Mark Coulton (Parkes, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'd like to speak about the air of optimism that's across the Parkes electorate at the moment. That's obvious, following the good seasons and the fact that the Darling River is now in flood—what I might say is a beneficial flood that's now heading towards Wilcannia and Menindee—with the lakes full and the rivers flowing. But apart from that, and despite the difficulties that our businesses and communities have had with the pandemic, they have a belief in a brighter future. Following some of the programs that we put in as a government, the first cohort of students in the Dubbo Murray Darling Medical School started the week before last. One hundred per cent of those students are regional students who will stay, do their degrees, do their specialty and continue to work.

I met with some interns at the Dubbo hospital who are planning a career in rural medicine—largely, those opportunities are because when I was minister we actually doubled the number of training places for junior doctors. We now have a graduated Medicare rebate, so the more remote the community is that you serve the higher the rebates you get for bulk-billing.

The apprenticeship program has put an extra 160 apprentices across my electorate to fill some of the gaps. We have massive skills shortages from all the professions through the trades right down to unskilled work, and there are endless opportunities.

At Dubbo senior college last year over 70 Aboriginal students completed year 12 and did the HSC. A decade ago that would have been seven. We're keeping those young people at school and opening up opportunities, whether it's employment or further education. Some of those younger people are actually joining the military. We're at a point where unemployment in my electorate is below the national average. Indeed, pre-pandemic—and we're nearly back there now—unemployment in Dubbo was just a fraction over two per cent.

Moree now has more high-vis people working there than people in RM Williams boots with the Inland Rail. There are 500 people at the moment working in the Moree district and building that railway line, with construction about to commence after design in the Narrabri-to-Narromine section. Broken Hill is expecting up to 10,000 more jobs over the next decade, mining things like cobalt, magnetite and gold. Rare earths are being mined at Toongi to meet the needs of a vastly-evolving electronic world.

I hear a lot about gloom and doom coming from this place— (Time expired)