Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We've had a year of Labor and what have we got for it? We've got a raft of broken promises, we've got a country unnecessarily divided over the Voice and absolutely everybody is worse off. But, as someone who hails from country Australia, the thing that has probably distressed me most about this last year is the absolute contempt that this government has shown for rural, regional and remote Australia, and it hasn't even tried to hide that shameful fact. They've cut critical infrastructure out of our regional communities, they've ripped general practitioners out of our communities and they're now even putting your local community pharmacy at risk.

The really weird thing about this is that the much-heralded budget surplus that we saw during the budget all came about on the back of rural and regional Australia. It was our booming resources sector and our fabulous agricultural sector that allowed Jim Chalmers to stand there and say that we had a budget—

Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Excuse me, Senator. I remind you to use the proper titles of members of the House of Representatives.

Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Treasurer's much-heralded surplus that he crowed about so much came off the back of rural and regional Australia. And what is even more distressing is that this government seems to think that a one-size-fits-all city-centric model is going to serve the best interests of this country. It completely ignores the fact that investing in productive infrastructure is what delivers surpluses. In my home state of South Australia, just as an example, $1.3 billion worth of infrastructure projects have either been cut or delayed. The north-south corridor, the Hahndorf township and the Truro bypass are just three of the major projects that were promised to South Australia that now seem to be on the backburner. (Time expired)