Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party, Minister for Resources and Northern Australia) Share this | Hansard source

In the time permitted, I might just focus on a few particular projects, because our agenda is project focused. It is focused on delivering tangible, concrete things that can deliver results for northern Australia. The Rookwood Weir in Central Queensland that I mentioned earlier will double agricultural production in the Fitzroy Basin, the second largest water catchment in our whole nation. That will deliver 2,100 jobs. It will drought-proof the towns of Rocky and Gladstone as well. There are some of the roads I mentioned. The development of the Hann Highway will make the first sealed route from Cairns to Melbourne in our country. That road will cut travel times by eight hours for the freight sector and shorten the trip by 800 kilometres, an enormous benefit, particularly to our banana growers and horticulture producers in North Queensland. We're also building the Outback Way. We've put $330 million towards building just the third sealed route across our continent in our nation's history, a massive nation-building project. Almost $1 billion has been allocated by the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility towards projects that will create jobs in northern Australia too.