David Littleproud (Maranoa, National Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Hansard source

That a Western Australian would say that the phasing out of live sheep exports out of the state she represents is not a failure to manage some of the nation's challenges—with all due respect, that just shows the disrespect and the contempt they also have for Western Australians. That is the sad indictment that we see on those opposite—that they talk a big game where they're from, but when they come here they say nothing. They toe the line and they do what they're told, and that's the sad indictment.

It's not just live sheep; let me go to the human toll that is being thrust on regional Australians. In fact, it's great to see the Minister for Health and Ageing here because one of his first acts on getting into government was to remove the designated priority area being restricted to just regional areas. For doctors, the designated priority area meant foreign doctors were only allowed to operate in regional, rural and remote areas, because we didn't have doctors. But, in his wisdom, the minister has decided to change that and extend that so metropolitan and peri-urban areas can now attract those doctors. So if a foreign doctor looks on the internet at Samford, in Brisbane, and then looks at Cunnamulla, in my electorate, I think they're going to pick Samford, with all due respect to the good people of Cunnamulla.

I can give a personal experience from my own electorate: I now have communities without doctors. That is the contempt with which people in regional Australia, a challenge which the health minister articulated today in question time—that is the human toll I face. That is the human toll where I have communities that don't have a doctor or health professionals because the government have prioritised metropolitan areas over the lives and livelihoods of people in regional Australia. That's not 'no-one held back and no-one left behind'; that is regional Australians being treated like second-class citizens. How can you come to this place in good conscience and do that to your fellow Australian? How can you look the people of Mitchell, the people of Burke and the people of Cunnamulla in the eye and say, 'You don't have a doctor because I've changed the policy because it's better to fit in a capital city'? This country is better than that and this government should be better than that, and regional Australia is bearing the brunt of it.

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