Labor forgets regional Queensland
The Palaszczuk Labor Government must admit the people of North Queensland are missing out on vital infrastructure projects and commit to the LNP’s announced overhaul of Market-Led Proposals (MLPs).
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In launching MLPs two years ago, Treasurer Curtis Pitt claimed it would open the door for private investors. But after two years just one project has emerged from the process – a new toll road in Brisbane.
Labor’s MLP process boasts a success rate of less than one per cent. And projects to receive preliminary approval have been located in Brisbane, while regional Queensland has missed out.
This lack of action has led to calls for an overhaul of MLPs from major stakeholders including the Property Council. Queensland executive director Chris Mountford is calling on the government to “streamline decisions and create greater certainty through the assessment process”.
It’s no coincidence the Property Council is calling for exactly what the LNP has already publicly announced as our policy, which is a complete change to Labor’s MLPs framework.
Our overhaul includes relaxing the strict criteria and speeding-up the approvals process.
Under this do-nothing Labor Treasurer, MLPs have failed to drive investment and create jobs.
Meanwhile, we’ve seen massive cuts to infrastructure investment in Townsville and an unemployment rate reaching its highest recorded level.
Sadly the people of Queensland are being let down and left behind by this government.
Only the Liberal National Party has the plans to drive growth, create jobs and build a better Queensland.
Scott Emerson
Shadow Treasurer
Not the man from Snowy River
There was movement in Mount Isa
As the word had got around,
That the Mardi Gras had leaped and got away.
It confused a thousand people,
It was worth a million bucks
But most of us could barely give a dollar.
George Harley
Mount Isa
Battle is not yet over
While there has been a lot of focus on Adani, it’s not just mining jobs at risk from Labor’s Left anti-development stance.
High value agricultural development and job opportunities will be lost in North Queensland if Labor persists with their plan to re-introduce tougher restrictions on what farmers can do on their land.
Farmers warmly welcomed the LNP, the Katter Party and the Member for Cook joining to vote down the Palaszczuk Government’s harsh vegetation management laws last year.
However the battle is far from over. Key figures in Labor’s dominant Left faction have vowed to ‘seek a mandate’ to bring the same flawed laws back again if re-elected, while green groups have formed an alliance to campaign on the issue.
The State Government would do well to remember though activists in Brisbane may love their ill-conceived vegetation management laws, the proposed changes were opposed by farmers, indigenous groups, the property industry, the mining industry and lawyers. Labor’s determination to re-introduce these flawed laws just shows they have no plan to develop the north, and it goes against everything the Federal Government is trying to achieve with its White Paper on the Development of Northern Australia.
With North Queensland’s unemployment rate among the highest in the state, you would think the Palaszczuk Government would be doing everything it could to support jobs, not putting up roadblocks.
Russell Lethbridge
AgForce Northern President