General News
25 October, 2024
‘Kick the four out’
CAIRNS deputy mayor Brett Olds has described the current Labor government as being “absolutely useless for Cairns”.
He told a media conference that the region had been ripped off to the tune of billions of dollars by the Miles Labor government. Cr Olds said the lack of funding had been “pissing me off for ages”.
“This government has been absolutely useless when it comes to taking care of Cairns residents,” he said.
“We’ve had a former treasurer and speaker of the house (Curtis Pitt), we’ve got a current minister (Michael Healy), a former dual minister (Craig Crawford) … pretty influential roles and a fourth candidate – all Labor – current in government and we have been been shafted.
“Make sure to vote guys, this is a serious election, cost of living, crime … our ratepayers are taxpayers too.
“Their taxes are building stadiums in Townsville, they are building bridges in Toowoomba, they are building everything across the state.
“If we didn’t have critical infrastructure needs, I’d be happy to take care of people who need it, but we do have critical needs … we’ve been overlooked for far too long. It’s been pissing me off for ages.”
Earlier at a council meeting, councillors were frustrated that they had to apply for a further $31 million in disaster recovery funding to rebuild public assets following the Far North’s record December flood.
The council needs the further funds to restore parks, beaches, foreshores, playgrounds, walking tracks and other projects.
Councillors moved a motion to receive “category D funding” from the state government for the restoration works.
Division 7 councillor Anna Middleton said she hoped the funding would be forthcoming by whoever won this weekend.
“We live in the tropics,” she said. “When we have a tropical disaster, we expect, we shouldn’t have to ask that this sort of funding will come and restore these areas that are really important to us,” she said. “So, enough is enough. Get your shit together and give us the money.”
Cr Olds said the council had to beg for the category D funding.
“We’re staring down a hole for our ratepayers of $25m-31m right now that’s not going to be given to us from state and federal governments,” he said.
“That’s on top of what other regions get, on top of the resilience pools that other regions get as well,” he said.
Cr Olds said the Cairns region was vastly underfunded when compared to other regions outside southeast Queensland.
But Member for Cairns Michael Healy said the Miles government had delivered key infrastructure while promising further investment, if re-elected, next week. “A returned Miles Labor government has made over $215m worth of election commitments to the people of the Far North,” he said.
“We’re putting $57m into schools up here. We’re putting tens of millions of dollars into our roads, and primary healthcare.”
