Matt Smith
Leichhardt · Australian Labor Party · Australia
“But what did those opposite do during this time? They talked it down, called for rationing and scared people. There was a marked decrease in tourism leading into Easter because words matter. But so do actions, and, on this side of the House, we do actions. Today is a great day for actions. Paid parental leave—26 weeks.”
“The world changed. Things that we didn't think could happen happened. A war on the other side of the planet impacted supply lines. Facebook changed the way we gathered information, changed the way we got our fuel, changed the way we got our fertiliser.”
“The minimum wage is increasing by 4.75 per cent. That is a noticeable difference. People will feel that that in their hip pockets, and that money will flow on. People will have the confidence to go take the kids to a movie and make sure that the birthday party goes the way that it should. It is a fantastic thing.”
“It was, as Senator Bragg said, a vacated space for 20 years. If you go back three years before the space was vacated, you get $25 scripts, something that we have proudly bought back in so people once again are not making a decision between health and food.”
“That is a holiday in beautiful Far North Queensland with a trip to the reef and out to the Daintree and to the crocodile farm! That is what we're delivering: cost-of-living relief and great holidays in the Far North! I'm proud of what we've done here in our 12 months.”
“I rise to support the Major Sporting Events (Indicia and Images) Protection Amendment Bill 2026. We'll do the legislative stuff first. This bill modernises the Major Sporting Events (Indicia and Images) Protection Act 2014 to ensure it remains fit for purpose.”
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“People need to know what is coming and how to react accordingly. This freeze gives pub owners and club owners throughout Australia that surety. Be they small businesses, larger pubs or the little country town ones, they'll know what is coming next. This is obviously a targeted measure. It is specifically for tap beer, for draught beer. That is because that is where our people are. It is holistic approach to cost of living and to encouraging small businesses. It is to get people into the pubs again, to chat again, to make sure that we have that social cohesion, to relearn what it's like to be with each other. The kids that are coming of age now, 17 and 18 years old—like my own daughter, who is 17—will start hitting the pubs in a couple of months. She went through COVID. She missed a large part of her development socially.”
“It's their first bit of real responsibility in the workplace. It's how I hope my children will work their way through university, the same way my sister did. It says something about the Australian identity, and I couldn't be prouder to get behind it. Now I will get to the nitty-gritty of the whole thing. This is a 2025-26 budget measure to pause the automatic CPI increase which used to be every six months. So every six months there would be an increase, two per year et cetera—in February and August. That's a day not necessarily circled in anyone's calendar but a day that rolled around nonetheless. Without these excise increases occurring it will provide the stability that business needs for forward planning and for consumers. Stability is the No. 1 goal that you need to provide for any kind of economic development.”
“It's testament to what a cold beer means that we have someone like the member for Kennedy held up, placed on a beer and celebrated not just in his community but right across the country. It is a truly special thing. People went to that pub for that beer, supporting that local business. Macalister Brewing, a little bit further north, looks out over the canefields of the western arterial. It has a fantastic array of beer. People go there for the experience—the taps, the kegs and the whole thing. It is part of a North Queensland afternoon. We have so many great breweries and so many great little country pubs dotting the area. We are bringing people back to them. This is how a lot of people get their first start while at university—getting their RSA, pulling beers and making a dollar.”
“It has become a quintessential part of the Australian identity. But it is about more than supporting the Australian identity and more than a cost-of-living process; it is bringing support to small businesses. We know that it was hard during COVID. Cairns is a service-industry city. You remove the service industry and it makes things very difficult. We need to bring people back into our clubs and pubs, particularly those supporting independent brewers like Copperlode brewery, up my way, who have honoured the member for Kennedy with the Patriot pale ale. I am waiting for mine, but I'm told I have to have been 50 years in the House—at which point I will be 96 or dead!”
“All of them are places where Australians gather to tell stories, have a great time and, yes, have an ice-cold beer. Knowing that beer is frozen and that it is cheaper brings more people to those environments. It helps our social cohesion and keeps that great Australian tradition of the Friday afternoon beer or the Thursday afternoon beer continuing. I am very much looking forward to getting home at the end of this week and going to my local, the Trinity Beach pub, looking out over palm lined beaches to the Coral Sea. It's beautiful. My mates are going to gather around, and we are going to have a few beers to celebrate Christmas, to celebrate being together and to celebrate mateship. We've known each other forever. That has been the common denominator: we meet for beers at the pub.”
“Having a beer after a week at work is an Australian tradition—heading to the local with your mates, having a chat, unwinding for the week and, particularly in Far North Queensland, bringing your own stubby holder because the schooner is going to get warm before you finish it. As I travel up and down the cape through my immense electorate, I run community offices during the day, but I know that I'm going to get most of the engagement that night at the local pub, pulling beers and chatting to the road crews, the public servants who are done for the day and the FIFO workers. Everybody congregates at the local, be it the Bamaga Tavern on the very edge of the northern Australian tip, the Wongai pub on Horn Island, the Grand on Thursday Island or the Exchange Hotel in Coen. All of them are the heart of Australia.”
“Beer is something I'm excited to talk about. I rise today to speak on the Excise Tariff Amendment (Draught Beer) Bill 2025 and the Customs Tariff Amendment (Draught Beer) Bill 2025. Beer has a rich history dating back to Mesopotamia and Ancient Egypt some 5,000 years BC, where it was actually safer to drink beer than water and it was even used as a form of currency. My own father experimented with brewing and tried to make a Cherry Ripe based beer, which was not flash. You should leave that to the professionals. And, as of now, we are making it easier for the professionals.”
“My question is to the Minister for Education. What is the Albanese Labor government doing to help Australians with a student debt and to make our education system better and fairer? What has been the response?”
“It is something I know this side is very proud of, something I know that we hang our hats on and something that I know makes a difference.”
“When we go to an urgent care clinic—as I had to do to get my daughter's X-rays—we know that all we need is a Medicare card. When Minister Butler came we up, were talking to a woman who had been attacked by a dog. She'd only heard about the Medicare clinic a little bit. She rolled in and got stitched up. Her wounds were cleaned and she was home within 45 minutes—unheard of for that kind of treatment. If you go to any of the major hospitals, you can be in ED for hours and hours. But, with just her Medicare card and our investment in Medicare and the urgent care clinics, she got home, she was comfortable and she was relieved. She had no idea who Minister Butler was when she was relaying this story to him, but it was a nice thing to see how the investment works for people on a day-to-day basis.”
“It is the largest single investment in Medicare since its inception. It is something that we should be proud of as a nation. I have lived under the regime of the US medical system, knowing how much it can cost without that safety net. Now the safety net has grown. One thing we can all agree on is that your postcode shouldn't matter in how you get healthcare. Your income shouldn't matter in how you get healthcare. I represent some of the most remote and disadvantaged places in the nation. Things like rheumatic heart disease, which is basically eliminated in the rest of the first world, runs riot through the cape. But, because Labor invests, we can give hope, we can give opportunity, and people know that when they show up to a doctor at one of the 24 bulk-billing clinics in Leichhardt, all that they need is their Medicare card.”
“Mission Beach is one of the most beautiful places in the country, outside of Leichhardt. It has palm-lined beaches, crystal-clear water and, in 2021, no GP clinic. When last I checked, in 2021, those opposite were in charge. One of the most beautiful places in the country could not hold a GP. That's incredible! But I'm pleased to report that they now have one. The people of Mission Beach—an ageing and retiring population—now have access to a GP on a regular basis. That's because of the Anthony Albanese Labor government. That's because of Medicare. That's because of the investment that Labor always puts into people's health and people's wellbeing. It's who we are. They talk about the credit card. They talk about the numbers. They talk about slogans. But $8.5 billion isn't a slogan; it's a commitment.”
“by leave—I'm very happy to continue my remarks on this motion brought forward by the member for Bowman. Medicare is one of Australia's great success stories, and while we can throw numbers about, the simple thing is that facts don't care about your feelings. In Leichhardt there are 24 fully bulk-billed practices helping families and kids. Bulk-billing rates in Queensland alone have gone up by 3.4 per cent. That is up despite what those people opposite would have us believe. Facts and figures don't lie. I'd like to talk about a little town not actually in my electorate. It's called Mission Beach and is about an hour and a half south in the electorate of Kennedy. But I'm sure the member for Kennedy won't mind—we have a passport-style arrangement going on there.”
“I'm not going to go and help my friends and her friends pack up her office because she's not coming back to work on Monday. That's got to end. It's not acceptable anymore. And I am so relieved that other men stood to talk on this today, and I hope more men will stand up and follow their lead and take control of this once and for all and stop this. We are better, our nation is better, our men are better and our women deserve better.”
“We can build them back up to be who they want to be, to be who they should be.' Nobody wants to behave like this. The perpetrators don't want to be this way. The victims certainly don't want it to be this way. So we have to find a way, together, to shine that light, to deliver that help. If you are one of those people who can't control themselves, who are having trouble with domestic violence, then seek help; find a way. Let's be worthy of the people who love us. Let's be strong enough to stand up in the pub or the locker room or at work and say: 'This isn't acceptable. This is where you go to make that change. This is what your family deserves.' I'm not going through this again. I'm not going to get that phone call. I'm not going to walk into a place where somebody I spent time with used to be.”
“The manosphere, the internet, toxic masculinity—all these things are contributing to create a world that is less safe for our women and children, and tackling that is the purview of other men. Statistically, one in 11 men will admit to committing an act of physical violence on their partner, which means, if you have a cricket team, one of your teammates—statistically—is a perpetrator. That's a very sobering reality. But it is not hopeless. I visit many women's and domestic violence shelters. I speak right across the Cape to rural and remote communities. And I know that the women are taking the lead. They want to help the men. At a recent forum of remote Indigenous domestic violence shelters, the women implored me: 'We have to help our men. They are broken.”
“When it was time to go, he killed her and then he killed himself, leaving that child an orphan who has to live with that. It is a stain on our country and our community that that little girl will grow up knowing what her father was capable of and without her mother's love. This happened during the campaign, and it has driven me to reach out to the families commission and to work with the member for Hunter to find a way through and find a way to stop this, because this is a man problem. This is men—primarily men; not always, but mostly men—inflicting damage on the people that we're meant to love, the people that we should protect and the people who should feel the safest around us. And the help's not coming.”
“I rise to speak in support of the motion marking the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. I commend the member for Forrest and the member for Bonner for contributing to this motion. It is an area that is sometimes devoid of male voices, and it should not be. First, a statistic—we know that one in four women and one in 14 men have experienced violence by an intimate partner since the age of 15. This is a shocking statistic, and, sadly, one that we know to be very true. My own electorate is obviously not immune. We are incredibly overrepresented in domestic violence. It is, unfortunately, something that I've been dragged into. A friend of mine, a work colleague, at the most dangerous time of her life, was preparing to leave her intimate partner, the father of her child.”
“When aged care continues to be rolled out, our programs matter. The word 'neglect' will never, ever be able to be used in conjunction with the way a Labor government treats our elders.”
“I was sitting at the funeral of an elder in the Torres Strait whose family was telling me how he'd built the school, cut down the trees and then worked his way down the Cape. These are the people we owe everything to—everything—and for 10 years they were left to languish. Now, as a political pointscoring job, we're taking a swing, when work is being done right now to improve the situation and the lives of our elder Australians. We care and acknowledge what our older Australians have given to us. One day I will have the privilege of looking after my parents. I've got to convince them to move from Victoria to Cairns, but they'll get there—the weather will probably help! That is an honour that I don't shirk, it is an honour that we in this place do not shirk, and it is an honour that we on this side do not shirk.”
“It is something that we are tackling—83,000 aged-care packages into people's homes to keep them longer where they grew up. Everybody knows there has been a problem, but only one side seems interested in fixing it. If those opposite had been interested in fixing it, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now. I wouldn't be advocating for residential aged care right across the Cape. We wouldn't have to bring the elders down to the Pinangba Hollingsworth elders centre, where there are wings for each individual community. People could stay close to home, where the Songlines are, where the Dreaming is. But it's not just Indigenous communities. It's Cooktown. It's Weipa, Mossman, Mareeba—large towns of up to 10,000 or 15,000 people. The old people built these towns.”
“They provided opportunity for all of us. Neglect! Do you know how many residential aged-care centres there are north of Cairns? One—the Star of the Sea, on Thursday Island. That's it. It is 2½ days of driving from Cairns to Bamaga. From there you hop on a boat and go to Horn Island, where you hop on another boat to get to Thursday Island. There are a lot of people between Cairns and the Torres Strait who deserve aged care, have deserved aged care and have never received it. In areas where culture breathes and lives, it is important to elders and their community that they live their ageing days on country and that they die on country. Neglect has robbed that from those communities. There is a massive amount of work to be done.”
“I want to thank the member for the opportunity to talk about some of the difficulties facing the aged-care system. I don't think it's any surprise that there are challenges out there. After decades of neglect from those opposite, the LNP, we are working hard to rebuild a system that fell apart. I am not the one who came up with the word 'neglect'. The royal commission told us that the system was broken, neglected by the LNP, and Australians agreed. Neglect—let that word hang in the air. The greatest honour that we have is to take care of our old people. When the word 'neglect' is used, thrown around by nothing less than a royal commission, then those who are responsible should hang their heads in shame. It is a disgrace, a national disgrace. Our old people built this country. They provide the culture.”
“When she initially hurt herself, I was very thankful for the urgent care clinic where she could go grab a quick X-ray and get home. On the subject of Medicare, this week there are now 24 fully bulk-billing clinics right across Leichhardt. But back to Sunday with the beers and the super-sized Village People—the beers will be cheaper because of the freezing of the beer excise. My mate Schooner can shout because his HECS debt has just been reduced by 20 per cent. The bloke pulling the beers is going to get his super at the same time as his pay, his penalty rates are enshrined and he can now save for a house, thanks to five per cent deposits. That's why the Far North is going to be better this week—all thanks to this Anthony Albanese Labor government. I'm really looking forward to getting home.”
“This weekend, I will be back in Leichhardt. Let me tell you, the group text has already fired up and we are planning to grab beers on Sunday. I've known this group of men for decades. We all used to be basketball players, but now we're construction workers, firemen—I just realised we sound like a super-sized version of the Village People! But that's not the point. The point is I will be home. Thanks to the Albanese Labor government, home is a whole lot better this week. My daughter has just finished year 12. She's not really sure what she wants to do, but fee-free TAFE is available to her and thousands of others around the country who are just finishing their high school journey. My other daughter is recovering from a knee reconstruction.”
“I'm happy for the people of Australia and for my children, knowing they will have continued access to excellent health care.”
“That little green card opens so many doors and gives people so much quality of life. That's why it's exciting that we've added extra urgent care clinics right across the country, including, very soon, one for the northern suburbs of Cairns. For those unfamiliar with the geography of Cairns, the northern suburbs are cut off when the floods come through almost yearly. We are isolated from any kind of medical help. An urgent care clinic will address that need. The aged, the young and the people who need a top-up of their medication will be able to get in to see a doctor, get checked out and get home where they belong without having to brave the floodwaters that come across our highways. I'm very excited that bulk-billing has been extended.”
“I rise today to speak on Medicare, built by Labor and delivered by Labor. This extra commitment adds $8.5 billion for people to get in to see GPs and get the health care they deserve. When I was playing in the United States, I took a hit to the face. My bottom lip was almost torn. The university I played for spent hundreds of thousands of dollars repairing me. A couple of years later, I blew out a shoulder—another quarter-of-a-million-dollar bill for those who were looking after me. In 2019, I had a stroke. Thanks to Medicare, I spent three days in hospital and was able to come out with a clean bill of health and no bill to pay. That is the beauty of Medicare—the equity of health care for all Australians. It is something we on this side of the House are proud of every single day.”
“Without the balance, I'm losing one or the other, and I can't lose one or the other. You would destroy the far north. We cannot go without our mining. Our mining will drive the energy transition—the silicon in the solar rooftops, the tungsten in the wires and the aluminium that is powering basically everything in this building.”
“There is no better place to demonstrate why this bill is needed than Leichhardt, because we need to give our industries, including our farmers and our tourism industry, the surety that they need to continue business, continue to bring wealth to the area and continue to drive jobs and economic development in my region, but we also need to protect the natural assets that allow us to do so. Our farmers need to be able to keep farming. Our tourism operators need a healthy and thriving reef. The reef and the Daintree are symbiotic. One cannot exist without the other. They have to be protected. We need to have regulations that work both for environmentalism and the industry. Otherwise, we hang out electorates like mine to dry. I hear multiple arguments that we're going too far or not going far enough, but the balance is critical.”
“My name is Matt Smith, and I'm of the Far North. The member for Kennedy is correct. The story of the north is told by farmers over generations, be it cane, bananas or cattle. It is told by the songlines of 60,000 years, celebrating the country, culture, sea and air. It is told by the tourism industry that delights people from all over the world as they visit our two World Heritage areas. We support industry and mining. We have tungsten, zinc, bauxite and silica, the tools required for the energy transition. All of it is in abundance in my beautiful part of the world, which is a place I'm very proud of and a place I know the member for Kennedy is very proud of. He speaks of it passionately. Nobody loves the land like a farmer. Nobody loves the reef like the tourism operators. Nobody loves country like mob.”
“My question is to the Minister for Resources and Minister for Northern Australia. How is the Albanese Labor government ensuring a strong resources sector that creates good and well-paid jobs in Australia's regions? What proposals are threatening Australia's resources sector?”
“We're looking forward in the communications—there is a big policy push that will help and that's a universal outdoor mobile obligation. The UOMO—that's a mouthful—will require Telstra, Optus and TPG to provide access to outdoor mobile SMS and voice coverage right across Australia. They will be able to leverage their existing mobile networks or use low-Earth-orbit satellites using direct-to-device technology. This is the change that is needed in regional areas. This is the change that is going to make a difference to the kids studying in Aurukun. This is going to make travel in the cape safer should you blow out a tyre or hit a pig. This is going to allow health to be done over telehealth, giving better health outcomes. It is great news for my community.”
“So, while they try and pin private commercial decisions on us, I wonder what else we can get blamed for here. Fantales were discontinued. I miss them dearly. Is that Albo's fault? Unlike those opposite, when something is impacting Australians, we step up. Since the 3G shutdown, the former communications minister convened a roundtable with the telecommunications industry, regulators and consumer advocates to reflect on Australia's 3G switch-off. This allowed discussions to happen about what we can do better when Australia transfers to new technologies in the future. We will give the people the reception that they need and that they deserve, and that they needed and deserved a decade ago. The action is being taken now.”
“Our cane growers are now using connectivity to check their crops, understand their run-off and make sure they can handle their pests. It is also part of the Better Connectivity Plan for Regional and Rural Australia, which will deliver $1.1 billion from 2022-23 to 2029-30. The 3G shutdown, for better or worse, is happening. It's no good looking back; we should look forward, and there's no doubt that Australians in some of the particularly regional and rural areas are experiencing poorer connectivity because of this. But this was a commercial decision made by Telstra, Optus and Vodafone, and it seems that more often than not the opposition's answer to everything is to blame the government or the Prime Minister regardless of whose decision it was.”
“That's why we in Labor are investing in telecommunications: $55 million for round 8 of the Mobile Black Spot Program; $50 million for Regional Roads Australia Mobile pilot programs; just over $115 million towards 74 projects that respond to local priorities with the objective of maximising economic opportunities and social benefits for regional and remote communities, as part of round 3 of the Regional Connectivity Program; and, as part of two successful rounds of the On Farm Connectivity Program, over $30.4 million in rebates, delivering thousands of connectivity solutions for primary producers, with another $20 million committed to round 3 of the program. Connectivity doesn't just mean phones; it increases the yield of our farmers.”
“I could make jokes about how, when I drive to Coen or Bamaga or Weipa and spend nine to 12 hours on dirt roads, my Spotify doesn't work and whoever is driving with me has to listen to my singing, but that's not really the point. It's dangerous. It's always been dangerous, and there has never been coverage there. It doesn't matter how many Gs you put in front of it. I've been in this role for six months. We've got commitments to get low-orbit satellites and to get 100 per cent of Leichhardt covered with mobile coverage, from three per cent. That's not on this government; that's on every previous government: 97 per cent without coverage. That's impacting health, education, transport, small business—all the things that the other side claimed to support but ignored. There were regions that mattered, but apparently mine didn't.”
“I rise today to speak on the motion moved by the member for Mallee. I'm glad to have the opportunity to talk about telecommunications, especially given my electorate and its struggles to get solid phone coverage. I can say with absolute certainty that everyone on this side wants and supports better telecommunications, especially for the regions. We can say that with confidence because we didn't try to downgrade the NBN the first chance we got. You should have access to quality communication services no matter where you live. Be it Canberra or Cairns, Sydney or Seisia, Melbourne or Mapoon, you deserve good coverage. Sadly, that is not the case. My electorate is vast, it is empty and there is not a lot of coverage. Ninety-seven per cent of Leichhardt has no mobile phone coverage.”
“I spoke to David in July to donate money so that the children who attended would have Christmas presents this year, and I looked forward to spending December with him, because the man's energy was infectious. He went from go to woah, doing 16-hour days in the lead-up to get everything ready at the boarding school and make sure that Christmas meant something to every single person in Cairns, no matter what their station was in life. Our community owes him a debt of thanks, and he will be very missed.”
“I rise to speak to the memory of my friend David Lennie, who tragically passed away aged 54 in September this year. David was known to the Cairns community as the man who ran the Cairns Community Christmas Lunch, a free lunch that last year fed over 500 people of varying backgrounds and demographics. It gave them a place to be with each other and provided joy. Over 120 volunteers came in at the behest of David and fed our community, gave refugees a place to stay and gave homeless people a day to feel wanted, valued and loved. David was a man who believed in giving back to his community and did so in spades. He will be very much missed.”
“Let me tell you how we over here are delivering for Australians. You already know the high points—record investment in Medicare, the Bruce Highway, HECS relief, five per cent deposits and more childcare centres in the Far North—but all of this can seem a little bit abstract. To give it the clarity it deserves, let me walk you through a random Saturday. The youngest rolls her ankle at sport on Saturday morning, but it's okay because a Medicare urgent care clinic is just around the corner. They can get an X-ray and a bit of reassurance and get home with just with their Medicare card. Perhaps they get an ice cream. They're feeling pretty good. Mum and dad feel pretty good. Their HECS debt has been cut by 20 per cent, and they are starting to look around at open homes because the five per cent deposit has opened up the door to homeownership.”
“He started answering the phone at one point, which—look, we weren't thrilled with that! But he did his best, I wish him all the best in the future, and, as he knows, he is welcome back in our office at any time.”
“Their fresh perspectives often highlight what needs to change for a better future. Thank you for your time in my office, Noah, and thank you for preparing this speech for me. Noah was a really great kid. He took the time to listen and learn, and he showed a real interest in the democratic process and what it felt like to be on the ground helping constituents. He travelled with me up to the tablelands to hold community offices. He sat with elders under the tree. He sat with me and former member Warren Entsch as we discussed some of the issues that were happening in the region. It's really inspiring to have a young person, at 15 years old, put their hand up like that and really show an interest in the future of their country and want to make a difference. He was a really great kid.”
“Fortunately our prime minister announced Australia's new 2035 climate target, at 62 to 70 per cent reductions in emissions from 2005 levels. This is a bold step for our country, giving young people hope and a clear goal to work towards as we push for real action both locally and across the nation. Noah was also interested in how young people could get involved in politics beyond youth councils, parliaments and advisory committees. I told him that volunteering is one of the best ways to start because it opens doors and creates opportunities for younger people. I also taught him how to work with constituents, how to listen, how to stay calm and how to do your best to help them. Spending the week with Noah reminded me how important it is to listen to young people.”
“The speech I'm about to read was written by Noah Solomon, affectionately known as the work experience kid. In September I had the privilege of hosting Noah Solomon, a year 10 work experience student, in my office. Over the week they sat alongside my team and listened to the concerns of local constituents and joined me at meetings. Noah raised some important issues that young people really care about right now. The main concern he highlighted was climate change. He spoke about the problems caused by the climate crisis that affect young people directly like extreme weather events, damage to homes and communities and ongoing uncertainty about the future. He also reviewed the recently released national climate risk assessment, which shows these risks are already happening and impacting our health, economy and environment.”
“As I keep fighting for the people in my community, I have no doubt we'll continue to deliver the funding and the support people need. I'm proud to have grown up in the regions. I'm proud to represent the regions, and I know my fellow regional MPs on this side of the House stand with me, in the pride and the passion that I feel for regional Australia. What I've just gone through is yet another example of how the Anthony Albanese government is improving the lives of rural and regional communities and building Australia's future.”
“Cairns's north side gets cut off during disasters. The floods cover the roads, and we would be unable to get to the hospital. This urgent care clinic will allow the people in the north of Cairns to have that peace of mind. The next generation of healthcare workers to staff our new UCC—radiologists, physios and other health workers—will be trained in Cairns, with $27.5 million committed to the construction of the CQU university campus, building on the $50 million already committed during the 2022 election. There was an additional $60 million of federal funding that went to the Cairns Tropical Enterprise Centre, facilitating the training of the first cohort of doctors that will go from go to whoa at JCU in Cairns, because we know that, when we train them at home, they stay at home.”
“We've also invested extra funding to build back better, to make sure that the roads impacted by Cyclone Jasper will not be as badly damaged the next time we face a cyclone. In the last election, Labor committed to delivering improved mobile coverage through the Universal Outdoor Mobile Obligation. This is especially impactful for the northern reaches of Leichhardt within the cape and for the Torres Strait, which have been left behind for too long without reliable mobile coverage. Leichhardt currently has 97 per cent black spot. This is great if you want to go driving and not be bothered for six to 10 hours; it's not so good if you have a flat tyre somewhere on the Byers range. Cairns is already home to one of the busiest urgent care clinics, in Edmonton, and the tenders have been closed for another one to be delivered on the north side.”
“Just recently, we have announced millions of dollars of funding for airstrips in Cape York and the Torres Strait, at Boigu Island, Horn Island, the NPA, Chuulangan and the Cooktown Aerodrome, allowing the mobility that people who get cut off every wet season require. This is good for health. This is good for education. This is good for all of the transport. And the investment doesn't stop there. We've announced $245 million toward replacing the Barron River Bridge on the Kennedy Highway leading up to Kuranda; $210 million for the Kuranda Range Road upgrade; $24 million for the Cairns Western Arterial Duplication and $38 million for the Cape York Community Access Roads project, right amongst the region.”
“In fact, I'm happy to report that, across my electorate, from Cairns right the way out to Joey Laifoo's in the Torres Strait, and throughout the cape, we have some amazing coffee. We have batch-roasted coffee at Bektopia in Cooktown, powered by White Whale—another fantastic Far North Queensland local business. So, while the members opposite continue with their infighting, we're just getting on with the job of delivering for Australia and regional Australia. After a decade of inaction from the LNP, there is a heap of investment flowing through to regional Australia. As a local member, I can tell you that that is fantastic news for Far North Queensland.”