Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I commend the member for Oxley for his words, for his advocacy for his constituency, and I observe the passion he had for Frank, a constituent in his electorate who has lost his house. He mentioned him in question time today. He read the thank you list like a Melbourne Cup caller because he had so many of them. I know that he's passionate about his electorate and he's grateful for the work done by so many people. They do it without wanting recognition. They do it without wanting acknowledgement. They do it because they love their fellow human beings. They do it for strangers. That's the Australian way. Thank you, Member for Oxley, for those words.

I acknowledge too the former member for Maranoa, who has just joined us in the chamber, and his work with the Royal Flying Doctor Service, an institution in this country that has saved many, many lives in regional Australia. I acknowledge the former member for Maranoa Bruce Scott for his work post-parliament. Indeed, he was a fine member of parliament, but what he's done post-parliament is something to be admired and respected. Thank you, Bruce.

The devastation, destruction and despair we've witnessed in South-East Queensland and, particularly, the Northern Rivers in northern New South Wales as a result of the recent floods is almost indescribable. During my time as Deputy Prime Minister, I vividly recall having toured flood ravaged areas across this nation. The heart-wrenching images stay with you. The loss of life, livestock, pets, homes and livelihoods is unfathomable, all at the hands of Mother Nature.

Even more recently, in my own electorate of Riverina, I joined the Prime Minister and New South Wales Premier Dominic Perrottet to survey damage to properties, homes and businesses in the Central West of New South Wales, when floods flowed through Forbes, Bedgerabong and other neighbouring areas. I know, from speaking with farmers and small-business owners who were hit hard by those floods, that the losses incurred are more than just bricks and mortar. It's the toll the loss has on those people's ability to want to keep going and the hit to their resilience, the hit to their pride.

But, like those people who the member of Oxley thanked, these are tough Australians. These are Australians who are not afraid to get in and have a go. They're not going to let a flood deter them from doing what they do for their own families, for their own communities and for those strangers they might have a chance meeting with at a time of disaster. Humans can only take so much, but they get back up when they get knocked down, and they get back up again and again. It's like that song with the words, 'I get knocked down but I get up again.'

It was in times of disaster faced by my own communities that we saw a flourishing of grassroots support, this neighbourly support that we see all so often in Australians. Whether it's floods, as we've experienced recently, or bushfires, no matter what calamity strikes, you can be sure that you can rely on your neighbours in the worst of times. Of course, you can also rely on those wonderful first responders: police, ambulance, fire officers, state emergency services. They are just magnificent people. They help to save livestock. They save property and they assist with the recovery and clean-up. They save human lives. The same power and the human spirit that I witnessed in my electorate, we're seeing again and again at the moment in the Northern Rivers and in Queensland.

I commend the member Page for his speech just before the member for Oxley and for his advocacy. I commend the state member, Janelle Saffin, as well for what she has done. She's a former member of this place. I also commend the member for Richmond, with whom I drove yesterday to parliament and we had a good chat. I phoned her during the height of the crisis to see how she was faring. I've got a high regard for her and I've got a huge amount of respect for the member for Page. I saw him at his best when the crisis was at its worst. I commend him, the member for Richmond and other members, and I certainly commend the newly minted New South Wales Minister for Emergency Services and Resilience, Steph Cooke, the member for Cootamundra. She has taken on that role after fulfilling a role in regional health. Dealing with COVID was very hard, and she's gone from dealing with that to dealing with this crisis. She's holding up well and doing a good job, and I know she'll continue to do that for and on behalf of regional constituents.

It's important we reflect on the impact of the floods and how, as a nation and as a community, we band together to support those who have been impacted as they face the fear of what might lie ahead in the days to come and again are on alert with more flood warnings being issued overnight. We stand by our colleagues and we stand by those people who are in harm's way. We've all witnessed the inspiring images through the media coverage: the nightly television bulletins with people on their jet skis and in their tinnies saving others. We've also got the Australian Defence Force. How magnificent are our ADF personnel who come to the aid of those people, and we thank them. Seeing people rescuing others from rooftops in their tinnies or their kayaks, moving livestock or providing warm meals and support is quite heartwarming, and it goes to the Australian way.

It does alarm me, it does concern me, that some use this as political opportunism. I appreciate that they're devastated, but to then go and dump household rubbish at Kirribilli, I do wonder about their motives. I appreciate that climate change is something that is very near and dear to people's hearts, but I do wonder about the motivation of those people when, in these worst of times, they use that as a means to make a political point. We can be better than that and we need to be better than that.

I commend those people who work in government departments for getting the assistance out the door as quickly as they could. Yes, there'll always be criticism. Yes, because of computer systems and other bureaucratic processes, sometimes some people do slip through the cracks. Rest assured, I know that if those people feel that they have missed out, there are avenues by which they can get that much needed assistance. Thank you to those public servants who do what they can to adjust as quickly as possible and amend those people's assistance measures, if they have missed out.

It also goes to the heart of mitigation, and that is why I am a supporter of making sure that we build the levee banks in the right place and making sure that we build water infrastructure in the right place, not just to help communities stricken by floods over and over again but, indeed, to ensure that we store the water so that we can grow agriculture. There's a win-win here; there's a double-bonus here. I look at Wyangala dam—not that this is the right motion to be pushing water infrastructure to grow agriculture—and raising the Wyangala dam wall would help Forbes, which has been flooded many, many times over the past 100 years. Indeed, we want, at all costs and efforts, to avoid these unnecessary floods because the right infrastructure in the right places could help those communities right now.

In closing, we cannot stop Mother Nature, but we can work together to support each other in these times of darkness and despair, because it's the generosity of community and human spirit which shines through in these times of natural disasters. At the worst of times you see the best in people; you truly do, whether it's the SES or whether it's strangers you may never bump into again who help people out. I can't thank them enough. The government stands by and is willing and ready to assist those impacted by the devastating floods now and into the future, as the floodwaters recede—and hopefully they are receding and we won't see, as some might suggest, future downpours like those affecting the poor communities in and around Lismore. Again, I commend the member for Page for his courage in sticking up for his constituents.

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