Terry Young (Longman, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

This was my third election, and it was very different to the first two. The first two elections were fought on policy. It was never personal, and I acknowledge the previous candidates for their professionalism in this area. Unfortunately, this election was very personal from my Labor opponent. There were so many lies told about me, and she brought my children into the campaign, which both sides have always agreed is not on. My staff and volunteers were accused of bullying, which is simply untrue. But of course a little bit of mud always sticks, which my opponent of course knew and went ahead with anyway. For the first time I had corflute signs pulled down, and, in many cases, they were replaced with my Labor opponent's signs.

Of course, the temptation is to fight fire with fire, and I could have pulled her signs down, but I chose not to. I was given some personal information on my opponent which was pretty awful, but I chose not to use it, because I want to be part of the solution not part of the problem. I've said from day one that I'd rather lose playing fair than win playing dirty. It still sticks to this day. Now, we know part of politics is about calling out other politicians or candidates for bad policy, but it should never get personal, especially involving families.

The other challenge that I had, which was a little bit unusual, was to put the Family First candidate last on my how-to-vote card.

I had it all sorted out and ready to go, and then I was given some very, very damning information on this particular young man—who I had actually met—and, sadly, he had come out and spoken in a terrible way about women and Jewish people. It was just awful, and he was obviously a confused, young 19-year-old. I took it very hard on having to make a decision, again, on whether to leak that for political gain or to just keep that to ourselves and not put this young man out there for the media to hammer. We took the decision—I think the right decision—to just put him last on the ballot paper and not put him out there to be destroyed by the media, because they can be very, very hurtful.

The problem was that was he disendorsed by the party—and I thought, 'Well, that solves that problem'—but what had happened was the ballot papers were already printed and he still appeared as the Family First candidate. So then I had the Christian community saying to me, 'Why are you putting a Christian last when you're a person of faith yourself?' Then I had to explain it, and that was very difficult as well. It was a pretty messy election, to be honest. But we move on.

Just for a little bit of history, I was very happy in small business before my political career began. I had reached the point of being 50-years old—or young, as I like to say—and getting to the stage where things had got a little bit easier than in those early days in business. We'd navigated those difficult and costly first few years, where 70-to-80-hour weeks and running on fumes was the norm, and the two businesses I had ownership in were 10 years old, and they'd matured. The temptation, of course, at that stage is just to cruise to retirement for the next 20 years and then do a bit of part-time work in the business in retirement, but I don't think I'll ever fully retire.

But I want to reflect on how good this country has been to a kid who was raised in Kallangur and then moved slightly north to Caboolture, which are both very blue-collar, knockabout communities. I left school at 15 and started work as a garage attendant, or petrol pumper as they used to call them in those days, and spent the first four years of my working life working full time on a minimum wage. I understand what it's like to eat vegemite toast for dinner. I worked hard, and I ended up owning businesses and employing young people who were just like me. I wanted to give back in another way to this country that had been so good to me—hence my run in politics.

I'm also driven by the fact that, in many cases, kids who aren't particularly academic feel like they are second-class citizens. If they don't get a degree, then they have no future. I want to give them hope. I want them to know they can make something of themselves, that they have value and as much value as someone with a degree. I despise this hierarchical system that we've created in our society, where people in some vocations are considered by many as more important than others with other types of jobs, simply because they earn more. Monetary worth should never define our value to society or our self-worth. How well we do our job, our behaviour and what we contribute should determine these things.

We all have our place in society, and we're all of equal value, regardless of our gender, sexuality, race, religion or vocation. Of course, different vocations are remunerated in different ways, for many reasons—the market demands, the amount of sacrifice required through training and the amount of risk needed in each vocation, and that's fair enough—but to say that those on higher incomes are more valuable is just not right. The attendants in this place, who look after the politicians so well, are just as valuable, and I thank them for their service.

Being the member for Longman for six years, I've always visited and met with the various community and sporting groups along with the City of Moreton Bay council to find out the needs of the Longman community. I spent most of my life living in the Longman community, apart from a couple of stints away for work, and, as a result, I know the community pretty well. As a result of these meetings and my experience there, I was pleased to obtain 27 election promises if the LNP had been elected on 3 May. Sadly, Labor only made two of the same commitments—so that's 25 much-needed projects that will either not go ahead, be delayed or have to be funded another way.

It means that the Pine Rivers Cricket Club won't get their lights so they can expand their ever-growing junior and female sides, as there's not enough daylight to support extra teams. The Caboolture Sports Football Club—or soccer, if you want to call it that—won't get their electronic scoreboard. North Pine Netball won't get their courts resurfaced.

The Moodlu Men's Shed won't get their much-needed upgrades. The Bribie Island Surf Club may have to compromise on the size of their extensions to their clubhouse. The Caboolture Snakes rugby league will have to wait longer for their new clubhouse. The kids who use the Bellara skate park on Bribie Island are disappointed. The Narangba Eagles will miss out on stage 2 of their clubhouse redevelopment. The Delaneys Creek Pony Club won't get their building upgrade. The Elimbah Soldiers Memorial Hall will have to wait for its much-needed refurbishment. The Lindsay Road sports complex, Sandstone Point community complex, the Burpengary and Morayfield community halls, along with the Burpengary Pony Club and St Eugene College will all miss out on much-needed CCTV security cameras to protect community assets.

There will be no help with the toilet facilities at the Bribie Island Golf Club or extra shade sails for the Bribie Island Bowls Club or the new cabins at the Bribie Retreat and Recreation Centre so that more camps can be hosted. Stanley Rivers Rugby League Club misses out on a much-needed clubhouse and change room upgrade as their female participation rate continues to grow. The Caboolture netball courts won't get the resurfacing so desperately needed, and the Narangba Crows AFL will miss out on their lighting upgrade to LED.

But the biggest commitment that I was able to obtain was the $74 million for stage 1 of the much needed Caboolture West connectivity initiative. As one of the fastest growing communities in the country, these projects are vital for the Longman electorate, and the message people of Longman got from Labor during the campaign was they simply don't care about the people of Longman. It's not too late, Prime Minister. If you want to show the people of Longman that you do care, I'll be only too happy to discuss these projects with you and get them under way.

I'm going to continue to advocate for the people of Longman and work with the Crisafulli state government and speak to them about a lot of these vital projects, like the four-laning of Morayfield Road. As I said, we're a very, very fast growing community, and the infrastructure is simply not keeping up with the population growth. In the six years that I've been in this place, the voting population of my electorate has grown from 116,000 to 143,000—in just six years. We have over 200,000 people in the electorate, so we need this infrastructure.

Morayfield Road takes a lot of the burden when the Bruce Highway is congested on a Friday afternoon or Sunday afternoon, with people going to and from the Sunshine Coast. Having two lanes, down to one lane and then back to two lanes is ridiculous. We need four lanes all the way from King Street, in Caboolture, right down to the highway. We need an acceleration in the timeline of the Bribie Island Road and the new bridge, four-laning from the Bruce Highway to the bridge, and then a new bridge. It's currently set for completion in 2039. Bribie has the oldest average population in Queensland. Sadly, in 2039, there might be a few people there now that might not see the new bridge. We need to bring that forward; it's a car park.

The Bruce Highway must have four lanes from the Pine Rivers Bridge to the Bribie Island turn-off, and upgrades are needed at the Morayfield-Uhlmann Road exit and Exit 150 Buchanan Road, along with the four lanes and the flyover to Caboolture River Road.

I mentioned earlier the election promise I was able to get for $74 million. This is needed, because they have just started turning dirt on one housing estate in my electorate that will contain 25,000 homes, which will house 70,000 people. To put that in perspective, that's one housing estate that's the same size as the city of Mackay in Central Queensland. These people won't have a way to get to the Bruce Highway, but many of them will be commuting to Brisbane for work. This initiative, planned by the council, will go from Caboolture River Road and the Morayfield Road intersection. A bridge will be built over a shopping centre and a train line to connect to a current two-lane road, which needs to become four lanes, and then it will go out to the highway. I was so pleased to be able to get that promise, but now that it hasn't happened, the council won't have the money to do it on their own—it's a big project for a local council—and that will delay the project another three years, unfortunately.

I also spoke to TMR a couple of weeks ago in regard to the Bruce Highway. I commend the LNP state government for speeding up this process on the Bruce Highway works, including the four-laning from Dohles Rocks Road right up to Bribie Island Road, as well as the extra work on the new exit that I mentioned earlier.

The train crossings at Dakabin, Boundary Road, Narangba Station and Pumicestone Road must be upgraded urgently, as they were neglected by the former state Labor government and their local members for nine long years.

We just cannot cope. People are sitting and waiting for two or three light changes to get across a train line, and it's simply not good enough. I grew up in the area, and I can tell you that all these crossings are the same as they were back in the 1970s, when six people and a dog lived in some communities. Something needs to be done because there are a lot of people living there now.

After two years of meetings, forums and development, I will present in October to the Queensland LNP government my solution to fixing the homeless situation created by this government's irresponsible immigration policy. It's a solution that I've worked hard on with state members from both sides of politics, with local councils, with organisations that are in the homelessness space and with a lot of the charities and churches as well, and the local community. We've come up with a really great solution, and I think it's going to work. I look forward to talking to the LNP state government about getting this going. I'd like to see something by the end of the year because the homelessness in my community is horrific. I've never seen anything like it. When I drive around, I see all these tents and people living in cars—and they're working people. It's horrendous.

In my maiden speech I was positive, and I remain so, despite the incredibly negative nature of politics. I've got a slogan on my billboards that says 'Terry Young gets things done'. I'm going to continue to get things done for my awesome community. Common sense, freedom and respect for all Australians' point of view and their right to have their own point of view, even if I don't agree with them personally, are ideals that I'll always adhere to in my role. I will always try to give the people I serve hope, rather than trying to score political points by creating fear and anxiety. As long as I have the honour to serve in this role, I will try and inspire the next generation to have a go, sharing my personal journey with young ears—both the successes and the failures that I've had in my life, because young people need to know it's okay to fail. In fact, failure is not a final destination; it's part of the journey to success, as we learn more lessons from our failures than our successes and that develops resilience.

I want to thank my volunteers for their commitment and hard work not only during the campaign and nearly three weeks of counting the vote but for their service during the term. I won't mention any names, as to miss one name would be an injustice. You all know who you are and the individual but vital role you played in the campaign. I also want to thank my staff for their commitment and the hundreds of extra hours they did during the campaign, and their commitment to our great party and to me personally. I could not do this without you.

I give a big shout-out to my family and friends, who support me not just practically, by handing out at a polling booth, even though a lot don't like doing that stuff—letterboxing and the like—but also with your love and support during the most difficult and stressful of times. My wife, Alex, and my youngest daughter, Jess, bear most of the load, as they are the ones who live with me! The others have all left home. So thank you, ladies.

Lastly, thank you to the people of Longman for putting your trust in me for a third consecutive term. As always, my door is open to meet with you, and, when you see me out and about, please come and say g'day, because I'd love to meet you. I promise you I will work my hardest to ensure our community gets what it needs. I will continue to speak the truth and use common sense and my life experience to serve you and fulfil my vision to make Longman the greatest community in Australia in which to live, work and play.

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