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

It is a great honour to be returned to this place for a sixth term. Indeed, I will continue to work just as hard for the people of the Riverina, albeit a vastly different Riverina than the one I was first elected to represent in 2010. I have some interesting statistics from the most recent election. In the federal election held in 2022, the coalition went from 77 seats to 58 at a 35.7 per cent primary vote. In the same election, Labor went from 68 seats to 77 to form government on the back of a 32.58 per cent primary. When you look at the figures from this election just completed in May, the 2025 election, you see the coalition went from 58 seats to 43 with a 31.82 per cent primary, whereas Labor went from 77 seats to 94 with a 34.56 per cent primary. Compare Labor's primary vote this time, at 34½ per cent, with 94 seats gained, to the coalition losing government in 2022 on the back of a 35.7 primary vote. That's extraordinary. That's absolutely remarkable. They have about 1½ per cent less primary and yet they have 94 seats and are crowing about being in government again, compared to the coalition losing government in a rather resounding way at the 2022 poll.

You also look at the changes in boundaries. You look at the fact that New South Wales and Victoria each lost a federal seat, Western Australia picked up one and the House of Representatives has gone from 151 seats in the 47th Parliament to 150 in this term. I mentioned before the boundaries of the Riverina. The Riverina is the most altered seat in federal history. Indeed, my seat almost represents from Matong to the Illawarra. But Riverina, if you look on the Riverina Wikipedia page—not that Wikipedia is anything to gauge anything by; it's only as good as the editors who upload information to it—for the area designated on that particular web page for Riverina, I do not represent any of that area, geographic, weather or otherwise, in the federal parliament.

The Riverina is basically from Narrandera west. Riverina was long considered the gateway to the Riverina. Throw in Wagga Wagga to get the population necessary to form a federal seat, which at the time which was about 100,000 to 110,000 people. These days, that Riverina area belongs now in Farrer, represented by the Leader of the Opposition. The Riverina in the boundary changes of 2016 added Grenfell, Weddin Shire; Parkes; Forbes; Cowra; and part of Hilltops. I now the represent the entire Hilltops Council area. I have picked up Boorowa and all that eastern end of the Hilltops Council local government area and, of course, have added Upper Lachlan, Yass Valley and Snowy Valleys. I have represented Tumut and Tumbarumba shires before. I'm pleased to say the New South Wales minister Ron Hoenig visited the area just last week to talk about a demerger.

Irrespective of the boundaries and the local government areas, I am very happy to be back here and I thank the people of Riverina—albeit by name, not necessarily nature—for placing their faith in me to continue the representation that I have given.

Speaking of ministers and state governments, particularly New South Wales: in Sydney at the moment, the leaders of the two major parties are working themselves into a lather over how high to go when it comes to the housing crisis. High density housing is the only way to go, they say. We're looking at a situation—I appreciate that this is state politics, but it does have a lot to do with what we are discussing in this chamber and in this place. Sydney's Moore Park Golf Course was partially repurposed into parkland to provide open space for a high-density development.

They're looking at TG Millner Field in Marsfield, the home of Eastwood Rugby Club—and indeed at Rosehill Gardens racecourse, which first operated for thoroughbreds in 1885. And what do they want to do there? They want to build high-density housing. There are only so many green spaces in metropolitan cities. This is madness.

Just the other day, on Sunday 17 August, at two o'clock in the afternoon, a light plane was forced to crash-land at Mona Vale golf course. If we fill in all our green spaces with high-density housing, what happens to those planes which take off from the new Western Sydney International (Nancy-Bird Walton) Airport, or indeed from Kingsford Smith at Mascot, if they get into trouble? But, more than that, for the life of me I cannot fathom the shortsightedness of our city politicians when it comes to housing.

As an aside: on Saturday, I drove from Picken Oval in Croydon Park to Gladesville. It took me nearly an hour to travel the 15 kilometres. It was bumper-to-bumper traffic.

Yet we have the Premier of New South Wales, Chris Minns, and, dare I say, the Liberal opposition leader, Mark Speakman, who want to just go up and up and up. Why? And they're looking for ways and means to have epiphanies when it comes to policy. Well, here's a policy idea: What about the regions? What about west of the great divide, in those great expanses, where we've got cities large and towns small looking for people to come west—looking for employees and for families to establish themselves? But we've got two leaders of two major parties who seem oblivious to the fact that regionalism is the way to go. I just don't understand why this is so. And it's not just New South Wales; it's endemic right across all of our capital cities and all of our state parliaments, where you've got city based politicians who cannot see the wood for the trees, quite frankly, because they think that the only way to proceed, to address the housing crisis, is to build high-density housing in already choked, clogged-up central business districts and beyond.

We've got a real situation in Australia. We've got a housing crisis, but we've also got an immigration crisis. Now, I know there's been a bit of to-and-fro between the Australian Bureau of Statistics—an organisation I know well—and media outlets about migration numbers. But data published by the ABS in December shows that net overseas migration was 446,000 in 2023-24—albeit down from a year earlier. But that is 1,221 people per day arriving in this country—1,221 people who need housing; 1,221 people who, arguably, need jobs, though some of them will be children.

But we've got a situation where we've got open expanses in regional Australia. You go down any high street, any main street, in a rural setting and you will see signs in windows that say, 'Apply within. Jobs available.' And yet we've got city based politicians in state governments—and in this place; I don't let the city based politicians here off the hook—who think that the only way to address the housing crisis is to go up, to build more blocks on top of one another, and to clog up our cities and make sure there's more pollution and there are more traffic jams. And I for one don't get it. I just don't understand it.

I want to give a few thanks to the people who've been very close to me and very supportive of my re-election. Ken Grimson recently retired after having served my office so splendidly well since 2017, but before that he worked as a journalist at the Daily Advertiser at Wagga for 33 years. He and I worked together from 1985 until I left the paper in 2002. Ken has been such a loyal servant to me, and I owe him the greatest debt of gratitude. I wish him and his lovely wife, Robyn, all the very best for a healthy and happy future.

I want to thank Barney Hyams, who was my campaign director for the fourth time. Barney from Batlow, as always, did a good job.

I also want to pay tribute to Mikelli Garratt, without whom the booths would not have been as successfully supported as they were. She did a power of work—she and so many other young people who helped out with the campaign, Young Nationals such as Josef Winkler and many others besides. They are the future, and I do thank them for the work that they contributed.

You cannot do this job without a supportive family, and my beautiful wife, Catherine, I do thank so very much. This was the first ever election in which I kissed a baby, and I'm proud to say I did. It was my granddaughter Adeline Bell. She brought her parents, Georgina and Daniel, up from Melbourne, to support me in the campaign. She had a 'Vote 1 Michael McCormack' onesie on, a little yellow and green number. I took time out from a press conference to kiss Adeline on the cheek. She was just three weeks old. I do thank her and her parents very much—Georgina in particular, who has never missed one of my campaigns. I actually think she likes it a bit more than even I do.

It was a tough campaign. It was a challenging campaign. It was probably the nastiest campaign—not probably; it was the nastiest campaign—I've ever been involved in, but the Nationals came through because the Nationals deliver. I do thank all of those people who voted for me. I do, very earnestly. But I also thank those people who didn't, because I will represent them as fiercely, as proudly and as passionately as anybody in this parliament.

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