Cameron Thompson (Blair, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Transport and Regional Services. Would the Deputy Prime Minister inform the House how the government works in partnership with local communities to deliver the infrastructure they need? How important is consultation with local communities?

Simon Crean (Hotham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Trade and Regional Development) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You’ve got to be joking!

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

I cannot see them, but I can hear the sound effects from the corner over here.

Simon Crean (Hotham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Trade and Regional Development) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Crean interjecting

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

I thank the member for Blair for his question. Unlike the last question from the Labor Party, it was a very serious question. Over a number of years, we, through our local members like the member for Blair, who is an outstanding representative for that part of Queensland and who listens to the local constituency—

Simon Crean (Hotham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Trade and Regional Development) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Crean interjecting

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Hotham is warned!

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

I have visited his electorate with him. People really enjoy and appreciate the representation they get, because they know they are not getting listened to by the state government in Queensland. The member for Blair raises a very important issue. Over the years, particularly through the AusLink funding programs, we provided a number of very important funding programs for local authorities to improve their infrastructure, their economies, their economic structure and, therefore, the social fabric in those communities, particularly in regional Australia. One such program—and I know the member for Blair has been a great supporter of it—is the Roads to Recovery program, which delivers funds directly to local government to enable them to fund local road and bridge replacement projects that they need in their local areas. The reason we took the decision to do this in 2001 is that we believe in local government and we believe that they are the closest level of government to local communities. They understand the aspirations of those local communities.

Since 2001 we have delivered $2.1 billion to local authorities across Australia; 25,000 local road projects have been funded by local government authorities with funding under the Roads to Recovery program. We announced in the budget this year that we are going to continue this program through to 2014. So between now and 2014 there will be a further $2.36 billion available for local road projects across Australia. This is serious investment in Australia’s infrastructure, which I have often said is not just the major highways or the major port access roads but also the local arterial roads in all those communities across metropolitan regional Australia. Because of the good economic management that we have delivered in Australia, we can afford to spend this money and provide this funding to local authorities. But, most importantly, we believe they have the ability to be able to do that because they are the closest to those local communities.

Premier Beattie in Queensland does not believe that. He is bullying councils, forcing amalgamations on them, stopping them from having any public commentary about it and, in past legislation, has actually moved to close down any comment by local mayors and local councillors. But we read in the paper today that he has also closed down and stopped any comment from Labor Party candidates throughout Queensland in federal seats. This is interesting because it runs a bit opposite to what the Leader of the Opposition would like to see. He says that he supports local government in Queensland. He believes that they should have a say, he believes they should have been consulted, but he has not been able to do anything about it. Now Premier Beatty is forcing amalgamations on local councils. He is closing down the mayors and the councils and not allowing them to have a say or to seek the view of their local community. He has stopped federal candidates in all those seats in Queensland from having a say. I can guarantee the members opposite that the members for Blair, Leichhardt, Lindsay, Herbert, Dawson, Hinkler and Wide Bay will all have a say, even if the Labor candidates are not allowed to mention local government amalgamations.

We are now seeing who is running Queensland and who has the influence in this federal election, and it is not the Leader of the Opposition. But we also found out in today’s media that the Leader of the Opposition has got form on this issue because, when he was a senior bureaucrat in the Goss Labor government in Queensland in the early nineties, that was when the last round of local government forced amalgamations occurred. That was under the stewardship of the Leader of the Opposition when he was working for then Premier Wayne Goss. And guess what? There was no consultation then either. There were no referenda held about those forced amalgamations either.

The Leader of the Opposition has not got the ticker to stand up to Premier Beattie on this issue and represent Queenslanders properly and give them a say. We have seen that he does not have the ticker to stand up to Joe McDonald. He has been able to kick his brother out of the Labor Party. He has been able to kick Dean Mighell and Kevin Harkins out, but he does not have the ticker to stand up to Joe McDonald or Premier Beattie on this issue, and if he cannot do that he cannot lead a government in Australia.