Fiona Nash (NSW, National Party, Deputy Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Hansard source

I can. We might not be all that sophisticated in this corner but we understand regional communities. Our decentralisation agenda is all about the region. It is about growing our regions; it is about strengthening our regions. On this side of the chamber, we know that when our regions are strong the nation is strong. There is no doubt that delivering more jobs and better jobs to regional areas will ensure the long-term economic sustainability and prosperity of those communities.

While government continually promotes regional areas to the private sector as a great place to invest, government also has a role to play in boosting jobs in our regions. Relocating government agencies is not a new idea. Indeed, as Senator McKenzie has indicated, it was the previous Prime Minister Keating pushing this. We know how successful decentralisation has been in the past in transforming regional communities. This government is going to do the drive to see it happen again.