Yesterday I attended a hearing into the Inland Rail project. The massively expensive project will see up to 40 heavy freight trains a day travel through southern Queensland to Acacia Ridge. (20 into Brisbane and 20 out)
Inland Rail uses passenger lines through south west Brisbane that local residents were promised would never be upgraded to heavy freight. That promise, by Labor Premier Beattie has now been broken by Premier Palaszczuk.
It is telling that neither Premier Palaszczuk nor any of her administration had the courage to front the inquiry to respond to the criticism of the route her Government is promoting.
The Mayor of Logan City Darren Power testified that within 20 years more than 50,000 residents would live with 1km of the train line, putting up with noise and vibration from 1.8km long heavy freight trains 24 hours a day.
The current plan is to terminate the line at Acacia Ridge, and not upgrade the rail link to Brisbane Port until 2040. This stupid idea will put hundreds of additional A double heavy freight trucks and related traffic onto local roads that can’t handle the traffic they have now.
Inland Rail’s preferred alignment also goes across the Condamine floodplain near Millmerran. Building a 2m railway embankment across a major floodplain is a really bad idea. The small culverts being built into the embankment will quickly block during heavy rain and flood out thousands of local residents and businesses.
The much better route through Warwick, along mostly existing freight rail lines was not seriously considered by the ARTC, this is a poor decision.
The budget for Inland Rail now stands at $20 billion and will go much higher. At this cost Inland Rail will never pay for itself. Our investigations into this and listening are going to continue. The more I hear, the more concerned I am about this project.
One Nation always aims to protect honest workers, protect small businesses and simplify our Industrial Relations (IR) system. The current IR reforms need a lot of work to achieve that.
Transcript
[Marcus Paul]
G’day, Malcolm.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Good morning, Marcus, how are you?
[Marcus Paul]
I’m okay. I’m just having a little chuckle at the wankfest going on in the United States at the moment. I get that it’s a momentous occasion. I understand every time a President’s inaugurated that they have to get celebrities up there to sing songs and carry on. But for God’s sake, enough’s enough, surely.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Yeah, I’ve travelled through all 50 American States. I’ve lived there for five years. I’ve studied at one of the top universities over there and I’ve worked over there in eight different states. And I love Americans. They’re absolutely fabulous people, but they’re different. You know, in many ways they look like us. They dress like us. They have similar habits, they’re casual and they’re formal like us, they love us. But mate, they just go over the top when it comes to celebrating things. it’s just for Australians, it’s too much.
[Marcus Paul]
Well, you’d think that there’s no issue with COVID-19. You’d think that America is all this, there’s no social inequality. You think that there’s no civil unrest. It’s all, I don’t know, look, I’m seeing right now the presidential motorcade with the military escorting Joe Biden back to the White House, the bloke looks like he needs a good lie down.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Yeah, it’s a contradiction in America. Wherever I went you can see contradiction. And, you can get a very energetic country like America but there are so many, so many inequalities as well. But there’s one thing that’s very strong in Americans and that’s the love of their country and their passion for freedom. And so, I think there’ll be a lot of Americans holding their breath right now.
[Marcus Paul]
All right, mate. Now you’re on the road driving down the New South Wales coast, you’re around Singleton, are you?
[Malcolm Roberts]
Yes, and what a beautiful day it is. I used to live in Singleton, worked here several times but it’s a glorious day and blue sky. We just driven up the Valley from Singleton. We’re now in Musswelbrook and we went past Bayswater and Liddell Power Station. It’s just absolutely beautiful.
[Marcus Paul]
Yeah, nice, now the federal government’s so-called industrial relations reforms, you’ve had a fair bit to say about that ahead of Senate estimates hearings in March.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Well, they’re going to try and bring in the legislation into the Senate fairly soon, it’s an inquiry at the moment but we’ve had a good look at it and we still got a lot more work to do on it. But Marcus, you know, our aims are always to protect honest workers, to protect small business. And, in this case, to restore productive capacity. And you know, the government is really just playing at this, it’s not addressing energy, it’s not addressing tax, it’s not addressing infrastructure, it’s not addressing over regulation. It’s still making life hard for people. It’s not a real reform at all, it’s just tinkering to look after his mates and the overriding thing with this so-called industrial relations reform, it’s not reform, it’s tinkering with the deck chairs on the Titanic is that their aim seems to be to not upset anyone and to try and please everyone. And whenever you do that, Marcus, you’re coming out of fear.
[Marcus Paul]
Yes.
[Malcolm Roberts]
And so they’re afraid. And that means the country will suffer. These regulations, they don’t simplify and small business badly needs that. The key aspect of this supposed reform from the Prime Minister is to get jobs, mate.
[Marcus Paul]
Yeah.
[Malcolm Roberts]
It won’t get any jobs. It’s just gonna make things more complex. There are some positives in there but there are overwhelmingly a lot of negatives. We’re just going to have to do a lot of work on this.
[Marcus Paul]
All right, now, obviously, on this trip down the coast you’ve been catching up with people who may have reached out to you, made contact, what are you hearing on the ground?
[Malcolm Roberts]
Well, first of all, I’ve got to say how beautiful the country is on the coast coming south down through New South Wales. It’s just green, it’s glorious. And people, I’ve heard from small business, for example, a guy who run, well, I won’t tell you his business because it’s a boutique business and I don’t want anyone to come back on him but he was really talking about how difficult life is under state, federal and local government. Because they’re making things complex.
[Marcus Paul]
Absolutely, could you imagine all that bloody red tape a business owner has to go through these days? It’s just, it’s almost —
[Malcolm Roberts]
But, Marcus, he was telling me things like if you get a permit from the state government to do something and then by the time you’ve finished dealing with regulations for the local government, the state government permits have expired and you’ve got to get it again. And that means more fees. And he was talking about 20, $30,000, I think, 50, $45,000 in one case, just to get consultants in to do the work for the local government. You can’t afford that.
[Marcus Paul]
No.
[Malcolm Roberts]
But one good piece of news. We visited a workshop here in Philly, a large workshop here, well, in Rutherford which is near Maitland. And they’re telling us, they do a lot of work for agriculture and mining machinery and they’re telling us that the price of coal has gone up quite a bit and they’re hiring again which is good for the Valley. And it’s really good for the whole Hunter Valley and Newcastle because most people don’t realise this but for every job in the coal mine there are six other jobs depending upon those jobs. And so the price of coal and the use of coal is extremely important to everyone in New South Wales.
[Marcus Paul]
Well, look, you know, you’ve got a bloke up there in the Hunter who is making a fair bit of noise. I’m sure he’s scaring the pants off of Joel Fitzgibbon but, I don’t know, if things are looking okay or a little better up there in the Hunter maybe Joel might hold on a little bit.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Well, the problem with Joel is his party. His party won’t let him do things. His party has got their foot on the throat of the coal industry and they’re determined to kill the coal industry. I mean, some of the senior people in the labour party have admitted that and said that is what they want to do. And it’s insane. One of the things I did coming down the New South Wales coast, I’m doing a bit of research in southern New South Wales in the next couple of days and I stopped in Port Macquarie and worked for a day and a half with an absolutely astounding Scientist there who’s been going through the Bureau of Meteorology records and mate, the records are just so shoddy and he’s done advanced statistical analysis. Once he’s removed all the the deliberate movements or adjustments. And there’s no warming at all going on. So, this whole thing about coal is just a beat up.
[Marcus Paul]
Yep, all right. Now, well, just on coal, of course, the Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, he’s had a lot to say. Oh, by the way, when you visit these places, do you don on your high vis shirt and you untuck the top of the collar just to show a little bit of chest hair, look all macho like you’re in the moment? And do you have your professional photographer tailing your every move for a photo opp, Malcolm? I’m just wondering.
[Malcolm Roberts]
No, that’s not me. What I’m doing is I’m driving by myself. This morning I’ve got some of my, one of my staff with me but I’ve been driving down the coast on my own. I make all my own arrangements. Take my own notes, I just listen to people because you can’t listen to people through others. You’ve got to listen by firsthand, direct.
[Marcus Paul]
Fair enough.
[Malcolm Roberts]
So, I don’t go for all that crap.
[Marcus Paul]
Well said. All right, mate, listen, we’ve got a listener Gail Thornton who follows the programme. We want you to say hello. Can you just do me a favour, say, good day, Gail. Hope you’re having a wonderful morning. Just say that for me.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Good day, Gail, hope you’re having a great morning.
[Marcus Paul]
See, Gail says on our Facebook page and I’ll have to tell you, you got a little bit of hate on our social media. Mind you, I get a lot of hate on my social media as well. That’s just what it’s all about. But your posts, when we re-share things that you know you and I have a chat about a certain issue, it’s one of the, this is what I don’t get, this is the hypocrisy with it all and on this programme, we will speak to anybody, labour, liberal, callithumpian, you know, we have Pauline, yourself and also Mark Latham. So, we listen to all sorts, we try to as much as we can. We would love to have the Prime Minister or the Premier on here, but they don’t even know we exist or they probably know we exist but their media people don’t want them to come on because they’re probably upset that I’ll- first question to the Premier would be, when are you going to resign? And the second question to the Prime Minister would be, do you take any responsibility for robo-debt? And what about the thousands of people that have possibly taken their lives? So, that’s why they don’t come on. But your stuff that we talk about is well-received, you know, you gotta have your haters for those to really like you, Malcolm, but Gail says, there’s no way that we will listen to anything Malcolm Roberts has to say. So, I just wanted you to say good morning to Gail. She’s one of your biggest fans, I think.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Well, tell her that I’ll be very happy to meet her. And I look forward to her giving me evidence that contradicts my arguments.
[Marcus Paul]
Well, that’s it. Good on you, mate. Always great to catch up, drive safely. You can’t drop by and visit us, I hear.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Not this time, I was wanting to do that and I’ve got two outstanding retired people in Sydney that I want to meet because they’re both very, very good on water. And that’s a critical issue for us but I was hoping to drop in. But if I go anywhere near Sydney, then, mate, I’ve got to lock up in quarantine in Brisbane when I go back. So, even if I just don’t get out of the car. I’ve just got to lock up. So, I’m going to drive through Mudgee and then that way down through Bathurst and then to Canberra that way, so it’s an extra drive but, hey, that’s the way it has to do.
[Marcus Paul]
Ah, look, we’re broadcasting out into those regions right now and it’s pretty good out there as well. You reckon it’s green on the coast. You should see it inland. It’s just gorgeous around 2MG Mudgee area and out to Bathurst to our station 2BS and out to Orange . I love it out there, mate. Look after yourself.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Thanks Marcus. We’ve got to look after this country and stop the wombats ruining it, the wombats in Canberra.
[Marcus Paul]
All right, mate, bye-bye. Malcolm Roberts, Marcus Paul in the morning.
I had a great first conversation back for the New Year with Marcus Paul. we spoke about Brisbane’s snap lockdown, big tech censoring conservatives and councils sneakily using COVID as an excuse to boycott Australia Day.
Transcript
[Marcus] All right, welcome back. 22 minutes to eight. That is of course, New South Wales Daylight Saving Time. Time to catch up with One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts. Happy New Year, Malcolm.
[Malcolm] Happy New year to you Marcus. And thank you very much.
[Marcus] You’re welcome. Did you get a break at all?
[Malcolm] I took some time off between Christmas day and New Year’s day.
[Marcus] Good on you.
[Malcolm] How about you?
[Marcus] I had a couple of weeks off, which was nice. Caught up with family as much as I could. And then Annastacia closed the border on me again and I couldn’t get up to see dad on the Gold Coast.
[Malcolm] Ain’t that disgraceful? Just capricious the way that woman works on this, just conditioning people to accept control. That’s all it is. It’s just nonsense.
[Marcus] Donald Trump. I’m looking forward to my wine, so it’s on its way apparently.
[Malcolm] Yes, I ordered it straight after the sixth. So it should be there pretty soon. It was recommended to me by Vic Pennisi, the Southern Downs mayor in Warwick. I don’t drink wine. I don’t drink spirits. The stiffest thing I have is light beer but my wife really enjoyed it. So I hope you enjoy it.
[Marcus] Thank you. Thank you. It was a bit of fun. Banning Trump from Twitter and other social media platforms. I mean, Twitter has benefited enormously from Trump using the platform during his presidency. Shares of Apple, Amazon, and Alphabet, the parent company of Google all shed more than 2% on Monday. They will suffer according to you by this ban.
[Malcolm] Yes, I’m married to an American. I’ve travelled through all 50 states of America. I’ve lived and worked there and studied there and I’ve worked in eight states. I get to know them pretty well. Americans don’t like this kind of behaviour from someone acting capriciously. As you said, it’s quite right. Twitter has benefited enormously from Trump and they didn’t seem to be bothered with him over the last four years and they don’t seem to be bothered with supporting Venezuela’s dictatorship, Iran’s dictatorship and China’s Communist Party. Now that we’ve got a Democrat coming into the White House, they seem suddenly to be concerned about Donald Trump.
[Marcus] I mean, they have protections as an open platform, both Twitter and Facebook, for instance. They’re not subjected to the same laws and rules as traditional media as they claim not to be publishers, but deleting Trump’s whole account of tweets is kind of acting as a publisher, is it not?
[Malcolm] You’re absolutely correct, Marcus. It’s akin to book burning. That’s what it really is. It’s just like burning books. As a publisher, they need to be accountable to the same laws that govern publishers. And that’s why Trump was coming after them to make sure they are publishers. But yeah, they’re acting capriciously just like the Queensland premier. We’ve now heard that there’s interference with the Ugandan Facebook and Twitter account holders ahead of the election today. Ugandan accounts have been linked to the incumbent president. They’d been removed from Facebook. Social media platforms are taking sides in an election by removing these accounts. It’s not the business of social media to decide who is good or bad. Now, some people, Marcus, might say, well, it’s a free enterprise society. You can join Twitter. They can kick you off, whatever. If you make a contract with Twitter to use them, then they don’t cut you off just before an election, which has been the threat from Twitter and Facebook for quite some time that they would cut candidates or even parties off their services just before an election at the last minute when they can’t do anything about it. And that’s exactly what’s happening in Uganda. And it’s exactly what’s happening in America.
[Marcus] Well look, some people say, well, the Murdoch Media seem to favour certain parties. And so why shouldn’t social media giants be able to do the same thing?
[Malcolm] That’s a very good argument. However, as I just said, if you’re gonna take my material, if you as a social media platform are gonna take my material for four or five or 10 years and then suddenly cut me off before an election, that’s not on. Now with Murdoch, I’ve got a choice. We know that he has favoured the Labor Party at times. We came out very strongly in favour of Rudd. I think he came out strongly in favour of Whitlam. And I know that he’s also favoured the Liberal Party at times, but I’ve got a choice. I don’t have to buy The Australian newspaper. I don’t have to watch his television stations. And that’s my choice if I do that. He can switch, like Murdoch’s Fox News in America when they started becoming biassed, just like CNN over the US Election. Reportedly the number of subscriptions at Fox News had plummeted by 50%. So they’re now starting to think about, because Americans had said, we’ve had enough of this bias. So Marcus, I think if you’re paying for a service, you can choose what you want to do. But if I’ve got an established relationship with someone, then they shouldn’t cut me off just before an election because I’m a candidate.
[Marcus] Australia Day not too far away, Malcolm. Some councils seem to be cancelling celebrations, refusing to celebrate the national day saying they are in solidarity with indigenous campaigners. It almost appears like they’re, if you like, blaming or hiding behind COVID 19 to justify the cancellation.
[Malcolm] Yes, you’re right. Some councils are refusing to celebrate the national day saying they’re in solidarity with indigenous campaigners, which makes me wonder because there are many Aboriginals who openly support Australia Day including some prominent spokespeople, male and female from their Aboriginal community. So I don’t know where they’re getting that from. And secondly, somehow as you said, refusing to celebrate and blaming COVID. Greatest Sydney councils including Liverpool and North Sydney, Parramatta and Canterbury Bankstown, are still going to have normal citizenship ceremonies but have cancelled the large gatherings because of COVID. So there’s some genuine concern in there as well, but it’s on Australia Day. We all should come together especially after this tumultuous year we’ve had in 2020, Marcus.
[Marcus] Absolutely. I mean, we’ve been through enough. If we are in this together, why can’t we celebrate together? I mean the division and some of the notoriety of that same, so negative, really isn’t needed at this time. And I do get a little frustrated that every year as it rolls around December, I beg your pardon, January 26, becomes a poster, if you like, for people that like to call it invasion day, et cetera. I don’t think we have the stomach for this year to be honest.
[Malcolm] No, I agree with you mate. It’s usually a beat up from Richard Di Natale when he was in the Senate. He was the one who pushed it. I don’t know who’s pushing it now. I think it’s just become some martyrs within various councils just wanting to make their say. But I agree with you. We need to come united in this country.
[Marcus] Now, finally, there’s another arbitrary lockdown, we know in Brisbane. There are some quite serious concerns of this United Kingdom strain of COVID 19 which is a little more dangerous than the previous ones for goodness sake. But if individual states are paying for jobkeeper, then you say, you bet there will be different decisions. I mean they’re drastic and abrupt closures. I don’t know, sometimes they are needed, but I mean at the end of the day, all it’s doing is wrecking the economy and ruining plans that people have for weddings and other major events in their lives.
[Malcolm] You’re absolutely right, Marcus. And what is really important here, is that the World Health Organisation which is admittedly corrupt, dishonest and incompetent, but even it, even it says that lockdowns are last resort and lockdowns are used to get control of a virus in the early stages. This basically says that Annastacia Palaszczuk in Queensland is admitting she doesn’t have control of the virus. And that’s a significant thing because what we’re doing in this country is we’re not managing the virus. The virus is managing us. One case pops up, one positive test pops up in Brisbane and we lock down a city of one and a half to 2 million people in greater Brisbane? And what happened was that, you hit the nail on the head because we have got to have the economy healthy because a healthy economy is the only way you’re gonna get future health, mental health and physical health. So we have had an insane debate in this country. Should we look after the health or the economy? The answer is you do both. And the leading countries in the world, Taiwan in particular is doing both because you have to protect people’s health but you have to protect the economy to maintain future health, mental and physical. And so we have got a stupid debate going on in this country. It’s not economy or health. It’s both. And that’s how you protect health. The premier was giggling on radio on Monday. I heard her. They were talking about the traffic jams of people flooding out of Brisbane and the premier after destroying small business and destroying families activities over the weekend laughed when she said, that the Gold Coast had great occupancy. There were traffic jams of people leaving Brisbane. I mean, what’s that gonna do for spreading the virus? If such a thing was the root cause of what she was doing. It’s insane.
[Marcus] Absolutely. I agree. I mean, COVID will continue its presence. We need more testing, rigorous quarantining and isolation of the sick and vulnerable. And we need to get back to work as well. The New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian, you say, seems to be in the most measured and pragmatic in response to the complex challenge of managing this pandemic.
[Malcolm] I said that. I don’t have much time for the New South Wales LNP government but I think when it comes to managing COVID, they’ve done the best. But they’ve still done a poor job by world standards. Let’s not kid ourselves. Australia has had over 900 deaths from COVID. And what we’ve got in the country, there’s 25 million people. Taiwan has got 24 million people on a densely populated Island. Sometimes the population density is a thousand times what we’ve got here in Brisbane, for example, and they’ve had earlier introduction of the virus, they’ve had longer with it. They’ve got much more inter-connection with the communist, China, where the virus started and wove in. They’ve had seven deaths. Seven deaths. And what they’ve done is they’ve focused, exactly what we were talking about a minute ago. They’ve focused on the economy and health. And what they’ve got is they’ve got a government that is worthy of trust. I’ve talked to people from Taiwan. They’ve told me that. The government’s not perfect but at least it involves people. It presents data. These people in New South Wales even, and even I’ve said it’s the best, they’re not presenting the data to underpin their plans. And so what we’ve got Marcus, is we’ve got plans all over the country that are completely different. I like the idea of that in the sense that it maintains state sovereignty but it shows me when there’s so much diverse plans that no one’s got the data backing up the plans and people deserve to have that data to know that their leaders are basing those decisions on data.
[Marcus] All right, Malcolm. Great to catch up. We’ll talk again next week. Appreciate it.
[Malcolm] See you Marcus.
[Marcus] One Nation’s Malcolm Roberts. Marcus Paul In The Morning
Senator Roberts rejects an extension to the QLD Chief Health Officer’s extraordinary powers in his submission to QLD Parliament’s Health and Environment Committee.
The sweeping powers, that allowed the state’s Chief Health Officer (CHO) to regulate people’s behaviour during the COVID pandemic, were initially introduced without consultation or debate.
Senator Roberts said, “A strong health response is the critical initial response to a pandemic, yet it is the Premier’s job to show political leadership and be accountable for the broader impact for Queensland.
“While lockdowns can be a solid initial strategy, the continued knee-jerk use of them after 11 months is an admission of failure. The ongoing damage to the economy will undermine people’s future physical and mental health.
“The Premier has been hiding in the shadows of the CHO’s health dictates since March and the economy, small businesses and Queenslanders have been left to languish.”
The role of the Chief Health Officer, an unelected bureaucrat, is to provide health advice for the Premier’s consideration as our elected representative.
“Over the past months the Premier has consistently abandoned the running of the state and instead allowed the CHO, who has responsibility for our physical health not our economic health, to be our defacto Premier.
“Only an elected government can be held accountable over the curbing of our rights and liberties, which is now beyond what is necessary,” stated Senator Roberts.
The ongoing extension of the delegated powers to the CHO puts her in a difficult position and may breach fundamental legislative principles, since the CHO’s unilateral decisions are way beyond her remit and her professional expertise.
Senator Roberts added, “Queenslanders voted for the Premier to be the ultimate decision maker, yet she shows reckless indifference to the importance of managing our state’s physical, mental and economic health.
“Anastacia Palaszczuk has surrendered her responsibility as a Premier. “The Premier needs to get back to work and the CHO’s extraordinary powers should be stopped and the position be returned to its intended advisory capacity only.”
