Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is addressed to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Trade. Would the Deputy Prime Minister outline to the House how the government’s investment in infrastructure is helping our regional exporters, particularly in my electorate of Riverina? How does the Deputy Prime Minister respond to recent calls for that investment to be scrapped?

Mark Vaile (Lyne, National Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for Riverina for her question. Of course the member for Riverina knows only too well that it is just as important that we continue to invest in critical infrastructure across regional Australia to support our exporters as it is to open up new opportunities in export markets for them, whether it be the wheat growers in her electorate of Riverina or the manufacturing exporters like Celair-Malmet or Precision Parts that are doing very well. They are in regional Australia, and we support them. We support their efforts of competing across the world and providing jobs in those regions in the export industries.

This year we have committed a significant amount of money to invest in infrastructure across Australia, particularly in regional Australia, through our AusLink program, in adding to the already successful AusLink program and in building it to a $15 billion investment in roads across Australia. But we have also announced a significant investment in communications infrastructure to underpin the need for modern communications across regional Australia as well as in the metropolitan areas. I instance the $3.1 billion Connect Australia package that we announced. It had two components: the $1.1 billion investment for services such as Broadband Connect to help fill in those gaps, particularly across regional Australia; and the $2 billion perpetual Communications Fund, which is going to provide the safety net for regional Australia for years to come.

Kim Beazley (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Beazley interjecting

Mark Vaile (Lyne, National Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will come to that in a minute. So, where the market fails to provide new technology, there is going to be a guaranteed source of revenue to provide that technology in regional Australia for industries like those in the member for Riverina’s electorate.

It is well known that the Leader of the Opposition has referred to these two lots of investment in infrastructure in regional Australia. Firstly, he referred to the Roads to Recovery program as a boondoggle. In this year’s budget we have added another $307 million to local authorities through the Roads to Recovery program, and I bet that the local authorities in the member for Brand’s electorate take the money and want to keep it. They would not want it taken back and they would not believe it is a boondoggle. The Leader of the Opposition described the Connect Australia package as a National Party slush fund. I wonder if the member for Capricornia thinks it is a National Party slush fund when it helps her constituents get better communication services. People in country Australia do not believe, as the Leader of the Opposition does, that it is unnecessary and trivial. They do no believe that the Roads to Recovery program is a boondoggle. They believe that the Leader of the Opposition is unnecessary and trivial.