Justine Elliot (Richmond, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Well, locals in my electorate of Richmond on the far North Coast of New South Wales know they can always count on me, and I'll always deliver on all of my promises. I'm really proud to be delivering on all my 2025 election commitments. These include the Tweed Heads Medicare Urgent Care Clinic, $2 million for Byron Bay Wildlife Hospital and $3 million for a North Coast crime prevention infrastructure plan. We officially opened the Tweed Heads Urgent Care Clinic at Tweed Health for Everyone Superclinic last December, and the clinic provides locals with free urgent care that they need, fully bulk-billed, open seven days a week from 7:30 am to 7:30pm and all you need is your Medicare card. So many locals have told me what a huge difference it makes having the clinic there to just really fill that crucial gap in providing urgent health care. Since the clinic first opened, there's been a daily average of 38 presentations, and nearly 60 per cent of patients who visit the clinic would have otherwise gone to an emergency department, so it's taking the pressure off the Tweed Valley Hospital.

Also, our government is taking decisive action to better protect our native wildlife on the North Coast. This includes my 2025 election commitment for $2 million for the expansion of operations at the Byron Bay Wildlife Hospital. Opened in 2020, the Byron Bay Wildlife Hospital operates seven days a week and has treated approximately 7,000 native animals, including hundreds of threatened species. It's a licenced all-species wildlife hospital and operates inside a custom built semi-trailer, making it Australia's only mobile wildlife hospital, which can be deployed during natural disasters as well. Recently I visited their facility in Lennox Head and there I met Biscuit, a tiny bandicoot, who's just one of the thousands of native animals that Byron Bay Wildlife will be able to continue to help because of the funding from our government.

Also, I am equally proud to be delivering on my $3 million election commitment for a North Coast crime prevention infrastructure plan. As a former frontline police officer, I know first-hand how important it is that we have more resources to strengthen community safety, including CCTV. This commitment will fund infrastructure measures for crime prevention and community safety right throughout our North Coast communities. The commitment includes $1 million for each of the Tweed, Byron and Ballina councils, and the funding can be used for CCTV, lighting, bollards, fencing or landscaping—all measures to improve community safety. This has come about because so many people in the community were calling for it and I'm very proud to be delivering it. All of these projects will be completed by 2027.

I especially want to thank all those members of the committee who—

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

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