Barnaby Joyce (New England, National Party, Shadow Minister for Veterans' Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's a great pleasure that I rise for this grievance debate. I want to start with a quote from the Labor candidate for my seat—and that's great; that's what I want. I want a Labor candidate against me at election, because we want to give the people a free run. She said, 'Labor has already made two significant local announcements in this campaign, which go ahead if an Albanese government is elected, regardless of the result in New England.' That sounds great. 'Labor has committed to the establishment of an urgent care clinic to relieve the pressure on Tamworth Hospital and $580,000 to establish more crisis accommodation for 52 families escaping domestic violence, including four staff to support these families through their crisis.' And there it is on the Labor Party paraphernalia.

Now we asked a question—or Senator McKenzie asked the question—because we're curious about this. We wondered what had happened to it. Senator Bridget McKenzie, a Victorian senator, asked, 'Can the department advise whether either the Investing in Our Communities Program or the Priority Community Infrastructure Program are delivering the government's election commitment to establish more crisis accommodation for 52 families escaping domestic violence in the New England electorate, costing $580,000?' As per the Labor flyer; as per the Labor announcement. 'Regardless of who won the election.'

The answer has come back. 'The Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts has no record of any commitments to crisis accommodation projects being delivered by our department in the local government area within the New England region.' This is the Labor Party: completely and utterly unbelievable; completely untrustworthy; does not stick to its word. I don't know whether anyone's watching this—I don't know if you are because you can't get to sleep or whatever—but this commitment should be honoured. You can't make promises and just not honour them.

I want to go through a couple of others which are very important for my electorate. There's Dungowan dam. Mr Albanese used to always taunt us when the member for Riverina and I were in government that we hadn't built dams. We actually put a lot of money on the table for dams: Wyangala Dam, Dungowan dam, Hells Gate—

Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Shadow Minister for International Development and the Pacific) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Emu Swamp.

Barnaby Joyce (New England, National Party, Shadow Minister for Veterans' Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Emu Swamp, up there at—

Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Shadow Minister for International Development and the Pacific) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Scottsdale.

Barnaby Joyce (New England, National Party, Shadow Minister for Veterans' Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Scottsdale Irrigation Scheme. We actually did a fair bit of that. There was the Bowen pipeline, Urannah dam. And as soon as Labor and the Greens got in of course all the dams went.

But Dungowan dam was a big one because the city of Tamworth is just growing; it's growing like Topsy. People are pouring in from Sydney. I was talking to one real estate agent: one in every four houses in Tamworth is now sold to someone moving out of Sydney. These people who are coming in from Sydney want a job. They can only get a job if there's water security for the city.

We had to fight to get the extension to Chaffey Dam. The Greens fought against it. The Booroolong frog raised its head. We couldn't do it. Apparently, the problem with Dungowan dam was a skink. There was a lizard. I don't know, I thought the lizards might just walk up the hill a bit. But if we don't get an extension of water security for the city of Tamworth, then the billions of dollars—and I mean that, the billions of dollars—of investment and the thousands and thousands of jobs—Tamworth is one of the biggest, if not the biggest, processors of animal protein in Australia. If Tamworth's not working, you're not eating. Eighty per cent of the meat you eat, if you get it from Woolworths, gets killed in Tamworth. They need water security. These are blue-collar workers. They're boners. They're the people who work in that blue-collar Olympics called animal meat processing, whether it's sheep, whether it's cattle, whether it's eggs, whether it's poultry. That's why we need the dam, but the dam's been delayed.

What 'delayed' means here is kicked into the long grass. That's a terrible shame. It shows that the Labor Party and the Greens—forget about the Greens. I don't know why you carry them. I don't know why they run you, but it shows you don't have the courage to do something which would actually get you votes. If you want to get this candidate, whatever her name is—Laura Hughes? She seems like a really nice lady—a nurse; a good lady—but she hasn't got a hope in a place like New England unless the Labor Party shows some gumption to stand up against the Greens and say: 'We're going to build the dam. We're going to do it.' Otherwise, Laura Hughes is just going through the motions. There's not a chance for her.

There are other things that were delayed. We want to make sure that Armidale becomes the epicentre of agvet chemicals not only in Australia, but in South-East Asia. We need a regulatory science. A lot of other countries like Thailand, like Indonesia, say: 'Why do we all have different regulatory programs? Why wouldn't we just have one and we can base it?' Armidale was the place they were all turning up to. They'd say, 'We'll go through the process with the university there.' We put some money aside to get this thing started. This was going to give us—to be quite frank, people would probably never vote for me. When I moved APVMA up to Armidale—I'll give you one thing: it was a great move and I'm pretty sure most of those people don't vote for me. But it was a great move.

This would also be a great move, and it would actually support some of those really high-line jobs for people who could extend their experience in the sciences into a job in a regional area to get a better bang for their buck—a more affordable house; easier access to where the kids go to school; a better lifestyle because they're near national parks, near the beaches. A lower cost of living and better bang for their buck. But why was the funding pulled? If I were really parochial, I'd say, 'You pulled the funding for a group of people who—I'll be frank; I'm a realist—would never vote for me.' They should have done that. They should have been big enough to say, 'Let's do this.' It's a good thing for Armidale, a good thing for Australia and a good thing for Labor Party voters, to be quite frank.

You pulled the funding for Guyra early learning centre—$4.2 million. You talk about wanting to look after kids and families, except when you get to a regional area. Then you don't want to look after them, so the people in Guyra can just go without! They've got kids, too. Vikki always informs me that how you get your kids looked after is one of the big issues. If the kids don't go into a childcare centre, into an early learning centre, mum or dad can't go to work. I'll be factual regarding country areas: mum doesn't go to work—mum has to stay home. So, if Guyra's not funded, mum stays home, which means mum doesn't have a job and which means you disenfranchise her from her potential, by reason that you haven't funded this. It should be done. If you want to be a government for Australia, not a government for some parts of Australia, then make sure you look after regional areas.

When I went to Armidale Rams Rugby League Club and went to their grandstand, the girls—guys and girls are both playing rugby league now—were getting changed under the grandstand, under the seats. It is horrific: it's cold, and people can stare into the change room and see you as you're having a shower. We're trying to get it fixed, and we want it fixed, but that funding is gone. That means that they have to go back to it. When I announced that, the ladies who arrived at that announcement were crying. That's how important it was to them—they were crying. It was so important to them. In the scheme of things, $600,000 is a lot of money, but in a federal budget it's not. It really touched me that we could make such a difference and that people were driven to turn up—they were so emotionally affected. But you've ripped the rug out from underneath their feet.

You want Tenterfield bypass to be safe, but we had a truck that, with flammable liquid, caught on fire just outside my office. If that had blown up, we would have had deaths. We've got to get those trucks out of town, and Tenterfield bypass does that. I've heard on the grapevine—this is a big part of my grievance—about something that the Labor Party is going to do, and the member for Riverina will be interested in this. The way they're going to fix our country roads—listen to this, Member for Riverina—is that they're going to reduce the speed limits. So, rather than make the roads suitable for the speed, they're reducing the speed limits so that everybody just has to go slower in regional areas. You'll never get a better grievance than that!

So I say to the Labor Party that, when you get the great opportunity—the great blessing—of running this government, you have to be a government for everybody. Maybe this is something for the Prime Minister to think about when he's got a bit of spare time—when he's getting bored at Mardi Gras, walking along and wanting something to think about. As he's holding his glow wands, walking along and having a wonderful old time, he might like to think about the people he's left behind.