Bob Katter – “The gloves are off”
NORTH QUEENSLANDER, Bob Katter, says he will continue to fight the tide of destruction caused by the policy decisions of the major parties as he seeks re-election in the seat of Kennedy at the forthcoming federal election, and warned that the gloves were coming off.
Mr Katter said he was tenaciously opposed to the net-zero emissions policy of the Liberal National Party (LNP) and Labor, which he says will destroy North Queensland’s three major industries, coal, cane, and cattle.
“Till the day I’m pushing up daisies I’m coming after the ALP and LNP with ruthless brutality,” Mr Katter said.
“Under the ALP and LNP free-market policies they collectively sold the railways, privatised the electricity industry, and deregulated the wool, maize, tobacco, fishing, peanuts, pork, eggs, sugar, and dairy industries. A trail of destruction that has wiped out half of Australia’s farmers, owner-operator businessmen and farmworkers. The only people who gained were the big supermarkets.
“They’re now putting coal mining, coal power stations, cane and cattle industries on the altar of their green ideology. Not on my watch.”
Mr Katter said he was sick of hearing talk about building infrastructure in North Queensland and will demand bulldozers hit the ground.
“To my knowledge there hasn’t been a single job creating development in the last four years of this Government,” Mr Katter said.
“Nor has there been anything from the Queensland Labor Government. They’re both going-to-do things, but that’s all they are, ‘Gunna-dos’.”
“The Federal LNP have frittered away $1,000m in studies and reports without building a dam, or producing an engineering plan. All while the Hughenden Irrigation Scheme, Hells Gates Dam (built to 395m above sea level to facilitate the Bradfield Scheme)[1], Charters Tower’s Big Rocks Weir, the Tableland’s North Johnstone Transfer, and Ingham’s Stone River Weirs are ready to go. The old Country Party, under Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen, was building a dam a year, yet the ALP and LNP have built none.”
Mr Katter said he would stand on his record of achieving things, despite the pedestrian nature of the major parties.
“I am not telling you what I am going to do. I’ll tell you what I’ve done,” he said.
“Serious money is being spent on the Flinders Highway from Hughenden to Cloncurry, and we’ve sealed the Hann Highway freight route that takes the
Tableland’s fruit and veg to the Melbourne/Sydney markets.
“We got the reversal of Glencore’s decision to close the copper smelter in Mount Isa which saved thousands of jobs in North West Queensland and Townsville (I put on public record my thanks to a retired ALP person, Robbie Katter and a Federal ALP member who assisted us). Unless we get the Copperstring Transmission line going in the next six months, then this work will come undone, and the copper mining industry is doomed.
“We’ve also secured the $10,000m Reinsurance Pool for Northern Australia with the good work of George Christensen and the Townsville Chamber of Commerce. We delivered Tully’s sports Grandstand, and the Mission Beach rock wall – providing the only safe harbour between Cairns and Townsville.
“The ALP and LNP handed over to me a goat track from the Cairns CBD to Gordonvale when that area came into the Kennedy electorate, and now we’ve got $2,000m in upgrades thanks to local fighters like Edmonton’s Fran Lindsay and Peter Piccone, and Gordonvale’s Brett Moller.
“The major parties should be fixing up the Kuranda Range Road debacle, by building a new route from Cairns to Mareeba/Atherton, called the Bridle Track Tunnel. It is closed 40-plus times a year for an average of seven hours and there’s multiple deaths a year. Instead of fighting for a new tunnel and highway in their electorate, the ALP and LNP have been telling us we don’t need it.”
Mr Katter said the Federal LNP Government can’t even fund and grow market gardens in the First Australian community area, which the Prime Minister promised to him in late 2018.
“They are still completing feasibility studies for market gardens four years on,” Mr Katter said.
“Well, the Mayor of Mornington Island, Kyle Yanner, and myself couldn’t wait any longer and we planted some fruit and vegetable trees ourselves.[2]
“People are dying from diabetes, malnutrition, and kidney disease and the politicians in Brisbane and Canberra could not care less.”
-ENDS-
