Steven Ciobo (Moncrieff, Liberal Party, Minister for Defence Industry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak about a report in the Gold Coast Bulletin today which says that the police budget has been slashed for the Gold Coast. Regrettably and unfortunately, this is entirely consistent with the Queensland state Labor government's approach to not providing the necessary resources for the Queensland police to do their job effectively on the Gold Coast.

Sadly, we've seen previously the consequences of Labor's complete mismanagement when it comes to the Queensland economy and the Queensland police. We can only remember, sadly, the unfortunate reputation that the Gold Coast developed a number of years back for being the bikie capital of Australia and the home of organised crime because we had a state Labor government that was soft on crime, was soft on law and order, and didn't provide the necessary resources for the Queensland police to be able to do their job effectively. It took the election of a Liberal-National state government to correct that problem.

I've got to highlight today that, under this state Labor government doing the very average job that they're doing, we have now seen frontline police struggling. There are now in fact in the City of the Gold Coast—a city of more than 600,000 people—31 fewer frontline police officers under Labor than there were back in 2015 when the Liberal-National Party was in power. Labor are soft on crime. They're soft on law and order. They're denying the Gold Coast the police resources the city needs. And, unfortunately, we are seeing a consequent increase in a whole range of different crimes on the Gold Coast. I say to the state Labor government: pull your socks up. I say to the state Labor government: it's time you actually provided the Queensland police with the resources they need. The Gold Coast Bulletinand I congratulate them for the work they've done—have the editorial today: 'Ryan treats us like mugs'. It talks about what an average police minister we have in this very average state Labor government.

I will continue to be a strong advocate for the Gold Coast, and I say to the state Labor government that they need to do a hell of a lot better than they've been doing so far. This is coming from someone with a strong track record of investing in law and order on the Gold Coast. We saw the former federal Labor government rip police resources out of the Gold Coast when they shut down the AFP office. I brought it back. I fought for it for the city. The fact is that we delivered the first strike force on the Gold Coast. We brought back the AFP and got rid of the bikies, and I say to the state Labor government that they need to do a hell of a lot better to improve police resources on the Gold Coast. (Time expired)