Gerard Rennick (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak today to call on the state and federal Labor governments to get their act together and get the Pinkenba facility—what was an immigration facility but is now a detention facility—approved to house up to 500 people. There's a facility sitting there. The Queensland Labor government wrote to the federal Labor government back on 9 August about getting it made fit for purpose to house 500 people, but nothing has been done. We're in a housing crisis, and we have got a massive rate of immigration of 600,000 people. That is the rate at which people are coming into this country. It is simply not good enough for the Labor government to be sitting on their hands while this facility goes unused.

I'd also like to mention the fact that Brisbane is quickly becoming a tent city because of the homelessness brought about by Labor's reckless immigration policy. Throughout COVID, you couldn't get the Labor Party to build these facilities fast enough. They were more than happy to criticise the Morrison government at the time for not building these facilities, and they were more than happy to lock up anyone that was unvaccinated or had COVID. Yet now, when it comes to actually helping out homeless people and getting them into these facilities, the Labor governments have stalled. They have stalled, and it is just another example of how the Labor governments are interested in power and control rather than in trying to serve the people. I call on the state and federal Labor governments to get busy, get the Pinkenba facility up and running and house 500 homeless people.