Ross Cadell (NSW, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

Regional infrastructure is so important. It is the projects that go into small towns and regions that get jobs, get people moving in and start rebuilding economies after the move to the cities. I spoke in my maiden speech in this place about the fact that we are hampered in regions because the cost-benefit ratios measure economic benefit, not need. When they put thousands of people saving five minutes on the way to work in a city above dozens of people being able to drive safely down a road, it is wrong.

When we sit there and think of regional towns, the jobs they have lost over the cutbacks and the displacements over some time, it is investments like these that get people coming back. When they come back, the whole town grows. We have seen the money drain from the regions. We've seen deals done were suddenly farmers have to deal with Woolworths and Coles and they lose money from the farm, so they lay off a farmhand. Suddenly the farm isn't as expensive, so the bank closes. That takes a few tellers and a bank manager away, so the school is no longer viable and we lose the school.

Everything we can do to put money back into these regions multiplies and makes regions better. During COVID, we saw a migration of people from the cities to the regions. We saw them going to where they could have a life, going where their kids could have a future, going where they could have lifestyle. That is despite regions being down on the services normally offered in cities.

When those across the road say we are pork-barrelling and funding our seats, it's not new. It's not pork-barrelling. Sometimes you know things. Sometimes you know people, sometimes you know projects. Senator McDonald spoke previously about good grant writers. There is an industry in a grant writing where they get commissions on getting things through, even if the project is not up to standard in reality. They can make the good appear brilliant; they can make the bad appear good. They overrun true projects funded by true local champions that will make a difference in communities. Doing that—having members stand up and say, 'This is important to my people. This is important to my town'—is not new. I would like to quote from the ANAO report into the last Labor government:

In one instance, ministers—

In brackets, Albanese—

made an explicit decision to approve an application that was known to be otherwise ineligible under the guidelines…

I'll quote another:

In one instance, Ministers—

In brackets, Albanese—

explicitly decided to waive the project eligibility criteria for an application they wished to fund …