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This is What an Actual Vision for Australia Looks Like

What happened to having vision for the future in this country?

You won’t get it from the Liberal and Labor Uni-party whilst they’re beholden to their donors.

Check out One Nation’s breakdown of the budget and how we would return Australia to leading the world.

Transcript

This is One Nation’s response to Labor’s Budget. 

My comments will be in two parts. 

Firstly, an analysis of what Treasurer Jim Chalmers has put into and left out of the budget. 

Secondly, what a One Nation budget would look like to return Australia into a prosperous country again. 

Starting with the measures in Labor’s budget for next year, 2024/25. 

Treasurer Chalmers wants everyone to know about his surplus for THIS year 2023/24. 

Yet his budget released two days ago for this coming year starting in less than two months aims to be a DEFICIT for 2024/25 

Many Australians might not even know what a surplus is. 

A surplus simply means that within a given year the Government is spending less than it’s income. It spends less than what it takes off Australians. 

Usually that’s a good thing. 

Like any Australian household, government shouldn’t be spending more than it has – that’s a deficit. 

Treasurer Chalmer’s surplus of $9.3 billion isn’t a happy story, though. 

It sounds like a big number until you compare it to the total budget spend: $683 billion dollars. 

Unfortunately, given Treasurer Chalmers’ amazing run of good luck this budget surplus is terrifyingly small. 

It would be like a family winning division 1 of Powerball and having $100 left over at the end of the year—and calling it a win!  

There should be rivers of gold flowing into the budget.  

Instead, we have a miserable trickle because Labor can’t resist spending every bit of its lottery winnings. 

Commodity prices for our exports like oil, gas, coal, metal minerals and agricultural produce have all been near or at record highs over the recent few years.  

That means huge amounts of extra money flowed into Treasurer Chalmers’s budget.  

‘Oil’, ‘gas’ and ‘coal’ are all dirty words to this Labor government and its Greens partners. And they’re too embarrassed to admit mining and agriculture have, largely, saved the budget. 

The second lottery win for the government is Australian workers.  

They’re working more jobs, longer hours and harder than ever.  

All of the extra work shows up in the record-low unemployment rate.  

That means more taxes from hardworking Australians are going into the budget coffers than ever before—a record. RECORD tax taken from Australians. 

That’s the story of this budget: three years of some of the largest tax intakes government has ever recorded, yet Labor can only squeak out the tiniest of surpluses. 

From this year on the deficits return. Tens and tens of billions of dollars in the red each year as far as we can see. Going deeper into debt. 

The Federal Government’s debt is due to reach nearly 700 billion dollars in coming years. 

At the rate this government is going our children’s children will not repay it. 

Despite working multiple jobs for more hours helping the government’s bottom line, Australians are still going backwards because of inflation.  

Inflation is the secret debilitating stealth tax on all Australians.  

It’s the reason Australia had the largest collapse of disposable income in the OECD.  

If you feel like you’re going backwards, it’s because you are. 

Inflation is leading to tax bracket creep. 

That means you’re earning more while your money is worth less yet you’re paying more tax overall. 

As your income rises with inflation, it takes you into a higher tax rate bracket. 

The government takes more money from you through bracket creep because of inflation. 

No wonder they voted against my amendment that would have removed bracket creep. My amendment would have removed the stealth tax. 

The government is fudging the inflation numbers, making it appear better than the price increases you’re actually paying in the real world. 

When they hand out energy and rent relief, it artificially lowers the inflation figures. 

This is just papering over the inflation. It does nothing to actually fix it. 

Economists across the country have slammed Treasurer Chalmers trickery on this. 

Without rent assistance the CPI for rents would haver increased 9.5% in the 12 months to March.  

Instead because of Treasurer Chalmers’ trickery it was recorded as just 7.8%. 

The cost of electricity has gone up 15% in just a year. The bill relief is papering over that, showing up in the CPI as just 2%. 

This is a clear, huge admission of failure of the net zero pipe-dream 

With the most amount of wind, solar and batteries on the grid than ever before in history, Treasurer Chalmers must hand out another round of power bill relief – because prices are too expensive. 

The inflation fight isn’t over for Australians who are still going backwards. 

This budget will pour more fuel on the inflation fire. 

There are only a few ways to genuinely reduce inflation: 

First, never repeat the mistake of printing $500 billion out of thin air over COVID.  

That created much of the inflation we’re fighting – as the former head of the Reserve Bank agreed to me.  

Second, reduce the cost of energy: Abandoning the net-zero pipe dream.  

While net-zero is pushing up power prices we’ll never get rid of inflation. 

Thirdly, cut the amount of visa holders in the country now driving huge demand. 

That’s not just a cut to the rate of immigration as this budget proposes, it needs to be negative, and people need to leave. As I’ll explain later. 

Finally, make investments in productive infrastructure to increase the productive capacity of our country. Assets like dams, power infrastructure, ports and rail lines.  

That’s called supply side economics. Improve productivity. 

That’s how inflation can be cut. Not with trickery. Improving real productivity. 

The next feature item of the Labor Budget is their Future Made In Australia plan. 

This is a vague, unclear collection of weird policy ideas like a billion dollar computer and outright scams for a total of $22.7 billion dollars. 

This will supposedly turn Australia into what they call a Green Superpower for wind, solar, so-called green hydrogen and other scams. 

The government will use that money to pick losers that have failed to attract any investment from anyone with common sense in the real world.  

This is a “Disaster made in Australia” Plan. 

China manufactures and tightly controls more than 90% of all of the critical parts of wind and solar power. 

Wind and solar make us completely reliant on China for our energy needs, Labor’s Future Made in Australia will only make that reliance worse. 

There’s no reason to become reliant on wind and solar due to our abundance of oil, gas, coal and uranium in this country.  

We’re the most resource rich country in the world.  

Why would we spend tens of billions ignoring that and handing over control to China? 

The Future Made in Australia plan is really a Future Made in China plan. 

This effectively sets up an unsustainable model of business practice which relies on taxpayer subsidies for any meagre profit. 

What a waste of Australian taxes. 

Next the National Disability Insurance Scheme, the NDIS. 

If left unchecked, the NDIS is going to eat this entire country alive.  

Originally budgeted to only cost $25 billion a year, it will reach $90 billion a year within a decade. 

Minister Bill Shorten says he can cap the growth at 8% a year. Yet it’s been growing at 14%. 

Providers often charge NDIS double or even triple the price for the exact same services. 

This draws carers to NDIS and drives huge worker shortages in aged care and childcare. 

The huge NDIS money sink has certainly contributed to this. 

The NDIS program has been a national shame with unconscionable budget blowouts, widespread rorting, use of taxpayer money for prostitutes and cruises and other scandals, And causes neglect of genuine disability cases. 

At some point it’s time for Australia to agree this scheme can’t be fixed and it’s time to start fresh. Send it back to the states to enable competitive federalism that is proven to drive efficiency and accountability. 

Let’s move on to the Future Drought Fund – $519 million dollars. Again seems a great headline. Just don’t read the detail. 

That money will be split over 8 years meaning just a tiny $65 million for an industry worth more than $90 billion a year to Australia. 

There’s only one real form of drought relief: WATER. 

There’s not a drop of money in this budget towards a real dam.  

To get cheaper groceries, we have to grow more of them. 

We have some of the best farmers, in combination with the best soils and climate in the world. 

Add water, and Australians won’t have to worry about grocery bills again. 

A vital part of this budget is the forecasts for net overseas immigration. 

That’s how many new people the government expects to take into the country. 

Australia’s net overseas migration was 528,000 in the 2022 to 2023 financial year, a historic record, nearly double the previous record. Double. 

That’s like adding a new Canberra to Australia, in one go. Without the political swamp. 

That’s almost one and a half (1.3) Sunshine Coasts imported into Australia in just 12 months. 

The Labor government claims this figure will decrease to 260,000 a year in 2025-2026, still far too much. 

It’s a prediction, and like any Labor prediction, don’t bet your house on it. 

Back in October 2022, 4 months into the 12 months they were predicting, the government said net overseas migration would be 235,000. 

Just 8 months later, the 528,000 figure blew their forecasts out of the water. 

Way more than double. Was it supreme incompetence? Or a lie? 

We’ll wait and see if their prediction of 395,000, an entire Sunshine Coast added to the population, for this financial year turns out to be true. 

If it’s not clear, no Australian should trust what a government says when it comes to immigration numbers. 

It’s claimed that the country is ‘just catching up’ after a slow down in immigration. That’s a lie. 

It’s a lie that’s causing a housing crisis, making Australians homeless and feeding inflation. 

Prior to COVID, there were 1.9 million foreign temporary visa holders in the country likely to require housing. 

Today, there are 2.3 million. That’s 400,000 more people in the country that are fighting Australians for a roof over their head and groceries at the supermarket. 

Why? To inflate GDP to get out of the per-capita recession. To look good not do good. Labor doesn’t care about the homeless its causing. 

That’s driven the massive crisis in the rental vacancy rate and huge increases in rents. 

This Labor government wants to keep adding to that, another 395,000 predicted this financial year, plus 260,000 the following. 

We don’t have enough houses to put these people in.  

We don’t have enough houses to put Australians in. 

We don’t have enough tradies to build enough houses to keep up with this many arrivals. 

We need to start deporting some visa holders.  

Net immigration needs to go negative until Australians have got an affordable roof over their head. 

Perhaps the most important item is something that’s completely missing from this budget. 

There’s not a single dollar allocated for a Royal Commission into the COVID response. 

Millions of Australians were forced to lock down in their homes. Forced to take an experimental medical product. Businesses were ruined. Children’s educations ruined. 

What’s the Labor government’s response? Silence. 

One Nation will continue to fight for a COVID Royal Commission and for perpetrators of human rights abuses to be thrown in jail. 

That covers some of the things that are in, and aren’t in, Labor’s budget. 

Now I want to talk about a better way, what Australia could look like as a prosperous nation under a One Nation budget. 

Here are things you won’t hear from anyone in a budget, except One Nation – because we’ve got the guts to say what you’re thinking. 

Firstly, guarantee affordable power: turn the coal fired power stations back on. Build more of them and remove solar and wind subsidies.  

It’s the only thing that can save us right now. 

Cheap power is a matter of life and death for Australians as many of them are facing the wall in this cost of living crisis. 

Nuclear should be on the table and we should simply let the cheapest power win – no handouts or subsidies. 

Secondly, stop inflation: stop quantitative easing printing excess money.  

$500 billion dollars was concocted out of nowhere during the COVID response.  

That’s a major cause of the inflation we’re still fighting today. 

The Former Governor of the Reserve Bank, Phillip Lowe, the culprit behind that money printing, even agreed with me on that. 

Thirdly, we’ll guarantee cheaper houses, cheaper rents, and get young people into their first home. 

Don’t just cut net overseas migration – start deporting some visa holders. 

Prior to COVID there were 1.9 million visa holders who needed housing, fighting Australians for a roof over their head.  

That’s now increased to 2.3 million today, plus 400,000 tourists and others. 

And, we’ll ban foreigners from buying Australian property. They’re currently snapping up nearly 1 in 10 new Aussie homes. 

We’ll convert the Labor government’s designed-to-fail Housing Future Fund and turn it into the People’s Mortgage Fund, issuing fixed rate 5% mortgages. 

Fourthly, get cheaper groceries: build dams and help farmers produce tonnes of fresh, healthy produce for Australians. 

Give farmers water and the right to use their land – we’ll never have to worry about grocery bills again. 

Fifthly, use all of our natural resources we have right here for Australians first.  

There’s no need to become a green superpower, and we never will. 

We’re already an oil, gas, coal and uranium superpower. 

Government won’t do this because some foreign unelected organisation in Zurich will claim we’re not ‘complying with our international obligations’. 

Governments of both sides have forgotten that their first obligation is to AUSTRALIANS. No one else. 

One Nation knows this. 

Finally, we must have comprehensive tax reform. 

The current system is highly destructive to our country and wholesale change must be made. 

We’ll put our trust in Australia’s people, release them from the nanny state that tells them everything they can and can’t do, and enable people to abound and flourish. 

That’s our promise of what would be a One Nation budget: 

Putting truth, Australia, and Australians first to ensure prosperity like we’ve never seen. 

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Special Forces Veteran Slams Chief of Defence Force Failures

I had the privilege of reading a letter sent by a Special Forces Veteran into the HANSARD record.

He shockingly details the Chief of the Defence Force (CDF) General Angus Campbell abandoning the soldiers that served under him. Due to the CDF’s successive failures and appalling state of Defence bureaucrats, the soldiers are abandoning him.

We need to make our Defence Force as lethal and full of warriors as possible, but that won’t happen with the current CDF at the helm.

Transcript

Tonight I’ll read a letter from a constituent, a special forces veteran who chose to leave the Australian Defence Force after seeing Defence leadership callously throwing soldiers under the bus. It’s a long letter, a clear and scathing indictment of Defence’s supposed leaders. Here’s the letter:  

Dear Senator Roberts 

On the 19th of November 2020 a certain number of SASR soldiers were accused of having a toxic culture with the release of the Brereton report.  

This was a sound bite Chief of the Defence Force General Angus Campbell, AO DSC, repeated to the world. He accused Australian special forces non-commissioned officers of attempting to fuse excellence with Ego, Elitism and Entitlement.  

The Brereton report, written by General Campbell’s subordinate, absolved successive defence force leaders of anything other than ‘moral responsibility’, including the CDF. 

It wasn’t written in the report, but the message was loud and clear: there was another “E” in the equation. That of Exemption, Exemption for defence force senior leaders.  

The Inspector General Australian Defence Force investigation and media campaign was clearly endorsed by ADF leadership.  

In contrast, we have seen the lower ranks of those who served Australia in the Special Operations Task Force/Group in Afghanistan systemically abused, disempowered, marginalised and their valuable service denigrated. 

Many of these men and women have since medically discharged due to poor mental health caused not only by aspects of their active service, but more damagingly, their treatment by defence and the media on returning home.  

Treatment akin to that of a bygone era.  

We have seen ADF leaders recuse themselves from command responsibility and the very laws and standards established after World War 2.  

The Yamashita standard saw the Allies demand a Japanese General be hung for crimes committed by his soldiers.  

Now, after losing our war, and in the hope of avoiding scrutiny from the International Criminal Court for their failures, it is OUR military leadership who demand their soldiers who fought under their command be punished while they refuse to accept anything other than meaningless ‘moral responsibility.  

During the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, the combined total cost to the Australian taxpayer was approximately $13.5 billion. 

During that same time frame Australian soldiers fought with substandard and rented ISR, Intelligence Surveillance and Reconnaissance equipment.  

They had no integrated close air support and borrowed US helicopters.  

Both Government and Defence ‘procurement specialists’ wasted three times the cost of both wars on failed and failing procurements.  

Now, we see the failed MRH-90 Taipan helicopter procurement feature in the tragic loss of life, devastating defence families and the serving community.  

We have seen veterans abandoned by defence and given no choice but to defend themselves in court without financial, legal, moral, or any other form of support from the same leaders they once served. This situation demonstrates complete disregard for those who loyally fought the wars of our generation and of the families who supported them.  

This ongoing treatment by defence leadership is yet another failure in their duty of care to the people they proclaim to value. 

Leadership then took their disregard a step further giving tacit approval to journalists by failing to correct the lies and fabrications they published.  

We saw the CDF and his service chiefs demand that senators’ questions in relation to the failure of the MRH90 helicopter be considered and respectful due to the families impacted by loss.  

This is a stance in complete contradiction to his grandstanding on the release of the Brereton Report, an uncaring act ignorant of the thousands of families impacted, and without consideration of the accuracy of the unproven and untested allegations, or of jurisprudence. 

We saw a victim falsely labelled a perpetrator by the cold and dispassionate Royal Australian Airforce chief.  

When offered the chance to set right the incorrect and damaging slur, the chief instead doubled down on his untrue statement with impunity.  

This further damages all victims in defence, while simultaneously highlighting to Australia the class distinction between an out of touch but untouchable leadership, and those they supposedly lead.  

We have seen defence leadership use national security as an excuse to cover their lies, mistruths, and omissions.  

And we have seen how the same leaders hide behind the ‘in consideration of the impact on families’ excuse, selfishly treating grieving families as human shields to protect their reputations. 

These families are strong families, they have supported loved ones through their years of service to this country, they don’t need protection, they need the truth.  

And now, we have seen elected senators voicing the concerns of their constituents and veterans, be labelled as divisive and bullied by the leader of Australia’s Military.  

If a lower ranked service member had publicly acted in the same way the CDF did at Senate Estimates, they would likely be charged with prejudicial conduct. 

If the civilian overseers, the elected senators responsible for scrutinising defence force activities and spending, are not immune from the wrath of our Defence force leaders, is there anyone in Canberra able to hold them to account?  

People do not leave bad jobs; they leave bad bosses. Defence has been pushing woke agendas to appease minorities leading to so many poorly conceived and implemented reforms.  

Furthermore, due to the defence leadership’s damaging use of the media to denigrate its veterans whilst recusing themselves, they have sidelined and denigrated ADF’s best assets, its people, and they are leaving in droves. 

This devastating recruitment and retention crisis is weakening Australia’s defence capability and national security, the very thing our leaders say they are protecting.  

This exodus of people from the ADF creates a vacuum that will take years to replace. These men and women are patriots; they are not leaving defence due to the promise of better-paid jobs.  

They are leaving because they are not valued and because of the incompetence, failures, double standards, blame-shifting, and lack of support from defence leaders. 

What has been the leadership’s answer to the current recruitment and retention crisis?  

To appoint yet another general to investigate why those who did, and those who normally would serve our great nation, no longer wish to do so.  

It’s a weak, box-ticking exercise to avoid leadership accountability and fails to resolve the issues.  

To Defence leadership, I say, if your medals are so important to you, keep them, and take ours back; there are more pressing items on the agenda. 

Over two decades, incompetence in a Defence hierarchy more intent on accolades, awards, and power, has mismanaged Australia’s defence force into its weakest ever position, and done so at a time when the world is in its most volatile and dangerous state since World War 2.  

These leaders leave us poorly defended, and solely reliant on another nation with a dubious track record for supporting its allies in war.  

Those of us who have been to war, who have been ‘in action’, don’t relish another one, especially one fought at home, that require our children to fight.  

On releasing the IGADF Brereton report into war crimes allegations, Angus Campbell was reporting as saying, “We are a nation that stands up when something goes wrong and deals with it and that is what I intend to do.”  

Well, as a concerned special forces veteran and father of Australian sons, this is me standing up, hoping someone in government will deal with this crisis.  

Or am I right with the final E? Exemption: Are our Defence Force leaders truly exempt from their failures and above international and domestic laws? The sorely needed Royal Commission into veteran suicides is a direct reflection of the poor leadership that has mismanaged defence over decades. 

A Royal Commission into ADF leadership, specifically the failures in leadership during the Afghanistan war, and subsequent to it, is now imperative to ensure the same failures are not repeated. The Government fails the nation if it does not. 

Signed: A concerned father and ADF Veteran. 

Name and address supplied. 

Anyone who hears the letter I just read into the Senate Hansard record will understand why many soldiers, veterans and senators, including me, have called for the Chief of the Defence Force, General Angus Campbell, to be fired. There are too many examples of hypocrisy, failure and incompetence from Defence leadership to list them all in one letter or one speech. Get rid of every single general who isn’t completely focused on making sure our Defence Force is as capable and lethal as possible. The safety and sovereignty of the entire nation require it. 

The state of the Defence Force is the fault of many successive governments and shiny generals, yet the responsibility for the current state of Defence must lie with the current head of the organisation, and that is General Angus Campbell. The Defence Force is going backwards—literally, when it comes to headcount—and the Special Air Service Regiment is facing an unprecedented capability crisis. One Nation believes warriors should be welcome in our military. We don’t need to spend time making sure drones are gender neutral. How about we just buy enough drones to defend ourselves? Spend money on ammo for our defence personnel to train with, not more gender advisers. Give medals to the heroes who show bravery in combat, not the bureaucrats who sit in air conditioning and shine their arse for half the war. The safety and sovereignty of our entire nation require that our ADF, the Australian Defence Force, starting at the top, tell the truth and be held accountable. 

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Heads must roll in Defence leadership

Australia’s diggers are being let down by terrible leadership from bureaucrats, generals and Defence Ministers.

We want warriors in our Defence Force and it shouldn’t be any other way. If the Chief of Defence Force Angus Campbell doesn’t understand that then he should resign.

Transcript

As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia I speak in support of Senator Lambie’s motion of urgency addressing the appalling state of leadership in the Australian Defence Force. It’s important to note that this motion isn’t about our soldiers, our sailors and our aviators. They are among the world’s best and are often the most motivated and disciplined men and women our country has produced. Yet politicians and the Australian Defence Force’s higher leadership have repeatedly let down our Defence Force’s amazing work. Time and time again the generals, the brass, have failed to demonstrate real leadership.

Our current Chief of the Defence Force, General Angus Campbell, wears the Distinguished Service Cross medal. He was awarded this medal supposedly for his command of troops in Afghanistan. There are questions over whether General Campbell was awarded this medal illegally. The criteria used to be that the recipient had to be in action, meaning in direct contact with the enemy. General Campbell spent most of his time in command sitting in an air-conditioned office in Dubai, thousands of kilometres from the battlefield.

Even if his medal was validly given, General Campbell is trying to strip the very same medal from people who were under his command and for whose behaviour he is responsible. It is a frightening exercise in double standards when General Campbell is awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for his command of the same people who he is now trying to strip it from for alleged wrongdoing.

Leadership means taking responsibility for everything under one’s command. This isn’t an opinion; the Yamashita standard enshrines it in international law. When the Japanese Imperial Army committed untold atrocities, it was the overall commander General Yamashita who was charged with the war crimes that happened under his watch. General Campbell alleges war crimes were committed, including during his time in command. He spits on the idea of command accountability with his actions. When I suggested to General Campbell at Senate estimates that handing back his medals would be the moral thing to do, he responded, ‘That’s very interesting, Senator’—contemptuous. For General Campbell to demonstrate leadership he would hand back his medals and resign today.

On General Campbell’s allegations of war crimes it’s important to note that, eight years after a discredited sociologist first levelled allegations, not a single criminal charge has produced a guilty verdict—not one. Instead of affording soldiers of our elite Special Air Service Regiment procedural fairness, General Campbell may as well have declared them guilty when, at a press conference, he announced the allegations and said sanctions would be applied—not a criminal court, a press conference. It seems General Campbell intends to add ‘judge, jury and executioner’ to his resume.

It’s acquisitions department, the Australian Defence Force’s higher leadership, washed its hands of accountability. Almost every Defence program has failed to meet budget, time or delivery goals. Billions upon billions of dollars are wasted every year in foreseeable project delays, poor project planning and badly defined deliverable goals. Yet everyone involved seems to still be getting promotions. Is the motto on the wall, for the higher brass, at defence headquarters ‘Failing upwards’?

General Campbell even endorsed findings in the Brereton report complaining of a ‘warrior culture in the SASR’. If you don’t want warriors in the most elite fighting unit in this country and among the best special forces units in the world, where the hell do you want them? These issues are the reasons why defence recruitment is in crisis. Good soldiers are leaving because of the double standards flowing down from the top. It’s absolutely demoralising. The entire top brass needs to face a reckoning, for the state of the Australian Defence Force, and I stand in support of Senator Lambie’s calls for exactly that. We get so many calls from veterans and current service men and women asking us to do exactly that.

We say to our enlisted defence personnel: Australians know the good work you do and the effort and dedication you put into training to defend our country. Your job is applying state sanctioned violence, and no-one should shy away from this fact. It is a very difficult job. One Nation supports you all, and we will do everything we can to call for your poor leaders to face accountability for their actions and inactions.

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Australia must master COVID-19

State and federal politicians need an urgent plan for Australia to master COVID-19, rather than being held captive in fear of the next wave of infections.

Senator Roberts said, “The ad-hoc opening and closing of our economy and politicians praying for an elusive and unlikely vaccine needs to transition to a longer-term plan of how to master COVID-19.”

The rolling debate of suppression versus elimination strategies are short-term and unsustainable and we cannot continue as we are.  At current infection rates it could take until 2040 for Australia to achieve herd immunity.

Taiwan, with a population similar to Australia, has had just seven deaths despite great exposure to COVID-19, yet unlike Australia it did not destroy its economy.

“There is a deafening absence of political leadership that has the courage to look beyond the immediate waves of COVID-19 infections to the horizon of how to live with COVID-19 in our community,” stated Senator Roberts.

Queensland’s state 2019-2020 mid-year Fiscal and Economic Review, pre COVID-19, states “An increased capital program of $51.8 billion over the forward estimates, supporting 41,500 jobs in 2010-20”.

Part of Queensland’s Economy Recovery Strategy Stage 2 for COVID-19 also states “$51.8 billion state infrastructure program over the next four years to give the building and construction industry certainty and confidence.”

“This is duplicitous and untrustworthy leadership that pretends this is new money for recovery, when it is in fact an existing capital works program re-branded as a recovery capital works program.

Senator Roberts said, “Clearly the Queensland government’s exceedingly poor financial management has left Queensland on the back foot with no additional resources to bolster economic recovery.”

“With no vaccine in sight, no money in the bank and no confidence in the Premier’s leadership to look beyond the advice of the Chief Medical Officer, then Queenslanders need to get back to work.”

“The Premier needs an urgent plan, based on data, on how we master COVID-19 so we can return the economy and our community back to prosperity.”

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