Fiona Nash (NSW, National Party, Deputy Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the senator for his question and for his very longstanding hard work for the people of regional Australia. I am delighted to advise the chamber that this morning I announced and launched the coalition government's Building Better Regions Fund. This is a fund that is going to continue to strengthen our rural and regional, and remote communities. As many would know, prior to this we had the National Stronger Regions Fund. I believe moving to the new structure of the Building Better Regions Fund will be a positive step forward and a great opportunity to deliver even more.

What we see is investment in our regions. We have to change the narrative from propping up the regions and talk about negativity into a positive language about investment, because there is an economic case to invest in the regions, which are absolutely the driver of this nation and they underpin this nation's economy. That is why we have made the changes and included not just an infrastructure stream, as we saw under National Stronger Regions Fund, but also a community investment stream, which will allow local communities to expand and identify ways to strengthen their communities. We know that when we invest in the regions it gives those regions confidence. Investing in partnerships with regional communities ensures that confidence builds and that the local people and local businesses with an eye to their future have that confidence to invest. So we will now see applications come forward from the beginning of next year, and out there right now the guidelines are available for communities to start doing their planning.