Anthony Chisholm (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Resources and Northern Australia, Senator Canavan. I refer to Senator Brandis, who said in relation to the Queensland Liberal-National Party that:

They're not very good … I'd say that the state opposition is very, very mediocre …

Does the minister agree with Senator Brandis?

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

I said yesterday and I will say it again in the chamber: I have different view. I think the LNP opposition is doing a fantastic job against a very mediocre government in Queensland at the moment. That is for sure. What the good Senator Chisholm failed to do was to refer to the fact that Senator Brandis said that the government of Queensland was also 'very, very mediocre'. So he is selectively cherry-picking quotes. We all have opinions, Mr President, and we all have particular views. My view is that Queensland would do much better under a Liberal-National government, because a Liberal-National government would be getting on with the job of building things in Queensland—projects like Rookwood weir, near where I am. There are enormous opportunities up there.

One of your colleagues, Senator Watt, came up and had a meeting at the Trades Hall in Rockhampton last week. He spoke about 457 visas but did not say anything about Rookwood weir. He did not say anything about whether he supports the biggest job creating project in the region, the Rookwood weir, which will create 2,000 jobs in our region. Instead he was putting out a scare campaign about some 457s, which, I think, is about 300 jobs.

It does not make sense to me. There are real issues and Central Queensland that Liberal-National Party are focused on, creating jobs in the agricultural sector and creating jobs in the mining sector. We have had Mr Shorten up in Queensland last week and, from all reports I have seen and all the transcripts we have been through of Mr Shorten's interviews in regional Queensland, he did not mention the Adani coal mine once. He did not mention at once! It would create thousands of jobs for regional Queensland, but again it is the Labor Party that is doing nothing and has no plans for jobs in regional Queensland. That is why we would be much better off with a Liberal-National Party government in Queensland. They are doing a great job, and I cannot wait for the next state election.

Honourable Senators:

Honourable senators interjecting—

Stephen Parry (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order on my right! On my right! On both sides! On my right and on my left. Senator Chisolm, a supplementary question.

Anthony Chisholm (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Again I refer to Senator Brandis, who considers the merger of the Liberal and National parties in Queensland may be revisited because of the reintroduction of compulsory preferential voting, and I quote:

… attacks the raison d'etre of the merger.

Does the minister agree that it is time for the Queensland Liberal and National parties to part ways?

Honourable Senators:

Honourable senators interjecting—

Stephen Parry (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! I will just advise the minister that he can answer what parts of that question he wishes to answer.

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

I want to answer it, Mr President—I do want to answer it! I know it is hard for the Labor Party to get this through their heads, that in Queensland our party, unlike in the Queensland Labor Party, is run by its members. Our party is a grassroots party: it is run by the people who turn up to the branch meetings week after week and volunteer their time. That is why I am here, that is who I am representing and that is why I spend so many nights in this place, away from my wife and family, because I want to help their aspirations and their ideas to get support in Queensland.

So, any decision about the Liberal National Party is one for its members. It is not like the Labor Party, where decisions are made somewhere in Brisbane—I do not know where they are based in Brisbane, but somewhere in inner-city Brisbane. Our decisions are made all over Queensland, by all the members in Queensland—by the 14,000 members of the LNP. That is who makes the decisions. So it is not for Senator Brandis or me. No-one cares what our opinion is in the LNP; it is the opinions of the party that matter.

Stephen Parry (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Chisholm, a final supplementary question.

Anthony Chisholm (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I refer to reports out of the National Party room that under Mr Turnbull this government is focused on issues that:

… very few people in the real world are worried about.

Isn't it that the federal coalition is very, very mediocre?

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

Of course, I am not going to comment on matters from a party room meeting. That would be completely inappropriate, so the question is completely irrelevant. But what I would say is that we are a government that is getting on with the job of doing things in this country. We want to get on with the job of doing things. We are the government of this country which is passing laws to ensure that the unions look after their members, not their own interests first. We are the government that has a plan to build infrastructure right through our country. We are the government that has a plan to develop the north of our country—the enormous opportunity that exists in Northern Australia, right across those three states.

I wish that some of my Queensland Senate colleagues would have offices based in the north and people based in the north. But we are proud that we are focused on the future of this country. We are focused on developing the opportunity that all Australians have, and that is what we are focused on—not what scuttlebutt is recorded in the media.