Ian Macfarlane (Groom, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Energy and Resources) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This week we heard much about the one-year anniversary of the Rudd Labor government, but missing from the fanfare of those opposite was the list of failings recorded over the last 12 months. Despite the Prime Minister’s promise to govern for all Australians, in reality life under the Rudd government has been a disappointment for rural and regional Australia. While the Prime Minister has spent a sixth of his first year in office overseas, he has done little for the people of regional Australia.

The big issue facing my electorate and the broader South-East Queensland area is, of course, transport. In its first year of office the Rudd government has undone the good work of the coalition on road infrastructure in this region. The legacy of the first year of the Rudd government has been to stall the progress of one of the top infrastructure projects in South-East Queensland, the Toowoomba bypass. Members of this place may be becoming familiar with this project, as it is one which I have raised often because of its vital importance to the future road transport between the rapidly growing western Queensland region and the south-east corner, particularly Brisbane.

This road services trucks that go to all parts of western Queensland and north-western New South Wales and, in fact, as far north as Darwin. This road sees heavy transport—cattle trucks, coal trucks and trucks carrying general freight—traversing the main street of Toowoomba. In no other city in Australia—certainly in no other city the size of Toowoomba, which is the largest provincial inland city in Australia—would this be tolerated. For those who are unfamiliar with this road, it is well worth seeing the pressure that it puts on the city of Toowoomba and the motorists who share that road taking their children to school and servicing their business needs and their social needs.

Those who are not familiar with the road may well be familiar, though, with the attitude of the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government. The last time we heard anything from the member for Grayndler about important road projects such as the Toowoomba bypass it was to deride them, belittle the legitimate infrastructure requirements of the region in Queensland and turn them into a game of political stunts and point-scoring—to the stage, as I mentioned earlier in this House, where he brought a letter which I had written to him asking him to uphold the decision of the previous government, the Howard government, which in May 2007 committed $700 million to the construction of this road. But he has such contempt for the people of South-East Queensland that he would much prefer to play politics with the issue and ensure that the people of Toowoomba and the western region of Queensland continue to miss out on such a vital piece of infrastructure.

The attitude towards this road is not the only attitude that concerns me. The economic decline which we are witnessing in Australia under the policies of the Rudd Labor government is alarming in every degree. As we heard in the previous discussion on the matter of public importance, the people of Australia were told that the Prime Minister was in fact—I will get the right words—an ‘economic conservative’. I will read the whole quote from the Press Club. He said:

We have learnt from the experiences in the 1980s. I pride myself as being an economic conservative committed to budget surpluses … This forms the economic bedrock of my plan for the nation’s future.

Yet yesterday, instead of inspiring confidence, instead of instilling the confidence that Australia needs, he plunged Australia into deficit and encouraged people to be concerned about the risk of a recession.

A year has passed since the Rudd Labor government was elected to govern for all Australians. Not only is it not governing for regional Australians and not only is it not governing for the people of my electorate of Groom but it is doing a terrible disservice to Australians and future generations in the way it is mishandling Australia’s economy.