Ewen Jones (Herbert, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Magnetic Island is just off the coast of Townsville. It is a truly wonderful place. It sits within the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. It is the jewel in Townsville's tourism crown. It is a quick 20-minute ride in a ferry across to Nelly Bay. Can I tell you, Mr Deputy Speaker, that during the campaign leading up to the 2010 election we came out and promised a walkway from Nelly Bay around the front of Bright Point, around Geoffrey Bay through to Alma Bay and the Arcadian Surf Life Saving Club. It would be the most fantastic walk in the world. It would be the walk equivalent of the Great Ocean Road. It would be absolutely magnificent.

Labor matched our promise of $4.7 million to build this walkway. It has long been needed on Magnetic Island, and I will tell you why. To get from Nelly Bay to Arcadia or Alma Bay you have to come out of Nelly Bay and go up over the steepest of hills. It is a backpacker haven. You have people there carrying great big backpacks up a steep hill with no sidewalk, only a rail beside the white line. You could step out and fall all the way down into the ocean. How no-one has been killed there is completely and utterly beyond everyone. My first attempt to get funding for this was actually under black spot legislation, but unfortunately not enough people have been killed. So the fact that it is a very, very steep hill and you have backpackers and tourists crossing that hill on foot and on pushbike makes it very hard. I won the election—best result ever.

Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Hear, hear!

Ewen Jones (Herbert, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you. The member for Denison asked the Prime minister what they would do with promises made by Labor candidates in seats where Labor did not win. The Prime Minister stood at the dispatch box, hand on heart, and said: 'Our promises were fully costed, every one of them. Of course they will be delivered. Of course they will. We don't go around making promises that we won't fulfil.' So I dashed off a letter, to which there has still been no reply.

Senator Jan McLucas was in Townsville. She was asked about the Magnetic Island walkway and she said, 'Of course, the candidate made the promise, not a minister or the Prime Minister.' It could be a loophole. So we went back and checked the Hansard. The Prime Minister stood at the dispatch box and said that whether the promise was made by a candidate, by a minister or by her it would be kept. So I do not know if Jan McLucas is calling the Prime Minister out for telling untruths. But now we find that the Townsville City Council has been told by this government—this government that cannot tell the truth—that they now have approval to apply to the regional development authority for funding. So that promise was that they were allowed to fill out an application form.

Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Jan McLucas needs to do that walk!

Ewen Jones (Herbert, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Jan McLucas needs to do that walk over the hill and the good, honourable senator would do a wonderful job doing it. Why is it important? We need to develop our tourism industry. The tourism industry in North Queensland has been decimated since the cyclones and since the floods. It is in a whole world of hurt. We need to get this thing right. If you could link this walk to the traditional walks over the hills, up to the fort, it would be one of the great walks in the world. Couple that with Indigenous tourism and take it all the way down to the tourism section of Horseshoe Bay and it would be a great addition to North Queensland.

At the end of the day, I was sitting there on Magnetic Island doing a listening post and some doorknocking. People come up to me and they say, 'Listen, the Prime Minister said she would fund it. Surely the Prime Minister will be good for her word.' To which I just said: 'Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Come on!' The Prime Minister stood at the dispatch box and said that a promise made by her prior to the election would be kept after the election. She stood at the dispatch box and said she would keep her word. This is very good. I call on this government to finally honour its word. Deliver the $4.7 million. You can deliver $13 million for a union website, but for $4.7 million to deliver jobs and tourism to North Queensland you cannot see your way clear. This government should get on its hands and knees, beg for forgiveness and say to the people of North Queensland: 'Here's your $4.7 million.' I ask the government to honour its word. (Time expired)