Stuart Robert (Fadden, Liberal Party, Minister for Human Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is wonderful to be here to report back to the House on some of the great work the Turnbull government is doing in the City of Gold Coast, the nation's sixth-largest city. It is a city that in 1954 had 19,018 people in the census and now has 600,000—the fastest-growing city of its type anywhere in the country. Some of the northern suburbs that I represent, Ormeau and Pimpama, have growth rates of 15 and 16 per cent per annum. They are the fastest-growing suburbs in the country. You would expect that in such a vibrant growing city and electorate the Turnbull government would be stumping up with a range of dollars and cents to assist. I am extremely pleased to report to the House that this is, indeed, the case.

Through a fair bit of advocacy work, I am very pleased to report to the House that over the coming 12 to 36 and 48 months $10,658,819 will be spent in Black Spot Program road funding or Roads to Recovery funding. Of that, a staggering $8,013,000 is from the federal government. Eighty per cent of the total Roads to Recovery expenditure on roads in my electorate, over the next four years, will be coming from the federal government. The message is quite clear: the federal government is not taking the Gold Coast for granted. It is delivering, in spades, to the fastest-growing city and the fastest-growing electorate in the country.

Let's have a look at some of these expenditures the federal government is stumping up. There is $484,000 for the Beattie Road, Coomera, between Foxwell Road and Waterway Drive, for a whole bunch of bicycle paths and footpaths that are needed. This is all coming out of the cycleway report section 5 that's been submitted by the local council and other authorities. Likewise, there is the upgrading and reconstructing of the existing road to the industrial collector from the Pacific Highway, the service road to Christensen Road. This is $2.95 million worth of expenditure for that worthwhile project. Likewise, for the upgrade of the road to four lanes and to convert the existing roundabout at Scarborough Street to traffic signals—this is between North Street and Stevens Street—there is a staggering $2.679 million to complete that piece of work. There is a third of a million dollars for construction of a 2.5-metre-wide shared path on the southern side of Musgrave Avenue between Stevens Street and Kumbari Avenue—again, building on the cycleway report.

We'll put a staggering $2.58 million into upgrading the existing roundabout to signal control, to improve the capacity, safety and improved services for pedestrians and cyclists on Napper Road, especially the intersection between Napper Road and Arundel Drive. There is $1.2 million to go into Peachey Road, Ormeau, between Doherty Court and Vaughan Drive, to construct and install signals on Peachey Road access to the Ormeau marketplace shopping centre. And $430,000 will go into the construction of a 2.5-metre-wide shared path on the southern side of Stevens Street, between Musgrave Avenue and the Gold Coast Highway, again building into that crucial area of Labrador.

This is an unprecedented amount of money, in my electorate, under the Roads for Recovery program. Of $10.658 million, over $8 million is coming from the federal government. This builds on an enormous amount of infrastructure work that's going ahead in my electorate for the Gold Coast. There is $95 million to build on stage 2 of the light rail. There is $270 million from the state and up to $55 million from the council, but it was the federal government's $95 million that got this project up and running. It's ahead of schedule. It looks like it will be completed by the end of the year but, certainly, will be opened in the early part of next year—well and truly in time for the Commonwealth Games. It builds on over $20 million in extra funding that the Commonwealth government gave, through a location offset, to get the $300 million Aquaman DC film made on the Gold Coast. That is a $300 million spend—the vast majority of which comes through the Gold Coast and my electorate—and, in terms of investment, an extra $20-plus million in location offset.

To get that sort of expenditure in a single electorate and, indeed, a single city is a great investment and an inspired approach to getting things moving. I commend what the government is doing. It is tangible. It is real. It's happening on the ground, and I'm incredibly proud to serve in a government that is that focused on local communities.