they had full-page ads from the state government promoting the value of the wild rivers. That was clearly done to support the Wilderness Society, and a lot of information that they provided was quite frankly quite deceptive and mischievous. I say this because there are 10 elected councillors in the Cape York area representing each of their regions. Each and every one of those—they are Indigenous councillors—has indicated their strong opposition to it. The ads have selectively picked people who have actually got some sort of benefit, either from the Wilderness Society or the state government—in effect, in most cases, buying their support.

What worries me is the fact that they have embarked on this national campaign, and I would hate to think what it costs to have full-page ads in all the national weekend papers. But I guess they have been able to successfully fund this program through the recent sale of Queensland Rail. I find that very, very disappointing.

As I said, we are really trying to make things happen in our region and I think we have a great opportunity to do that with a high level of cooperation. We are desperately trying to re-establish programs. For example, there was a very positive one we announced called the farm gate distribution network. We always talk about remote communities and the disadvantages they have, particularly regarding access to fresh food at an affordable price. It was a very small program that actually I had committed to as part of our campaign. I hope that we can have it re-established. It was a farm gate to distribution network, where there was an arrangement made with the local farmers to produce food specifically for the remote communities and it was sold directly into a network that went into these communities. The process at the moment is that the produce is sold to agents and goes down to either Sydney or Brisbane and then is relocated back into North Queensland, so that at times it can be a couple of weeks old by the time it gets to the plate in the remote communities. And of course there is an additional cost for freight.

This initiative meant that there was a chance for us to be able to put food on the tables in the remote communities at the same price, or cheaper, than it could be bought in Woolworths or Coles—in most cases that food would be a lot cheaper. It also provided a great opportunity for our farmers in the region insomuch as they had direct contracts with the communities, which meant that they were able to get a lot more—they were not paying middle men and what have you. So it was a great initiative; it was not very expensive and was one that we desperately need.

Another issue that will certainly help us relates to aviation charges. At the moment there is a review of aviation charges for our airports. Cairns has a particular disadvantage in being a regional international airport but, unlike Townsville and Darwin which are very heavily subsidised by the military, it has to rely purely on the costs of aircraft coming into the area. There has been an increase in aircraft accessing the airport in recent years and that has caused a major problem. I am hoping that that will be factored in and that there can be a special case made to make sure that we are able to remain competitive as we start to recover—maybe some sort of sliding rate. I am urging government to consider that because that will be a very important part of our economic recovery. We cannot afford to continue to have the cost of landing in Cairns as a disincentive for people flying into that area. I understand that the review result will be coming out towards the end of this year, and I hope that there will be due consideration given to our special circumstance. I think additional funding should be coming into the area to help us build a new industry in sports tourism and to give us the support to allow our communities to recover to what we had in the past.

Mal Washer (Moore, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to speak on three issues which are of critical importance to Australia’s future. One is the stabilising of our population to sustainable levels, increasing our productivity and reducing our emissions of carbon dioxide and its equivalents.

Australia, like other countries around the world, faces immense challenges to create sustainable cities and societies for the future. For these to be sustainable, they must be able to meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. They must be vibrant and healthy environmentally, socially and economically.

Eighty-five per cent of Australians live in an urban community within 50 kilometres of the coast. If Australia is to have a population of 35 to 36 million people by 2050, this will increase the size of most of our coastal cities by greater than 60 per cent. We already have over 22.3 million people. The aim should be to stabilise the population to 26 million, and to do this we need to reduce the overseas migration program to 70,000 people per annum. Population growth in Australia last year was 440, 000, with net overseas migration of 285,000, up from 213,416 the year before. We need to cut skilled migration to 25,000 per annum. One hundred thousand young Australians aged between 15 and 24 years dropped out of the workforce last year. In 2007-08 skilled migration was 114,777. Of the so-called skilled migrants, only a minority of non-English-speaking migrants use their professional qualifications to work. In 2007-08, 3,485 cooks and 1,082 hairdressers came in on skilled migration. Currently around 3.97 million Australians aged between 15 and 64 are not employed in the labour force.

We need to hold family reunion at 50,000 per annum and increase the refugee intake from 13,750 to 20,000 per annum. We need to restrict the New Zealand or trans-Tasman program to the number of permanent departures from Australia over and above 25,000. Half of these should be skilled and the other half family reunion. Other New Zealanders should apply through normal application. For example, in 2007-08 we had 61,380 permanent residents leave Australia permanently and we had 34,491 permanent arrivals from New Zealand. Last year this increased to over 51,000. It is worth noting that one- third were third-country migrants who attained citizenship in New Zealand and came to Australia.

The current fertility rate in Australia is 1.92 babies per woman. Ideally this would be 1.8 if we are to hold the population at 26million and plateau beyond 2050. The argument about increasing population is that we need more skilled migrants to increase our productivity and profitability in the future. However, if Australia is going to be successful in the future it will need to be a country of clever people and have innovations and new technologies where that is not necessarily required.

We must increase productivity. Australia’s unemployment rate is 5.1 per cent, one of the lowest of all OECD countries; however, our overall slack in the labour market is actually higher than the OECD average. Underemployment increased significantly during the downturn; however, even before the current downturn we had amongst the highest rate of involuntary part-time employment in the OECD. These are part-time workers who cannot find full-time jobs. More than 60 per cent of involuntary part-time workers have no post-school qualifications and one-third of them are under 25.

Also, those part-time workers who are given the opportunity to move into full-time work have poor financial incentives. Our tax and benefit system creates few incentives because the pay-off from working longer hours is small. For every additional dollar earned, an average worker will lose almost 55c in taxes or lost benefits. The disincentives are even greater for households with children where only one person works. They lose more than 70c in every additional dollar earned when moving to full-time work, mainly through a loss of means-tested family benefits.

Of the Australian government sources of 2006-07 tax revenue, 45 per cent was sourced from individual tax; 23 per cent from company tax; 16 per cent from GST; and the balance from superannuation, excise and other taxes. From a productivity perspective we need to look at thresholds on income tax and at the level of company tax. The levels of company tax need to be reduced and the thresholds for income tax increased. In order for this to occur, the level of consumption tax, the GST, may need to be investigated.

We must make it easier for businesses to employ people. Whilst equity concerns need to be addressed, care must be taken not to undermine labour market flexibility. Firms must have the flexibility to adjust to changes in their operating environment. Businesses cannot be drowning in a sea of red tape and compliance requirements.

The growth in productivity during the 1990s resulted from a number of causal factors which may or may not be replicated in the current financial climate. A number of advances may have been one-offs in the nineties but we still need to be aware of where we can make further advances. We need to consider always innovative ways in which the best outcomes can be achieved. Some of these strategies may include: trade liberalisation and openness to trade; research and development expenditure resulting in technological advances and development in information and communications technology; good and efficient use of human capital; flexibility of labour, capital and product markets; and increases in mining production.

Geography may be a limiting factor in Australia. Physical geography cannot be changed by governments but we can ensure that nationally and internationally we can compete, with our own well-developed transport and communications systems, and that all of our infrastructure building is based on an understanding of both regional and national needs. We should ensure that any government initiatives do not stifle innovation in the business sector. This may mean more flexible arrangements and cooperation between business, unions and governments at all levels.

As a medical doctor, mental health has always been a critical issue for me, as it has not been adequately addressed in the past. From a productivity perspective, it is also a critical issue. Mental health is a key workforce participation priority. Almost half of all Australians experience a mental health disorder at some time in their life.

Finally, we must address our CO2 and equivalent emissions. To do this we must put a price on carbon. This will encourage other measures that need to be undertaken such as improving energy efficiency, reafforestation and investment in renewable energy technologies. Australia has a strong reliance on non-renewable, CO2-emitting forms of energy. Although sustainable energy technologies and resources exist, a strong market driver to guide their use and further development does not. Pricing of different energy sources is not always level, and large-scale grid power in Australia rarely represents the true cost of delivered electricity. Large power stations in Australia are mostly coal fired, and the price of electricity produced does not include the external costs of greenhouse gas emissions and pollution. We must create an honest market, one which tells the ecological truth. Either we have tradeable permits—which very successfully reduced sulfur emissions from power plants by half from 1990 to 2000, at minimal cost, in the US—or we calculate the cost of carbon dioxide and its equivalents and incorporate it as a tax on goods and services. Taxation is the most powerful tool available in the market economy in directing consumer habits. It will enable goods and services which involve lower emissions in their production to become more economically viable.

Our current economic model is not sustainable. A new economy must be developed that is powered by sustainable and renewable energy sources. Last time atmospheric carbon dioxide was this high was probably 20 million years ago. The current rate of increase is approximately 1.1 parts per million per year—100 times greater than the most rapid changes that have occurred over the last 650,000 years. Around 30 per cent of anthropogenic carbon dioxide—that is, carbon dioxide generated by man—is dissolved into the oceans. Carbon dioxide reacts with water to form carbonic acid, making our oceans more acidic. As carbon dioxide has a higher solubility in cold water, the Southern Ocean contains a disproportionate amount of anthropogenic carbon dioxide compared to other, warmer oceans. Therefore the impacts of ocean acidification are being seen first in the Southern Ocean.

Increasing acidity makes it easier for aragonite to dissolve. Aragonite is a form of calcium carbonate which marine organisms such as planktonic species use to build skeletons or shells. It is thought that aragonite could disappear from the Southern Ocean within 50 years if carbon dioxide emissions continue to increase. The impacts being seen in the Southern Ocean are likely to be followed elsewhere. Acidification of the earth’s oceans within this century will have potentially serious implications for the sustainability and management of many marine and coastal ecosystems and fisheries.

Reafforestation not only locks up carbon but also has the potential to enhance rainfall. Clearing results in changes to surface albedo, which is the proportion of light or radiation reflected by a surface. A land surface area that is light in colour reflects much more solar radiation than a darker surface and this causes serious changes to the microclimate close to the ground. Surface heating causes the thermal convection which triggers the inflow of moisture laden colder air from the ocean.

In WA in the winter time colder moisture laden air is dragged inland by convection and becomes part of the constant west-east system of high and low pressure systems. Across all four southern states we have extensively modified the surface albedo by clearing. In the northern agricultural region of WA we are only probably dragging in one-third of the moisture laden air that we did before land clearing. There is good evidence to suggest that the ecological threshold or tipping point for this convection driven moisture laden air may be in the region of a 40 per cent change in surface albedo. In the 40.6 million hectares of cleared cropping and farmland of the four southern states, around one-third of the land is not suited to intensive production. Replanting this land with native trees would go a long way to restoring some of the microclimate thermal issues and bring back the west-east moisture laden trade winds from the Indian and Great Southern oceans. To re-tree this area, which is not suited for intensive production, 13.52 million hectares would have to be planted. With approximately 300 trees per hectare, we would conservatively average 35 kilograms of sequestered carbon per tree lifespan, or 495 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent annually. That is two-thirds of what is required to offset our agricultural sector emissions.

Australians want cities that are vibrant and healthy, environmentally, socially and economically. As their representatives we must make the decisions to work towards this. We must stabilise our population at a sustainable level, we must increase our productivity to retain our living standards and, finally, we must address our carbon emissions. To do this we must place a price on carbon, because if we do not we will make some crazy decisions.

Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Defence Science and Personnel) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I acknowledge the contribution of the member for Moore. It is always gratifying to hear his contributions to debates in this place, particularly because he is not cowed by views which might be expressed elsewhere within his own party. I hope that those people in his party who are cynical about the issue of climate change and the need for a price on carbon read his speech. Whilst we might not all agree with everything he has said, he makes a very good argument as to why this parliament, and indeed Australia, should have a price on carbon. He is a person who comes to this place with a great deal of worldly experience. From my observation, since I have been in this place with him, his contributions to whatever the debate of the day might be have always been thoughtful and insightful. I want to thank him for the contribution he has made to this discussion.

Whilst I would like to engage in a debate about climate change, that is not the purpose for which I am going to speak today. What I would like to do is paint a picture of how my own electorate of Lingiari benefits from initiatives from this government. I say that because, as you would know, Madam Deputy Speaker, as a minister you do not often get an opportunity to freewheel it in a discussion in the parliament, and not often do you get an opportunity to speak on behalf of your own electorate.

I now come here with two roles, really—my ministerial role and my role as a member of parliament. In my ministerial role there is one particular area that I would like to pay some attention to because it directly impacts upon my own constituents—that is, as the Minister for Indigenous Health. I was the first Minister for Indigenous Health appointed by any government, and it is something I am quite proud of. I am proud to have overseen an 85 per cent increase in funding for this critical sector since we came into government.

I think that how the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health sector works and the importance of community based health services within the structure of our health delivery system in this country are not properly understood. Within the context of the current debate in the main chamber about health reform, I think it is worth contemplating the engagement of Aboriginal community controlled health organisations within the broader question of health reform and, most importantly, their contribution to alleviating the very poor health status of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and working with us to close the gap between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians and the rest of the community in life expectancy and in all matters to do with health.

We know that people are very poor in my electorate in the Northern Territory. We know that none of the health delivery systems that have operated in the past has been really successful—in fact it can be argued that, on the face of it at least, they have not been successful at all. But changes are coming. Change not only is coming but has come. It has come in the form of the collaborative relationship which has been developed between the government of the Northern Territory, the Australian government and the Aboriginal community controlled health services which provide fundamental primary health care to very large portions of the Northern Territory population.

They run health services in Darwin, Katherine and Alice Springs. For the Katherine West area they are run through the Katherine West Health Board. They are run through Sunrise Health Service to the east of Katherine, down to the area of Ngukurr and the gulf. There are the Wurli Wurlinjang Aboriginal Health Service in Katherine, the Anyinginyi Congress health service in Tennant Creek, the Utopia homelands health service to the east of Alice Springs, the Pintubi Homelands Health Service to the west of Alice Springs, and the Central Australian Aboriginal Congress in Alice Springs. These are very important initiatives. There is also the Miwatj Health Aboriginal Corporation health service operating on the Gove Peninsula, and the Laynhapuy homelands have their own health services. There are other organisations across the Northern Territory which provide these health services.

These health services are provided by Aboriginal community controlled organisations. They employ their own staff. They have cultural awareness and ownership of the services, which is quite important in making a difference in dealing with health issues that confront people. But I need to emphasise that if you measure them in the broader context of the success rate of delivery of health services—actual numbers of patients et cetera—then you will see that these are very successful organisations because they provide broad based primary health care. They provide doctors, nurses and access to physiotherapy, psychological services and the like—the sorts of services you would expect from a comprehensive primary healthcare service.

Unfortunately they do not get a great deal of visibility in the broader Australian health context. This is true not only in the Northern Territory but also in Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria. In every state of this country there are very good primary healthcare organisations that are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community controlled. They deliver fundamental services—very basic services but very important services—to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities across this country. I am forever encouraged by the contributions they are making to their own communities.

In the context of the health reform which we are currently engaged in, I think they have illustrated what it is to be a good primary healthcare service. When talking about delivering superclinics and the like and how to deliver good, comprehensive primary health services, I think we need to see some of these organisations, because of the quality of the work they do, as benchmarks for the provision of best practice.

What I do want to talk about briefly are some of the issues that confront people in regional and remote communities but particularly in remote communities. One of those issues is, of course, very poor infrastructure. Over recent weeks you will have heard, Madam Deputy Speaker, about Wadeye in the Northern Territory—sometimes referred to as Port Keats but its correct name is Wadeye. There have been difficult times there, going back over recent years, with social volatility and a whole range of issues. It is a community of about 3,500 people with its own health clinic. It is a Northern Territory government health clinic but the Commonwealth funds the services it provides, largely. I was in the fortunate position of going to Wadeye only a week or so ago to open a new clinic. This new clinic provides state-of-the-art health services to this community. From memory, it was a $7½ million spend, which means that this piece of infrastructure is second to none not just in terms of its physical attributes but also in providing accessibility to Aboriginal men and women. It understands the cultural appropriateness of dealing with men and women separately, and it does that through the design of the building, and it is staffed by very professional and highly motivated people who are delivering first-class care to their community.

I have used Wadeye as an example; I could have used any number of communities across the Northern Territory and, indeed, Northern Australia. I could refer to the organisations in your own state, Madam Deputy Speaker Livermore—the Queensland Aboriginal and Islander health services do an exceptional job in providing primary health care. But it is not only in primary health care where we need to be looking and listening to what is happening in Aboriginal community controlled health services, and I want to refer to one program in Katherine. The StrongBala Male Health for Life Program is an initiative underway in Katherine. This program helps men who have endured social alienation through substance abuse. It helps them to rebuild their lives. It has grown from the ground, coming from an initiative from Wurli Wurlinjang, the community based health service in Katherine. There were effectively a couple of key drivers, Phil Richards and John Fletcher, who have coordinated the contribution of the Wurli Wurlinjang Aboriginal Health Service committee and other sections of the Katherine community to establish a place for men to rebuild their lives, to provide employment pathways and to express and affirm their culture.

This program is unique, for a number of reasons. Not only is it actually addressing the health status of men but it sees the whole of life, the whole story. It is saying: ‘If we want to make you a healthy individual, we can give you access to primary health care, we can give you health checks, but we need to make sure you are looking beyond the health centre and the health environment and looking at your whole life. How can we make sure you don’t become further dependent on alcohol if you have been dependent on alcohol previously? How can we make sure you have a pathway to employment?’ These are the sorts of things that will make a significant difference to the lives of many Aboriginal people in and around Katherine—not only the men themselves but also their families, because they will impact directly upon the relationships they are involved in. If we can help control some of the poor behaviour that exists in some family relationships then we will improve the life outcomes for young Aboriginal kids who are being born into these families—and that has got to be our objective. So, if we can see this as not only developing the individual but having a significant impact on individual families, their own family and their broader family, in terms of their extended family, and on their communities, then it will have made a significant contribution to the wellbeing of many Australians and be a positive outcome for so many.

These are the sorts of things that are engaging people—that when we talk about health we are thinking about it in a more holistic sense than we may have done previously. We need to understand the interrelationships that exist between drug and alcohol dependency and life outcomes for others. That is why StrongBala is a very, very good program, a great initiative and one which deserves to be understood. It should also be seen as an opportunity by others to learn from it.

I might also say, while on the subject of men, that in Alice Springs the Central Australian Aboriginal Congress has a unit which is run by a very good friend of mine, John Liddle. Mr Liddle runs this male health program and as part of that they now run biannual male health workshops. These workshops have concentrated on the role of men in the family. The last one, which I attended a few months ago, was about violence in the family. As a result of this discussion, which took place with Aboriginal men from around Australia but principally from Central Australia, they took what I think is a very strong view about themselves in relation to their partners and their children, their families and their communities, and they have now started a movement entitled Stop the Violence. It is about trying to get people to understand that there is no place for violence in any family in any community and that if they are on the grog that is not an excuse for being violent, and what we need to do is to get people to understand that it is unacceptable to behave violently in any given set of circumstances.

I want to highlight that this, again, is an initiative from within the community, just as StrongBala in Katherine is an initiative from within the community. It has the support of the whole community and will make a great deal of difference over time to the health outcomes of many people. Most importantly, it will have a direct impact on young Aboriginal men who live in and around these communities. One of the by-products, of course—hopefully—is that it will teach them responsible behaviour. It will teach them how not to behave irresponsibly when they are involved in the consumption of alcohol. We know about the higher levels of violence in some communities that are the direct result of abuse of alcohol and other substances.

There is a very strong discussion going on within the Northern Territory community about alcohol. It is a discussion that needs to have the attention of the broader Australian community, because it is saying that we need to control not just the abuse of alcohol but its consumption, the way it is retailed, who it is retailed to and how people behave when they have been consuming alcohol. These are very important discussions that people need to be aware of.

I will complete my contribution by referring, for a moment, to Building the Education Revolution. I am not sure what planet people in this place are on when they say that there is something wrong with Building the Education Revolution. They have not visited the schools in my communities, where there is absolutely 100 per cent support for the work which is being done through Building the Education Revolution—over 300 projects in my own communities. In Lingiari, it has benefited 130 schools to the value of $180 million—an enormous amount of money. Not only is this a great investment in employment and job opportunities generally and in business opportunities but the impact it is having on the life outcomes of young Territorians is obvious to everyone. It has transformed schools in a way we cannot imagine.

I am sorry for the opposition, who bleat and moan about some of the issues which have emerged in a small number of schools across the country. I say to them: open your eyes, go and have a look at what is happening in some of these communities and understand the immediate educational and social impact of the new infrastructure on these communities. If you were able to open your minds to those things, you would see that you would be opening your minds to the new opportunities that now exist for young people that did not exist previously.

A fortnight or so ago I was at a community at Gapuwiyak, in Arnhem Land. Recall that in 2000-01, prior to the election of the Labor government, there were no secondary education opportunities for kids in the bush—none. Whose responsibility was that? The Country Liberal Party—the conservative party, to which the member for Solomon and a senator for the Northern Territory belong. It was disgraceful.

Do you think you would have seen a science laboratory in Gapuwiyak before the election of a Labor government? Not on your nelly! What we were able to do a fortnight ago was open a new science laboratory on the northern coast of Australia—the Arnhem Land coast. This year seven of its students will be graduating from year 12. That is such a fillip to that community, and the infrastructure which we are providing will add to the opportunities that new and current students in the school will be able to avail themselves of. There is also the Gunbalanya CEC.

The Katherine High School has a really innovative program, a sports science centre to complement the very successful Clontarf Academy program. Unfortunately, I do not have the time now to talk about Clontarf, but at some point I will, because it is a very successful program in attracting kids to school, leveraging off sport and giving them an educational outcome which they would not otherwise have got. It has been a very successful program, and those people involved in it need to be congratulated.

I note the Maningrida CEC, with its language centre; the Milingimbi CEC, with its science centre; OLSH—Our Lady of the Sacred Heart—at Wadeye, with its science centre; Shepherdson College at Galiwin’ku, with its science centre; and Tennant Creek High School’s science centre. All of these things are initiatives of this government, yet we hear in this place question after question of the Prime Minister about the supposed inadequacies of the Building the Education Revolution program.

Let me tell you: in the real world, there is nothing that could be said other than positive things about Building the Education Revolution and its impact not only on the physical infrastructure but on the capital infrastructure of this country—the human capital benefits that will accrue as a direct result of having this infrastructure built and the opportunities that it creates for young Australians to get improved educational outcomes as a result of this infrastructure. I am a former teacher, and I have to say to you that I have not seen better school facilities in this country in the 35 years that I have been involved in public life. I say: congratulations to this government for the work we have done in this regard, and shame—real shame—on the opposition for trying to undermine it when everyone knows it is very successful. I have not visited one of these communities where I have been talking about Building the Education Revolution without hearing the question: ‘What goes on down there in Canberra? What is it about the Australian newspaper? Is it just New South Wales? What is it?’ They speak glowingly of Building the Education Revolution and its impact upon their communities, their children and their families and the opportunities that will inevitably result from that investment.

Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Families, Housing and Human Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I say to the previous speaker that it is a pity that the examples he gives did not extend throughout the rest of the country. The waste and mismanagement that are part of that program could have provided for more schools, more teachers and more facilities not only for Indigenous students in the Northern Territory but for students throughout this country. The pity is that on this day, when we mark three years since the election of the Labor government under Mr Rudd, we see that it has been three years of waste not only of time and reform opportunities but of billions of dollars of taxpayers’ money by a government that has largely been all talk and no action.

I raise in this wide-ranging debate an important issue about both the environment and industrial relations—in particular the industrial mess that the Victorian desalination plant project has become. In particular, I call on the Victorian Premier, John Brumby, to demonstrate leadership by stepping in to fix the industrial mess surrounding the Victorian desalination plant project and to come clean about any involvement of the Victorian Labor government in ensuring that the CFMEU would be the major union involved in the construction of the desalination plant.

Last Saturday, the Australian newspaper revealed that one of the reasons Thiess management had resorted to the unorthodox practice of hiring an undercover investigator to get to the bottom of hiring practices at the desalination plant was that union officials were dictating to Thiess who could be hired on the project. It seems that a number of these employees do not have the appropriate skills required to do their jobs and that this lack of skill is inhibiting productivity and delaying the progress of construction. One manager apparently said that there was no way that the plant would be constructed on time. It was also claimed that the union thug and convicted criminal Craig Johnston has been involved with the project. While it seems that Mr. Johnston, a former state secretary of the AMWU, has an AMWU ticket, the union at the centre of all of this mess is the militant Victorian construction division of the CFMEU. This is a union with such an appalling track record of thuggery, intimidation and unlawful behaviour that it was recently fined $1 million for its disgraceful actions on the West Gate Freeway project, a project which involves erecting safety barriers on the side of the West Gate Bridge to stop attempts at suicide by people who are obviously in that mental condition.

The Labor government is trying to wash its hands of the problems at the plant, saying either that management practices have nothing to do with them or that Thiess has a fixed price contract and that it will be their problem if the construction is not finished on time. Mr Brumby desperately wants to avoid accountability for the fact that his government was involved up to its armpits in ensuring that the CFMEU rather than the Australian Workers Union got the desalination plant job.

The involvement of Victorian government minister Martin Pakula, a former Victorian secretary of the National Union of Workers, in directing traffic to the Victorian Trades Hall Council secretary and former BLF official Brian Boyd to negotiate industrial agreements for the desalination plant is Victoria’s worst kept secret. The story is that the interests of Victorian taxpayers were ransomed as part of an internal ALP deal to satisfy a bizarre political alliance between the CFMEU, the National Union of Workers and the shop assistants union. Observers do not think it a coincidence that Martin Pakula announced that Thiess was awarded the desalination plant tender within days of the finalisation of preselections within the Labor Party for the elections this Saturday.

It is extraordinary that, while John Brumby talks tough when it comes to law and order, he has never publicly criticised the CFMEU, even when that union was bringing in bikie gangs as picketers at the West Gate Bridge project. Presumably Mr Brumby’s and the Labor government’s silence when it comes to the thuggery of the Victorian branch of the CFMEU is as much a mystery to the Prime Minister as it is to observers of the Victoria’s industrial scene. On this issue, credit must be given to the Prime Minister. She should be given credit for standing up to a powerful left-wing union by making clear that she will not support or condone, either actively or by her silence, union thuggery, while the so-called right-wing Victorian Premier sits on his hands. But then maybe it should not come as a surprise. The Prime Minister would have as much understanding as most of how Victoria’s so-called right-wing Premier is beholden to this bizarre alliance between the National Union of Workers, the shop assistants union and the CFMEU.

The fact is that Labor used taxpayers’ money to pay off the CFMEU by ensuring they got the work at the desalination plant, and Victorians are paying and will continue to pay a huge price for this tawdry deal. The excessive wages and conditions being paid to construction workers have been well documented. Tradesmen stand to earn more than $200,000 annually on this job. The long-term ramifications for Victoria, which already has a reputation for being expensive to build in, are serious. Now we have the allegations of poor productivity because of the employment, at the insistence of union officials, of employees who are not properly qualified.

It is time for the Victorian government to put the interests of taxpayers first rather than their Labor Party factions and subfactions. There should be full and frank disclosure on the part of the Victorian Minister for Water, Tim Holding, as to all the advice, both informal and formal, that he received from his department detailing any recommendation, advice, opinions and views about the awarding of the tender for the construction, operation and maintenance of the Victorian desalination plant project.

Likewise, Ministers Pakula and Holding should disclose details of all meetings, telephone discussions, teleconferences, videoconferences and correspondence between them or their office and any representative, employee, official, member, lobbyist or consultant acting for or on behalf of the NUW, the CFMEU, the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union, the Australian Workers Union, the Victorian Trades Hall Council, Thiess Degremont joint venture and John Holland Leighton joint venture discussing the Victorian desalination plant project.

The dispute at the Victorian desalination plant does not look like being resolved any time soon. The project has become an industrial quagmire that needs to be fixed and fixed fast. It is therefore a great pity that the Victorian Premier has tied his own hands on the matter and is unable or unwilling to intervene. The people of Victoria deserve much better.