Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Hansard source

I am pleased to participate in this debate on the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Independent Expert Scientific Committee on Coal Seam Gas and Large Coal Mining Development) Bill 2012—after my colleague Senator McKenzie, from rural Victoria. Like Senator McKenzie, I could not help but laugh when I heard Senator Waters, from Brisbane—the capital city of Queensland—lament the speakers list on this bill and claim that it was the Greens that look after rural and regional Australia. If it were not so tragic, that sort of statement would be funny. Most people who live in rural and regional Australia understand how debilitating the Greens and their policies are for rural and regional Australia.

But I will return to the speakers on today's list. Senator Waters was lamenting that there were not many Labor speakers—and she is right about that—and not many coalition speakers. The speakers on the list before me are Senator Waters, from Brisbane; Senator McKenzie, from rural Victoria, in Bendigo; and myself from rural Queensland, where I live in Ayr, a sugar-growing area. Regrettably, there is not a lot of gas around the lower Burdekin, but I travel widely in rural and regional Queensland.

Then we have Senator Williams from Inverell in New South Wales, in an area where this is very important. We then have Senator Nash from Young out in Western New South Wales, again where the coal seam gas is very important. We have Senator Joyce from St George in rural Queensland, again an area where this is important. Senator Heffernan is from Junee in Western Queensland, again an area where this is a real issue—