Matt Smith (Leichhardt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility Amendment Bill 2026 and the important investment it will unlock in northern Australia, and I do mean unlock. There are a lot of technical parts to this. The member for Moreton went over them in great detail. I'm not going to bother.

The fact is that if you look at Australia from my perspective, it's upside down. All of the population is in the south, but all the best stuff—everything that we need—is in the north. Throughout history, the way colonisation occurred was that the population was in the south; in the north, there was not quite as much. The NAIF exists to rectify this—to give the north the opportunity to really, really shine. We shine pretty brightly anyway. Our mining sector punches above its weight. The critical minerals, which will be so important for the rest of this century and into the future, are all in the north. Our tourism is the best in the world. We have world-class attractions. We have places you can go and see that are represented only in Australia and only in the north of Australia. It is beautiful.

Our people are tough and resilient. We handle natural disasters in our stride. We deal with the humidity and the heat. We are a tough group of people. Our farmers reflect that. They are strong. They bring us the best produce in the country and some of the best beef in the world. American McDonald's uses Australian beef, and they use a lot of it too. There are bananas, exotic fruits and avocados. Your hamburgers are better because of what happens in the Far North. At Christmas when you're getting those gulf prawns, the big tigers—they're from the north as well. Our cultural history goes back for 60,000 unbroken years. When you go to some of the communities that I get to represent, English is the third or fourth language. Children will speak to you first in Wik, and it is beautiful.

We are in a position, though, where we can take all of this, add to it and make the north even stronger and, as a consequence, make Australia stronger. We have the potential for renewable energy, massive tidal zones, huge amounts of space, plenty of wind, plenty of water, plenty of sunshine and biofuels. There's so much work being done with sugar—turning sugar into ethanol and turning sugar into jet fuel. Guess what there's a lot of in Leichhardt? There's sugarcane everywhere as far as the eye can see. It's a part of our identity. When I drive home over the Barron River and look over the cane and the vistas going back up to the range, it's beautiful. It screams Far North Queensland and it screams prosperity. It screams opportunity. All these opportunities in our regions are going to help the country grow. But, to make the most of any opportunity, to make the most of any potential, we have to invest in it. If you don't invest in potential, that potential is wasted. That's precisely why the NAIF is so important, precisely why it exists and precisely why it needs to be extended.

The Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility fund is worth $7 billion and is a government development financier providing concessional loans for the development of infrastructure projects right across the north and the Indian Ocean Territories. There is an impressive portfolio of investments in my own seat, including social and affordable housing. There are 490 places. That's 490 homes. It's not just about the jobs. It's not just about addressing the housing situation. It's a place where families are going to grow. It's a place where grandparents will meet their grandchildren for the first time. It is a place where Christmas presents will be opened. It is a place where birthdays will be celebrated and where loved ones will be welcomed. That's what these investments are. They're not just economic; they're also social. If we are going to build the economic future of Australia in the north, we're going to need people and we're going to need places for these people to live. I've inspected that place many times. I'm very excited about what that means for my community.

The NAIF will stick around until at least 2036, safeguarded by five-yearly reviews. The world is changing. The way that we interact with technology is changing. So it is appropriate that this legislation is built to change with it. That flexibility is going to enable us to deliver the right projects in the right areas. The increase from $2 billion to $7 billion is massive. It shows confidence in what the Far North can deliver. It shows confidence in our regions. It shows that this Anthony Albanese Labor government acknowledges that the world is pivoting to the north and is going to pivot with it. I'm so very proud to be part of a Labor government that now has so many regional MPs and so much representation across the north of Australia and that our voices are being heard. The potential, the opportunity and who we are are being recognised. It's about what that means not just for me but for the future of my children, my children's friends and the communities that have sometimes been left behind in economic development.

Every community that I go to across Leichhardt has a plan. They know where they want to go. They know what they want to do. The NAIF is going to help them unlock the finance that they need to get that going. I hear about abattoirs and produce markets and ways to feed the mining camps at Rio Tinto and Cape Flattery. I hear about cultural tourism and what that could mean to these local communities. People are talking to us about geothermal electricity. There's all this potential. It all needs investment, and sometimes government needs to step in to be that investor—to invest in our people and invest in our ideas. That is what the NAIF is for.

A part of that, of course, will be the rest of the infrastructure that we're investing in. That includes better roads. You need that connectivity, which is why the investment in the Bruce Highway, the Kennedy Development Road, the Cairns Western Arterial Road, the Kuranda Range Road and the bridges is so important. These are just some of the roads in my electorate that are going to benefit from that. We're also investing in universities. This holistic approach means that the Far North is positioned uniquely to move forwards, and it is all driven by the NAIF.

I hope through my speech I have shown just how important both the NAIF and government investment are to northern Australia and what northern Australia means to the rest of the country. We are not the final frontier. We are the future. The NAIF allows us to be the best version of ourselves and will help bring Australia along with us. I commend this bill to the House and all urge all members to back in northern Australia.

See this speech in context