Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is well known that my electorate on Brisbane's south side was hit hard by floods last year. We saw firsthand the destructive force of Mother Nature. We saw also the community spring into action as strangers helped strangers clean up after the worst of the flooding had passed. And it is in this spirit of solidarity that I rise today on behalf of my constituents to express support for the people out in western Queensland, in places like Roma and Mitchell, who have been hit by floods in the last week.

Earlier this week the mayor of the Maranoa Regional Council, Robert Loughnan, contacted me. He knew that I had a bit of an idea of what he was going through with his community. He outlined to me the destruction that has just occurred in Mitchell. Seventy-five per cent of the town's structures were inundated by water. All but two of 30 local businesses were flooded—businesses such as the bakery, which had lost $450,000 worth of equipment. As the council puts it, the departure of one or two small businesses in a small town is a serious matter; however, the loss of 10 or 15 businesses in a town like Mitchell will alter the social fabric of an entire region.

We talked about the destruction, we talked about the clean-up and most importantly we talked about how you make sure all this does not happen again and how you make sure that the infrastructure stands up to the test at times when we are seeing record-breaking floods. A levee around the evacuation centre has been discussed and is worthy of investigation; in fact, it is worthy of action. Having spoken to the member for Maranoa about this, it is important that all levels of government combine to make sure that proper protections are put in place for the future in communities like Mitchell which, I am advised, have not been so affected to such an order of magnitude before. But something big is happening out in that part of Australia in terms of unprecedented flood levels. The mayor also informed me that there was a need for approximately $130 million of work on the regional road network as a result of previous floods, coupled with unprecedented usage of our rural road network by ever-expanding gas corporations.

I started by saying that I am here to express solidarity with the people of my electorate, with the people experiencing devastating events right now. I acknowledge the work of all local, state and federal members dealing with the current flood challenge in western Queensland—in particular, my colleague the member for Maranoa, in working with his local community—and if there were to be any one of us going through this I would hope that other members would express their support for constituents going through this at this time as well.