Murray Watt (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise tonight to make a contribution, as I often do, about the future of regional Queensland. I'm the duty senator for Labor for the electorate of Capricornia in Central Queensland, and it's an area where I spend a significant amount of time. Both Central Queensland and regional Queensland as a whole have so much going for them. Regional Queensland is a true economic powerhouse. Whether it's mining, agriculture and other traditional industries like that—or, more recently, tourism, education services through some fine universities and vocational education institutions, health care and marine science—the range of industries and jobs available in regional Queensland is extremely diverse.

Similarly, regional Queensland is home to some of the most pristine environments in Australia and the world. Whether we're talking about the Great Barrier Reef, the rainforests up the coastline of North Queensland, the gulf or the grasslands out west, we are truly blessed to have an environment as rich as we do in regional Queensland. Of course, whether we're talking about the major regional cities—places like Rockhampton, Mackay, Townsville and Cairns—or small outback towns, regional Queensland is distinguished by having very strong and supportive communities that bind together in difficult times and support each other through thick and thin.

So regional Queensland has so much going for it, and I'm very proud, as a member of the Australian Labor Party, that we believe so strongly in our regions and that over many, many decades we have been strong supporters of our regions.

In fact, I know that our friends in the Sydney branch of the Australian Labor Party dispute this, but we maintain to this day that the Australian Labor Party was born under a tree in western Queensland, in Barcaldine, so a commitment to regional Queensland and regional Australia is very deep within our bones. But, unfortunately, despite these many positives that lie ahead for regional Queensland, the area is being very badly let down by its members who represent it from the Turnbull government, the LNP members. These members are all different people but there's one thing that really binds them together and that is the fact that, as LNP members in Queensland, they talk big but they deliver little.

I was saying yesterday that whether we're talking about The Nationals in other states or the LNP in Queensland, to their shame, they continue to represent nine of the poorest 10 electorates across Australia. They talk about this and wear it as a badge of pride. They don't admit that it's actually a sign of their failure. These are electorates that The Nationals and the LNP have represented across Australia year after year, election after election and decade after decade. And what have they got to show for it? Continued poverty, continued disadvantage and continued inequality, whether that be looking at the incomes that people are earning, whether that be about unemployment rates, whether that be about poor health outcomes or whether that be about lower levels of education that are delivered to people in regional Queensland and regional Australia. I am not saying that to pick on people in those communities. We think that regional Queensland is a wonderful place with strong economies, job opportunities, strong communities and a wonderful environment. But those communities are being held back in their development and in achieving a great quality of life by the incredibly poor political representation that they continue to get from the LNP and The Nationals in the rest of Australia.

Even today with the Prime Minister's big announcement around energy, which we know was a complete flop and was a cave-in to Tony Abbott, regional Queenslanders are going to be some of the people who will be hurt most as a result of today's announcement. We know that the Prime Minister has ignored the advice of his Chief Scientist in not adopting a clean energy target, which the Prime Minister himself said would help to deliver lower power prices. So regional Queenslanders, as a result of this decision, are going to be paying higher power prices than they need to pay. But in addition to that, the job impacts on regional Queensland will be very stark. All up there are several renewable projects, mostly solar but other types as well, that are under construction and underway in regional Queensland. If you put all of those projects together, they'll be delivering around 1,000 jobs. They are exactly the kinds of jobs that are now at risk as a result of today's announcement by the Turnbull government. So yet again we have an example of the LNP out there pretending they're the friends of the regions and the friends of regional Queensland, but when they come down to Canberra they sell out to their Liberal Party mates from the North Shore of Sydney and deliver things that are actually going to make regional Queenslanders lives' worse.

Labor has a different approach. We want to get behind regional communities. We want to talk about the issues that are holding regional Queensland back. We want to listen to people in regional Queensland about what their concerns are and we want to come up with solutions for what those problems are to ensure that they have an even better quality of life than what they currently do. And that's why, a bit over a week ago, so many shadow ministers joined me in Rockhampton and across Central Queensland to get out and talk to Central Queenslanders, listen to what they want and come up with solutions for the problems that they are confronting. I'll run through a sample of the things we undertook over the course of that week.

On Monday, our Australian jobs task force visited the picket line of mining workers in Tieri. We know the industrial relations minister, Michaelia Cash, has had something to say about that picket line. But what you won't ever hear from her is any condemnation of the company there. Like so many mine companies around them, they are gradually getting rid of permanent workers and replacing them with short-term casual labour hire or contract workers. But Labor was out there talking to workers about what kind of industrial relations environment we need going forward to make sure that people in regional Queensland can continue to have secure, well-paid jobs.

On Tuesday, Catherine King, our shadow health minister, and the Medicare task force of Labor were out talking to drug and alcohol rehabilitation counsellors about the need for more rehabilitation services in an area which, unfortunately, is suffering from an increase in the use of ice.

On Wednesday, the shadow northern Australia minister, Jason Clare, and the shadow finance minister joined me and state representatives talking to tourism operators on Great Keppel Island about what support they needed, particularly from the government's failed Northern Australia Infrastructure Fund, to ensure that we can have more tourism developments and, therefore, more jobs in tourism on Great Keppel Island.

On Thursday, the shadow regional communications minister, Stephen Jones, joined me in talking with a mum who is very representative of so many people in Central Queensland suffering from terrible NBN services. This woman can actually see NBN towers 300 metres from her own home. I might say that this was the site of a press conference conducted by the Minister for Regional Communications, Fiona Nash, and the local member, Michelle Landry. They turned up and did a press conference outside a brand new NBN tower and spruiked about what a great job they were doing. That NBN tower is still not even turned on. There's a tower there ready to service people in Central Queensland, but this government can't get it together to turn that tower on and provide the NBN to people all around it. We also met with many small businesses who are suffering from the shoddy rollout of the NBN.

On Friday, the shadow agriculture minister, Joel Fitzgibbon, joined me to talk with representatives of the meat processing industry. Obviously, Rockhampton is the beef capital of Australia. That industry employs literally thousands of people right across Central Queensland. We were very pleased to do a tour and have a meeting with the meat processors and the workers at Thiess, and to meet with many of the cattle farming representatives as well to hear what they needed.

The week culminated on Saturday with the National Country Labor Forum, where shadow ministers and ALP members from across regional Australia came together and talked about what we need to do to improve the future of regional Australia.

That's what regional Queensland needs. It doesn't need more excuses and more failures from the Turnbull government. They get out there and announce funds, announce structures and announce programs on a daily basis but actually seem completely incapable of delivering anything on the ground, whether it be the Northern Australia Infrastructure Fund, which was announced two years ago and has not created one job or funded one project in regional Queensland, or so many other examples of funds which have failed to do what they needed. Regional Queensland deserves better than this. It's a great place with great people, but it needs a government that's going to get behind it. If the LNP is not prepared to do that, Labor is.