Tony Windsor (New England, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is with pleasure that I speak on the address-in-reply to the Governor-General’s speech. There are a number of things I would like to raise in this debate. Firstly, I would like to recognise the time of the new parliament since the election. Obviously I was involved in the process of the determination of the government. Since that determination occurred, there has been a settling-in period, which you have been a part of, Mr Deputy Speaker Slipper. A number of changes have been made in procedures and processes. I am pleased to say that I think things are starting to settle down, and the nature of this particular parliament has been a positive experience so far. Some people with various political agendas may find that difficult to handle, but there have been some positive indications that some of the substantive issues that the Australian people want addressed can be addressed in this particular parliament.

One of the very attractive things about this particular parliament—and I am not speaking just as an Independent; it is not just about vested interest; I think the Australian people are looking very closely at this—is that the executive does not have total power, as is normally the case. It is quite a different parliament to previous ones. As time goes on, I think members from both sides of the parliament will recognise that there are very real opportunities in the nature of this particular parliament which will give all backbenchers, all members of parliament, a degree of freedom that they have not experienced in the past. There was a dictatorial nature of previous parliaments, where the executive, the ministry, the cabinet and the inner cabinet dictated to the backbench how they would think and how they would vote. This parliament is going to be substantively different.

I have just left the other chamber and there is a debate going on down there about the suspension of standing orders, for instance. That debate is based on the logic rather than the politics of argument. I think it is refreshing to see people arguing and putting their case before their fellow parliamentarians within the parliament and then having it adjudicated by those fellow parliamentarians. In a technical and theoretical sense that is what our House of Representatives was supposed to be about. It was supposed to be about representatives from the various electorates coming together and debating various issues on the floor of the chamber, making decisions as to whether the arguments had been cogently put, whether they had been convincing and whether they had logic, and then the decisions being made.

I think the Australian people are starting to see that this parliament is significantly different from other parliaments they have had. Some would argue that, in a hung parliament, nothing will happen. Some people in the media and some people in the political process have argued that reform will not occur in this particular parliament because of the nature of it.

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

As I was saying before the interruption, due to a division having been called, I was talking about the reform process. Some people have suggested that, because of the nature of this particular parliament, reform of a significant nature will not occur. I would argue to the contrary. For instance, as we speak today, I think the passage of the National Broadband Network, in my view, is a very good example of a very-much needed reform, which essentially has been neglected in the politics of telecommunications for the last decade. It is no secret that I am a fan of the fibre-optic arrangements under the National Broadband Network and I am very pleased to see that reform proceeding, as I am to see the structural separation of Telstra. I think the two things are very significant in terms of the way forward, particularly for regional Australia where anybody with any sense would understand that the possibility of developing two or more wholesale networks in regional Australia is just nonsense. It may happen in some major urban areas but, obviously, not in country areas.

We had that debate some time ago when the third tranche of Telstra was sold. The then Prime Minister, John Howard, and the National Party’s Senator Joyce, who had the balance of power in the Senate, argued that competition would deliver to country communities. Obviously, that has not occurred. As part of the agreement with Senator Joyce and the then President of the National Farmers Federation, Peter Corish, on the passage of the legislation to sell the third tranche of Telstra they said they had it in writing and that it would be entrenched in legislation that there would be equity of access to broadband and telephone services, including price, for country constituents. And we all know that that did not occur. So one of the things that I am very pleased about is that, in our negotiations on the formation of this government, there was support not only for the National Broadband Network and the rollout in regional Australia but also for obtaining an equalised wholesale price. So, as I said, I am very supportive of that piece of reform.

There are other areas where I think the nature of this parliament can achieve significant reform. I am pleased to see the member for Riverina here. He has very big shoes to fill. Even though he is taller than the previous occupant, they are big shoes to fill. I pay my regards to his predecessor Kay Hull, who was an excellent member of parliament. The member for Riverina is also involved in the House of Representatives committee that is looking at the Murray-Darling issue. That is the Standing Committee on Regional Australia, and I congratulate Minister Crean for setting up that committee. Also part of the discussions we had in the formation of government was that a regional development committee should be part of the committee processes within this parliament. It has not been in the past but I think that has now been remedied.

The significant issue of the Murray-Darling system, which has been politicised and played with for many years, with very little happening, is now coming to a head and the regional Australia committee will look at that issue. As I have said on a few occasions before, the nature of this particular parliament—and it can fail, as other parliaments have—could utilise the hung parliament to obtain a solution to the ongoing problems of both the socioeconomic impacts of water reform and the environmental concerns that many people do have in parts of the system—at the top end, at the bottom end and, obviously, in the middle. So that is another area of reform where this parliament could proceed and make meaningful gains. Some people have suggested that this will be a stagnant parliament because the executive does not have control. As I said before the break, I think it is a great thing that the executive does not have control. I think that in his next book John Howard may well agree, because when the executive had total control of the parliament the wheels started to fall off that particular government. I know that, if you are into power, that is what you want, but the people do have their say as well.

There are other areas of reform. I am involved in a multiparty committee that is looking at climate change. In the previous parliament, I was on another committee that was looking at the impact of climate change on agriculture, and there are a number of issues that I will be raising in this committee as well. I think that is an area that we need to look at. That might be in terms of direct action, as the Leader of the Opposition has talked about from time to time. I have spoken about a number of issues there in terms of soil carbon and various technologies that not only assist in the sequestering of carbon but also improve drought readiness for various farming and grazing activities. That is a very significant issue that potentially will be addressed by this parliament.

There are many other issues that I think will be debated, and the Governor-General mentioned some of those in her address, but I do not think there is any that intersects and interconnects a lot of those issues that is greater in importance than broadband. Not only does it have the capacity to negate distances—a disadvantage of being a resident in the country; it has the capacity to enhance productivity in a number of ways. I note that Malcolm Turnbull has been talking about the Productivity Commission, and I have discussed that with Malcolm on a whole range of occasions.

One of the reasons that I did not agree with the arguments of the member for Wentworth about the Productivity Commission was that it is very hard for a body such as the Productivity Commission to factor in technologies and services that we do not even know exist yet. One of the things that I raised with a number of economists on that issue is: for instance, how would you design it as a benefit in, say, 10 years time if 300,000 aged people who would normally enter the aged-care institutional sector were able to be kept in their homes for an extended period with the interactive arrangements that broadband would offer? What would be the savings to the aged-care budget? What would be the capital savings in facilities that will need to be built if the baby boomer group head, as they are heading—and there is a representative of them here today, Paul Neville—into that age group where they will have to go into an aged-care facility?

Paul Neville (Hinkler, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Not for a while yet!

Tony Windsor (New England, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Hinkler’s hearing is adequate, and obviously he will be able to stay in this environment for quite some time! I did mention, member for Hinkler, that in about 10 years time the technologies will quite possibly be available for interactive, real-time health care and participation in communication with relatives, and also this technology has the capacity to provide monitoring services within the home environment. What savings will be accrued from that sort of technology? No-one knows that, and the Productivity Commission can only guess at it, and there are any number of examples of that sort of thing. What will the savings be when GPs in country areas will be able to almost immediately contact specialist services, potentially in any part of the world, if they have issues? That sort of backup in providing some of those services is going to be extraordinary.

One thing I would like to speak about as well is the ongoing debate that is taking place in regional Australia, particularly in parts of the New England electorate, about the interface of coalmining methane gas extraction, groundwater systems, surface water systems and flood plain management. There have been a number of issues in Queensland recently where there are very real concerns about the lack of a policy platform to base future decisions on. And the people of the Liverpool Plains, for instance—there was another meeting held in Gunnedah only last week, and the Leader of the Australian Greens, Senator Bob Brown, attended, as did others—have very real concern with some of these extractive activities and even the exploratory activities that the state governments are allowing to proceed without any real knowledge of the potential impacts on the hydraulics of various groundwater systems and the long-term impacts on some of the most productive land in Australia.

In that case I was talking about the Liverpool Plains. In Queensland, in the Haystack Plain and in places like Felton and other parts of the Darling Downs, areas which have been very, very productive over the long term, some of the more profitable extractive activities are moving in. We really do not know the long-term impact of allowing those industries to go ahead. I am not arguing against those industries, but I have argued for some time that what we really need—and I will be moving this way next year when the parliament settles down—is legislation to put in place some form of bioregional assessment prior to the granting of exploration licences and the argy-bargy that goes on between the investment sector and government. In this case it is mostly state government but, with the Murray-Darling arrangements in place between the Commonwealth and the states, there is a role for the Commonwealth to play, and part of that role may well be through amendment to the Water Act 2007. Irrespective of how we do it, we need to put in place a clear policy platform for bioregional assessment to be done. If the bioregional assessment shows that there are risks if certain activities occur in certain areas—to the groundwater systems or whatever, depending on the nature of the land—then those activities would be prohibited.

These bioregional assessments could well involve putting lines on a map to show certain areas where exploratory activity and mining activity can occur and other areas where it cannot. It is a fairly simplistic way of looking at it. Some people say that it would be very difficult to do. Well, we do it in national parks now. We have passed a law to say that in certain areas of land you do not carry out certain activities. I suggest that we do the same for some of the very productive food-producing areas, particularly where there is an interconnect between the groundwater and surface water, and particularly when we are going through this process of trying to design an intervalley water budget. If extractive activities that could impact on groundwater and surface water flow were allowed to proceed, what would it do in the Murray-Darling, for instance, in terms of the whole water budget? I do not know the answer to that and neither do the mining companies and the state governments. Before we get too many cumulative impacts of some of these extractive activities, we really need to have a handle on what that means.

Normally an extractive industry will look after its area of land, but all it has to do through the EIS process is look after the area of land it is actually mining and make sure that nothing gets off it to pollute the neighbours. But, if you are invading groundwater systems, the impact could occur 10 or 100 kilometres away—nowhere near the actual activity itself. Proving in a court that the extractive activity, when it crossed a groundwater aquifer, for instance, caused a problem 10 or 15 kilometres away will be enormously difficult for a landholder to do. The case would be beaten to death in the courts. I think government has to put in place a policy. As I said, I will be moving to put in place some sort of legislative arrangement next year that will address that. There are others who are looking at it. I know Melanie Stutsel, the environmental officer for the Minerals Council of Australia, addressed a similar issue in a Senate inquiry a few years ago. The mining industry were suggesting that they were not opposed to something similar to a bioregional assessment. The question is: who does the assessment? I think it is the role of government. The Murray-Darling system, where we have come to special agreements between the states and the Commonwealth, would be a very good place to start.

Paul Neville (Hinkler, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a pleasure to be able to respond to the Governor-General’s speech. In doing so, let me start at the beginning. The election on 21 August was unique in our country’s history. The run-up to it was marked by the crumbling of the Rudd government. From the moment Tony Abbott took the leadership of the coalition on 1 December 2009, a new dynamic swept across Australian politics, with the polls showing a growing disenchantment with the Rudd government. In the last week of the 2010 winter session, that disenchantment in the government had developed into disillusionment and finally into panic. The execution cabal, consisting of union and ALP officials and former officials now in the parliament, was ready to strike and did so ruthlessly on Wednesday, 23 June. It was as close to a bloodless coup as we are ever likely to see in this country. Many rank-and-file members, and even senior cabinet ministers, had no idea what was afoot until the die was cast. Some of them did not know until they came back to the chamber from dinner engagements around 10 or half-past 10 at night. The party meeting was merely a formality.

Not surprisingly, there was disquiet if not outright shock in an unsuspecting electorate. This disquiet was palpable, certainly in my area, and especially amongst traditional Labor voters, many of whom were quite outspoken and said they would never vote Labor again. While the coup had many of the hallmarks of the faceless men of old, there was a troubling difference: the coup leaders were not shy about their roles. They gloated in media interviews and maintained their sense of smug self-satisfaction by indulging themselves in retrospective books on their roles, milking the previous leader’s demise for everything they could get out of it. It is little wonder then that the new Prime Minister evoked the catch cry ‘moving forward’, using it incessantly. Why the emphasis on moving forward? Because no-one dared looked back. The other mantra excusing the plotters’ duplicity was ‘Labor had lost its way.’ That too resonated in the electorate, though not in the same way Labor might have expected. The admission hangs around the Prime Minister’s neck as an albatross of constant reminder. It was certainly not a strong footing for a new government.

Against this background, we moved inevitably towards the federal election. Hinkler, which three years ago ceded Gladstone and the parts north and west of the Burnett River to Flynn and picked up Hervey Bay, has always been a volatile electorate. It has nevertheless been kind to me in its new and old manifestations over the last seven elections, and I deeply appreciate the loyalty and generosity of my constituents, especially on 21 August. Hinkler, which is now essentially the Coral Coast, Bundaberg, Childers and Hervey Bay, resisted the 8.5 per cent swing to Labor in 2007, despite which my margin was reduced to 1.7, and later by redistribution to 1.5. However, the results in 2010 not only recaptured old ground but took the LNP vote to 60.5, an increase of 8.9 per cent and two per cent above our notional recent best. I was humbled to win all 48 of the booths in Hinkler, with positive swings in 47 of them. In one the vote actually dropped from 65 to 63 per cent—my only bad mark in the campaign. Dreadful!

The rejection of Labor twice on these new boundaries deserves some attention, not for some personal self-indulgence but rather as the basis of an analysis of Labor’s contempt for the electorate. In both the 2007 and 2010 elections Labor made only meagre promises to Hinkler, two of them former promises—the Isis River Bridge and the Hervey Bay Community Centre. In 2007 we were promised $10,000 water grants for surf clubs. Why you would give water grants to surf clubs I have never been quite sure. Only half of them were ever delivered. A modest grant was also given to the Bundaberg Cricket Association. In 2010 Labor promised 50 per cent funding for an athletics track in Bundaberg and $70,000 to convert a toilet block into a sporting club canteen—hardly riveting stuff and paltry when put against the rampant ALP promises in some marginal seats where there were serious challenges, like Herbert and Flynn.

What infuriated me was the lack of collective vision on the part of the ALP when it came to local projects. You would think that both sides of politics would want to get these things for the community. These were practical, focused and, in many cases, modest proposals. It seems the ALP candidate was forbidden from matching my promises, important as they were to the community, no doubt on the basis that, if I were successful, an ALP government would not be committed to delivering them. It is a bit cynical, isn’t it?

In short, Labor’s failure to articulate a real vision for our communities or to commit to key civic infrastructure was their real undoing. Quite frankly, I was amazed that, outside those I have just spoken of, Labor did not identify one solitary key project to support or even map out a plan for the growth of the region. I think that lack of knowledge or passion for the electorate cost them dearly. The people and businesses in Hinkler are passionate about improving their future. They simply will not accept candidates who do not even engage with grassroots issues.

In contrast, the coalition made commitments to road infrastructure in Hervey Bay, a rapidly increasing city; improving local waterways; and building a performing arts centre at Urangan State High School. None of these were matched by my Labor opponent. In fact, she described the latter, almost unbelievably, as ‘unfair to other high schools’, failing to recognise the role of an integrated arts curriculum in a regional high school. Why should all these special arts faculties be only in capital cities? Why can’t we have one in regional Australia? I cannot for the life of me understand why the Labor candidate would not match the coalition’s $3 million commitment to get this project off the ground. She was once a supporter of it but backed away from it.

The projects I have been talking about have not been just plucked out of the air. They are things that have been identified by the community as local priorities and, in some instances, they are things that have been worked on for years. For instance, the performing arts centre at Urangan high school has the strong backing of the community and the school has been visited over time not only by lots of local people interested in the concept but also by former Prime Minister Rudd, the Minister for Infrastructure and Transport, Mr Albanese, and the Leader of the Opposition, Tony Abbott. All of them have been there.

The coalition also planned $10 million for helping the Fraser Coast council upgrade key arterial roads around Hervey Bay, like the much talked about Urraween extension and River Heads Road, the access corridor to Fraser Island. This investment would have helped relieve traffic congestion in a growing city and would have been a much needed boost to business in the first instance and tourism in the second.

Hervey Bay is also lucky to be the home of the Fraser Coast youth mentoring service, which supports and guides troubled students who are having a tough time with school and need extra encouragement to stick with their education. We talk a lot about this, but we do not do much about it. Unfortunately, the program’s funding has not been renewed by this government—a situation that the coalition was ready to fix by providing around $600,000 to keep it running for a further three years. I have already met with the Attorney-General since we resumed about the continued funding for this youth mentoring service, and I am hopeful the government will take on board its importance to the local community and provide some funding to keep the doors open.

At the Bundaberg end of the electorate, I fought for commitments to clean up our local rivers with a new water weed harvester and to open up the mouth of the Elliott River by way of a groyne wall—both of which would have made a real difference to very serious environmental problems. The sense of disappointment in the electorate that Labor will not match these commitments is palpable. People are not stupid. They understand that the government holds the purse strings. So I appeal to the government to seriously look at these projects, match the coalition’s commitments and improve the prospects in my electorate of Hinkler.

I also identified some small projects like a grant of $260,000 to the Hervey Bay Hockey Association and others under coalition structured programs like revegetating the isthmus at Elliott Heads and consolidating sections of the Hervey Bay foreshore—a prime tourist area and currently a hot topic in that city at present. There is some erosion and some clumps of vegetation that need attention. We also identified, under our environmental high schools program, Bundaberg High, Isis High and Xavier College.

As I said, my opponents in 2007 and 2010 would not engage with me on these issues, not so much as a serious letter to the editor. It was as if they were ordered to be mute. During the 2010 election campaign they offered, as an offset, a contrived series of debates on health. I refused to debate these issues until the coalition’s policy was on the table. The debates went ahead without me and drew a paltry 25 and 30 people respectively. After you removed the media, organisers and ALP functionaries, the debates drew only 12 or 15 members of the public. In fact, the worst attended was for the then Deputy Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, who did much of the speaking for the candidate, who was supposed to be debating, while a CFMEU devotee helpfully waved around a placard—no doubt to enhance the one-sidedness of the event.

For all that, we had a great campaign. May I acknowledge today my superb campaign team led by Rod Wilson, who has masterminded all seven of my campaigns. His meticulous attention to detail and his experience with the media is unsurpassed. Dick Bitcon was his deputy and the National Party-LNP’s ‘light on the hill’ in the Bundaberg district. Dick added even greater strength to the campaign, as did the team in the Hervey Bay office: Norma Hannant, John Rutherford and Jenny Sorensen. Steve and Trish Hoffman coordinated the Childers area in between the two cities. Ruth Gillespie also played a vital role in the finance for the campaign and I appreciate her help.

May I also acknowledge Brendon Falk, Wayne Fehlhaber, Dale Fehlhaber, Paula Harberger, Michael Nyenhuis, Ted Sorensen, Russell Green, John Rutherford, Julie Stewart, Stan Flack, John Norris and Steve Dixon for their hard work. The LNP’s Llew O’Brien, our regional vice-president, was also ready to help anywhere anytime.

It is not just the five weeks of a campaign which decides the fate of the sitting member; it is the time in between campaigns which dictates whether the seat will be held or lost, and I have been singularly blessed with excellent and experienced staff who have done the hard yards. Kate Barwick, Heather Hawkins, Janelle Geddes, Darlene Dobson and my former chief-of-staff, Leslie Smith, who returned for a short time, worked tirelessly before, during and after the campaign, doing the everyday things behind the scenes that got the right result on that day. The pivotal anchor of my campaign was my wife Margaret, without whose support and humour a tough campaign would have been made impossible.

As we look to the horizon of the next three years, or however short this term might be, I see some important targets for Hinkler. Firstly, we need to dedicate ourselves to a campaign to see pensions increased. Increasingly, I see pensioners come into my office who cannot make ends meet. This is not some whinge or annual push for more money; this is a serious cry to the government for help and to recognise how costs are impacting on vulnerable retirees.

11:14:33

While I acknowledge the special increase of $30 to single pensioners a year or so ago and the recent half-yearly adjustments, more has to be done to allow those who have worked all their lives to live reasonable and trouble-free existences. If members are in any doubt about what I am saying, let us look at the costs which have risen since Labor came to power. Let us look at the quarterly figures for December 2007 and September 2010: electricity prices increased by an average of 42 per cent across Australia; gas prices an average of 29 per cent; water and sewerage has increased by an average of 46 per cent; hospital and medical services by 20 per cent; education costs—school fees etc—by 17 per cent; postal costs are up 16 per cent; and property rates and charges have risen 19 per cent. Those increases do not factor in the recent pressures from a variety of influences—for example, the scarcity of properties in mining and mining service communities which has been instrumental in pushing rents up to a point where many pensioners have had to leave towns. If the cabinet leak which said that the current Prime Minister was opposed to pension increases is true I am truly staggered.

I am not a tree hugger; I am a practical environmentalist. I have demonstrated that in many ways in my electorate. But with the Great Barrier Reef and the offshore fishing grounds around my electorate of Hinkler there has to be balance. First, we had what was called the East Coast Trawl plan that took out 250 trawlers—in fact it actually took out 290. We were told the reef was then secure. Then we had the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority’s RAP program—its Representative Areas Program. It was originally only to take 20 per cent of the water surface of the reef, but when the maps came out it was 33 or 34 per cent. In my part of the reef, the southern end of the reef, the practical application of the government measures was 70 per cent. Now we are going to have a closure off Fraser Island. This is known as the Fraser Area for Further Assessment, which is a cute way of saying: ‘We are going to close down a bit more.’ We will come to a point where there will not be a critical mass left in Bundaberg and Hervey Bay to drive the processing works. Before all those programs I have talked about, we had about 80 trawlers each in Bundaberg and Hervey Bay. Today we have about 30 in each city. Another cut could see that number reduced to 20 or fewer. Then we get to a point where we do not have critical mass, which then flows back through the community to the people who work in the processing works, to the chandlery, to the fuel, to the people who service the trawlers and, indeed, down to recreational fishing, which relies on a lot of those services as well.

The other thing I want to see is fair treatment for farmers. There is a push now to tell farmers that they are environmental vandals. That is not the case. I have never met a farmer who does not believe in looking after his property or in looking after riparian areas around properties. This is another push that is coming on to primary producers, not just fishermen but farmers. I call on the government to be fair to people when bringing these measures about, to understand that, yes, there have to be environmental measures, but you do not have to make life a misery for everyone along the chain.

Those are my views on the Governor-General’s speech. I hope that the electorate of Hinkler will continue to prosper. I will be doing everything in my power to make it so.

John Murphy (Reid, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next day of sitting.