Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am delighted to join this debate because I think I actually bring a reality check to the debate that we have had tonight. Unlike the Labor Party speakers who, with respect, have simply read speeches written by some Canberra based backroom clerk like the one who cleverly wrote Senator Conroy’s speech, I actually live in rural and regional Australia. I live a small country town. In July every year I drive throughout north-western and western Queensland. I am often in Far North Queensland, down in Rockhampton and out in Gladstone and Longreach, and, rather than reading these prepared speeches by some Canberra based adviser, I actually get out there and understand the work that Senator Coonan and other members of the government before her have done to assist telecommunications in rural and regional Australia.

I cannot forget the days when without any warning the Labor government shut off the analog telephone, which used to provide a service to rural and regional Australia, without any alternative strategy or system in mind. As is always the case with the Labor Party—and particularly with Senator Conroy—you do not listen to what they say or what they promise; you look at what they do when they are in government. They are criticising us now for interest rates hikes up to seven or eight per cent and say that it is terrible. They do not remember—they do remember but they choose not to remember—when I personally was paying on my own home loan mortgage interest rates of 17½ per cent. When you hear Mr Rudd saying that he is a fiscal conservative and that he will not let interest rates get up to that, do not listen to what he says; just look at what Labor do when they are in government.

The previous speaker had the temerity to mention the Australian Local Government Association. The Labor Party pretend that they are a party interested in rural and regional Australia. I would ask anyone sitting opposite me today to indicate if they happen to live in rural and regional Australia, and not one of them puts up their hand. Do any of them understand what the terminology ‘rural and regional Australia’ means? For Senator Conroy I think that means driving a truck. You were in the truckies union, weren’t you, Senator Conroy, and very involved in driving those big trucks? You were doing something in the Transport Workers Union. I am not quite sure whether you were actually driving trucks but it was probably driving trucks from the CBD of Melbourne to Mordialloc—and Senator Conroy probably thought that was regional Australia. Regional Australia is where I come from and where I drive every year. Senator Conroy, hopeless at policy but quite a nice fellow, should come out with me as I drive—