E&OE...
Well thank you very much Kerry, and to my other two parliamentary colleagues, John Cobb and Alan Cadman, to the Deputy Mayor, my fellow Australians. It's very nice to have a morning tea at one of the most well known sporting locations anywhere in Australia and I do want to take the opportunity of just mentioning in passing that several years ago the Federal Government contributed some $10 million towards the strengthening and upgrading and expansion of the Mount Panorama circuit, and it has certainly been one of those iconic locations in the sporting life and experience of our nation.
It's a huge pleasure to be in Bathurst today. It's a great pleasure to share a platform with my friend and colleague Kerry Bartlett, who as you know has been the very energetic representative for the seat of Macquarie over the last 11 years. It's an opportunity for me to commend him to you as somebody who will work hard for you, will never let you down, will always agonise and worry about local issues that are important to his community. I meet a lot of local members in my time, some of them are good, most of them are dedicated and some of them are absolutely superb - and Kerry certainly falls into that last category. He is a superb representative. Yes he does deserve applause.
He comes as somebody new, at a federal level, to the area of Bathurst and in saying that I do not speak critically in any way of the current Federal Member for this area or for the work that he has done for the district. I praise him for that and I say to you that Kerry will do just as well, indeed, being a member of the Government, he will be able to bring certain things and certain attitudes to the electorate which are very special. But I don't come here in any way to engage in partisan criticism of the current member. I come here to say a few words of encouragement to all of you, to remark upon what a wonderful country we have. This country is living through the most remarkable economic times that it's had since the end of World War II. We have a 32 year low in unemployment. If you are in any way influenced by the sense of hope and optimism that people have about their own personal circumstances you might be interested to know that consumer confidence is also at a 32 year high. We've paid off an enormous national debt of $96 billion over the last 11 years and we are able to, because of that economic strength, to do many things that we simply wouldn't be able to do if we were in debt as a country.
One of the things that we're able to announce in the Budget, and I'm very proud we're able to announce, was the establishment of a dental school at the Charles Sturt University. And the establishment of this dental school was the result of very, very strong lobbying, not only by the university but also very strong lobbying by Kerry Bartlett and other Members of Parliament representing the central west of New South Wales.
I want to say something about the importance of road links between the metropolitan area of Sydney and the central west of New South Wales. As you may know we've previously committed $100 million to the Great Western Highway as a road of national importance and the corridor strategy for Sydney to Dubbo is currently being finalised; and we believe very strongly in ensuring that the long term needs underpinning economic growth in this part of New South Wales are considered. The Sydney to Dubbo corridor strategy will identify the long term requirements for this corridor including addressing the limitations of the current route. And as a result the Commonwealth Government today is offering $10 million on condition it is matched by the New South Wales Government, for a planning and engineering study including a detailed environmental investigation for an expressway standard connection over the Blue Mountains of New South Wales.
There are already strong proposals for a Bells Line Expressway which will be investigated under this study. And while this study would normally be, excuse me, a responsibility of the New South Wales Government we are willing to work in partnership with them to ensure the best outcome for the people of New South Wales, particularly those in the central west. And we recognise much work has already been done on this project, but we strongly believe in working with the state government for the longer term, and I do hope that the government will work with us, and I urge the state government to recognise the need and begin planning for improved access from the M4 to the base of the Blue Mountains as part of the state transport network. And $10 million will be available from the next round of Auslink due to begin in 2009.
Could I also say that although this part of New South Wales has received some relief from the drought, I stress some, over recent weeks, the drought still continues to affect New South Wales in a very savage way and also many other parts of Australia. And we can only quite literally, and without, I say this without any hint of irony, we must all continue to pray for rain because we need a lot more rain in the next few weeks if we are to avoid very, very severe outcomes in relation to allocations to irrigators out of the Murray-Darling Basin from the 1st of July in the middle of this year.
In different ways the Commonwealth Government has helped drought affected farmers, we've maintained our commitment to Exceptional Circumstances which of course covers vast areas of New South Wales and amongst the wonderful work that is done to help people affected by the drought, is the wonderful work of the Country Women's Association. And what the Country Women's Association does is to provide small but precious grants of money to needy families, assessed by them as only they can do because their in tough with local people and local circumstances, and to date we've provided $4 million for emergency grants to families and community organisations. But because of the ongoing challenge of the drought, I announce today that we're going to provide a further $8 million to the Country Women's Association to distribute emergency grants to families and community organisations in drought affected areas. And I take this opportunity of praising the Country Women's Association as being one of those great enduring, iconic, special Australian organisations that do wonderful work for local communities and epitomise the local community spirit of so many Australians.
Finally can I say what an extraordinary joy it is to me to come to a gathering which represents all the elements of a local community and represents all the age groups of a local community. The large attendance here today of schools students, coming from all the schools, we have a great variety of schools in our part of the world. In Australia we believe in an education system underpinned by a very high quality public education system, but also an education system that, yes we'll give a clap to a very strong education system. I am a product of the public education system of New South Wales and I'm very grateful for the quality of the education that I received in it. But we also believe very strongly in the right of parents to choose where they educate their children and it's long been the philosophy and policy of my Government to support the right of parental choice. And if parents want to send their children to a Catholic school, to the school of another Christian denomination, to any other kind of independent school then they are deserving of a large measure of Government support in relation to that choice; and that has been the philosophy of our Government to provide choice. We want to help all schools, we don't want rivalry and competition, we want all schools to be of high quality and great excellence and the last Budget contained an enormous additional commitment to education, most particularly, of course, to the university and technical education sector and I'm delighted that I'm going to meet some apprentices later because we do need an Australian nation where a technical qualification is as prized as a university degree. We made a big mistake in Australia a few years ago, not a few years about 30 or 40 years ago, when for some reason we allowed individual technical schools to fall into disuse. State governments stopped having dedicated technical schools and we're all lumped into comprehensive schools and the funny idea developed that everybody had to go to university. Now that is a funny idea, it's not a right idea. A lot of people should go to university but a lot of people want to become trades men and women, and they should be encouraged to do so, and they should be encouraged as is rightly the case to believe that is just as good as going to university, just as important as going to university. And that's why in the Budget we provided a lot more money for building additional Australian Technical Colleges and also we've provided resources to give more help to apprentices.
I know a lot of apprentices sort of feel the financial pinch in the first few years because you can often go out and get an unskilled job at a higher wage. But can I say to aspiring apprentices and actual apprentices in this audience, I know it might be difficult the first couple of years, but once you've got your trade qualifications you will end up doing far better and you will get a much higher income, you can even start your own business if you have that apprenticeship qualification. And I therefore encourage you in so many different ways to persevere with your apprenticeships. And I say to the young people here today who are still undecided about their careers, and I remember at the beginning of the last year of my time at high school in Sydney, at Canterbury Boys High School, I was not certain about what I was going to do when I left school and I understand people still contemplating. Those who are disposed to go into a trade, go into it because you won't be sorry, you'll find it rewarding, you'll also find it very well paid because this nation is desperately short of skilled tradesmen. Every advanced western country is short of skilled tradesmen and they will be at a premium as the years go by. So it's a decision you won't regret.
I have talked long enough. It's a great pleasure to be here. As a Sydney boy of course I from a very early age I holidayed in the Blue Mountains and I am very familiar with Bathurst and Lithgow and Oberon and Blayney and all these wonderful areas. And Kerry has had me on the mountains on many occasions and I'll be delighted to come back here. Bathurst is a very historical place, of course, it's the birth place of one of my predecessors, the very well known and well loved Ben Chifley, and it's therefore part of the political folklore of the this country. And we honour that and we honour the place that Bathurst has in the history of the development of New South Wales and then Australia. But ladies and gentlemen it's a great delight to be here. I wish you all well. I thank all the community groups for their contribution to the stability and cohesion of our wonderful country and I finish where I began in very warmly commending my friend and colleague, and I hope your representative in the National Parliament, Kerry Bartlett. Thank you.