Prime Minister
BELINDA MURPHY, MCKINLAY SHIRE COUNCIL MAYOR: So firstly welcome, everyone, especially the Prime Minister, to McKinlay Shire and to the Shires of the North West. The support we’ve received from the Prime Minister down over the last ten days, and the State Government, has been phenomenal and we cannot express how much we’re happy to have you out here. As confronting as it is to see on the ground what is going on, we’re really looking forward to the discussions moving forward. We’re very happy with where they’re going at the moment. The Prime Minister has taken time out already to talk to our local businesses. This is beyond the farm gate. This is about the survival of our communities in the North West and I think that’s clearly understood from the top down. We look forward to him meeting with our graziers and continuing today. So, welcome, and also, Deb, thank you very much for coming.
DEB FRECKLINGTON, QUEENSLAND LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION: No worries, Belinda.
PRIME MINISTER: Belinda, thank you very much. John and the other mayors who have been with me here as I came into Cloncurry last night. Those who I spoke to at the Bowl-o last night and then producers this morning, small businesses, Lions Club. Once again, in a scene of a genuine national disaster, we are seeing the real mettle of Australians, we’re seeing the real resolve, the real heart and compassion of Australians, thinking of others first before themselves. This is my number one priority right here, right now. It has been pressing now as the events unfolded here in the space of such a short period of time and I think I’d ask all Australians to be mindful of the level of shock that are in these communities. I know there are people all around the country who are wanting to help and they’re actually even asking, “Why haven’t they got back to us? We’re offering help.” Well, the reason they haven’t is because they’re dealing with a lot here. And there’s a lot going on here now as these communities are getting around each other and they’re working on the immediate response to the disaster that has occurred here.
The disaster that has occurred here is different in all different parts of the regions. It’s affecting small businesses in some towns different to other towns. The producers, the graziers themselves, the nature of their herds and the stock losses is different. The composition is different and right now, the urgent need is to deal with the immediate response, which is why we have provided the Category D assistance to primary producers at $25,000 up to $75,000. We’ve ditched all the paperwork. We’ve provided Category C assistance to those who are eligible for small businesses and we’re looking at the eligibility of that.
We’ve provided them $1 million for each Shire that is affected and we’re looking at extending that, even now as we speak, to those who are affected. Where it’s needed it’s going to happen but the nature of our response is very much being guided by the local mayors here right across North Western Queensland and I want to commend them for their leadership. They have been under an enormous amount of pressure as they have been dealing, in many cases, with the impacts to them and their own families, let alone what’s happening more broadly in their communities, and the leadership they have shown to gather people together, the volunteer effort, to make sure that I, the Premier and others are informed about what the needs are has been excellent. I also want to thank Brigadier Jobson for the amazing work that he’s been doing. And he, like me though, we’re taking our instructions from the local mayors here because they’re the ones who are in constant contact with their community and their graziers and primary producers.
There is a long road ahead here. Of course we need to provide the immediate response and that is occurring as we speak. We then must look to the future and the future requires some key things to be done. First of all, if you look around here, you know, you’ve got to rebuild a lot of this critical infrastructure which is linking all of these towns and linking up their economies. This is very important, we’ll be doing that together with the State Government and the Deputy Prime Minister and with Linda Reynolds – the Assistant Minister for Home Affairs – they’ll be here over the next few days working through some of those issues. But it’s also about restocking, it’s also about the future – the next five and ten years. This will be again one of the most prosperous regions in the country. It is the top of the supply chain in many respects when it comes to our cattle industry and we’re going to rebuild the cattle industry here. That’s my message to the people of North Queensland.
My Government, working together with everyone else, we’re going to rebuild the cattle industry and it’s going to be an area of great opportunity and prosperity into the future but we need to get back to that starting line. We’ve been knocked off our feet here a bit right across the region but we will get back up, we will all get back up together and we’ll get back to that starting line and we will do everything that is necessary to help people do that. There’s issues of debt to deal with. There’s issue of the stock losses. There’s issues of cash flow. We’re aware of all of these things but the other thing we must be keenly aware of is we have to get these plans right. That’s why I’m here. Of course I'm here to provide some comfort and to let people know that the rest of the country that they are here with them as well. But I’m also here to listen about what the recovery and reconstruction plan is and we’re quite advanced in our thinking in these areas and what I’ve been able to do over the last 24 hours, as well as the earlier contact I’ve had with the mayors and the military and others, is to really start fashioning some serious longer term plans.
I’ll have more to say about that when we’ve got it right. But in these situations and in the wake of a natural disaster like this, you don’t rush to failure, you get it right, you listen, you get the facts in, you listen to what all the options are and then you take action on the basis of the decisions you make. That’s what I’ll be doing and, so, I would ask for some immediate patience because I believe, as Belinda and I were discussing – and John and Greg this morning, that’s what they want too. They’ve got to make a lot of decisions locally too. You don’t want to make decisions in the immediate wake of a disaster that you regret in two, three years’ time or even 12 weeks’ time. So, we will get those decisions right, we’ll get them right by working closely together.
But for today, my heart goes out to the people of North Queensland. You know, it’s very upsetting. I mean, you can’t smell what we can smell here today and I’ve got to tell you, it doesn’t smell as bad here as it did where I was earlier today, as I was with families who have been on this land for generations, building up a herd of the finest cattle in the world that are Australian, generations of breeding, and to see that all washed away and lying just in the mud which is turning to dry dirt and the smell is overwhelming. So there’s a lot of healing that has to go on here. We’ve put the additional mental health support into the programs here and I was pleased last night at the Bowl-o to be hearing back from people about how they welcome that. A simple request is that Australians will reach out to you and you will reach out to each other and on the other side, as always, we will be stronger than ever.
JOURNALIST: Do you think the wider Australia understands the scale of this disaster? People that don’t live in this region, they’ve seen pictures but do you think they get a sense of just how big it is?
PRIME MINISTER: No, I don’t and I don’t say that critically. I mean, how can you? You know, I’m a boy from the Sydney suburbs, I’ve been here before actually, it was 30 years ago. I’ve been to Cloncurry more recently so I do know this part of the world maybe a little bit better but they can’t. And what they can’t understand I suppose is that, it’s not just the economic impact of this and the natural impact of this. This is a livelihood, it’s a life, it’s a way of life and we’ve got to make sure that doesn’t get washed out to sea as well and it won’t because none of the people I've spoken to today who can still put a smile on their face and tell you a good yarn, they’re going to stay and they want to stay but they’re saying, “Can you help us stay?” And my answer to them is, “Yes, I will.”
JOURNALIST: In terms of the losses, it is a significant chunk of the beef industry. Do you anticipate that will have a national effect?
PRIME MINISTER: Of course it will. Just like the droughts have. The drought has had a significant impact and I’ve got to say, in preparing our reconstruction plans, a lot of the lessons that we’ve worked on and learnt through what Major General Stephen Day’s been doing as the Drought Coordinator, we can apply here. I mean, frankly, some of the water infrastructure, on-farm infrastructure, write-off programs and things like that will actually come in very handy here. I mean, you can’t just go and put a whole bunch of new stock on these properties tomorrow morning. Fences have to be fixed, turkey’s nest, all this sort of stuff. This all has to be fixed. There’s a lot of work that has to go on to these farms now and so that’s a key part of the plan. And then there’s the restocking. But as I’ve said, the property I was out at today, they just can’t go and just buy the same stock they had before. They built those stocks up over generations and they have to breed that stock back up and that will take many years.
Now, they’ll have other options in the meantime to run a sort of a cash operation to do that but to rebuild that, that won’t happen overnight. But there are others who have different operations and there will be an opportunity. There’s opportunities for adjustment, there’ll be opportunities where there are more drought-affected areas and where some of that stock might be able to come here. So we’ll see. But they’re the plans and the details we’ll have to work on. I also want to thank those who have been carting fodder up here, the fodder drops that have been done over the last week or so. And are now extending more into the Gulfow country where it’s going, that will continue but now we’re getting to the point where we’re over that immediate demand and I’ve got to say to the ADF, who were rescuing people in the middle of those floods, Lindsay and Sally I know out at Longford had to be rescued off the top of their roof and the only offence they took was that they were described as an older couple – with a smile on their face so that shows you the sense of humour that’s still here.
JOURNALIST: PM, you said you don’t want to rush it but any idea of a timeframe on when we might have…?
PRIME MINISTER: I’m not talking months, I’m not necessarily talking days but I’m not talking weeks either. This is an important part of my process and it’s important why Linda and Michael will be here tomorrow and working closely, I’ve got to say, with the State Government and retired Major General Smith. Retired Major General Smith who is the State Coordinator working together with Brigadier Jobson, they are dealing predominately with this immediate response and recovery. What I’m talking about is a five, ten year plan to rebuild the cattle industry.
JOURNALIST: What else outside of the cattle industry, how to rebuild these towns, aside from the industry stuff?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, you’ve got to keep the money churning in the economy. That’s what we’ve learnt from the drought. One of the things that has been most successful in our drought program was those $1 million we put into all of these councils, you know, a very large investment, $100 million and more and what that means is that the money, whether it’s been doing up the local amenities block or doing some dog-fencing or things like that, that’s kept money moving around the town. As we were just chatting before, Belinda, with the local small-business people, they’ve got cash flow problems at the moment because the people that need to pay them, they’ve been underwater. And so there’s going to be a bit of a cash crunch here, a bit of a cash drought in the next little while. So our small business programs, and I’ll be speaking to Minister Cash about that, the need to be integrate in with what we’re doing with the primary producers as well. That’s why it’s not a simple answer and I know when there are natural disasters, everybody thinks, “You’ve just got to do this and this and you send them the army and it’s all done.” No, no. This is far more complex. It goes to your question. This issue is far more devastating and far more widespread and it requires a much broader and comprehensive response.
JOURNALIST: The Queensland Government has a new report out into the Adani project which looks like it could be killed off because of the small black finch…?
PRIME MINISTER: I’m happy to take that question in a sec, I’m very happy to take that question but if there are other questions on…?
JOURNALIST: Do we have any idea of the scale of the losses at this stage?
PRIME MINISTER: No, I think that’s the short answer. I mean, I’ve been talking to producers today, they don’t know. The best estimates I’m getting from them is saying 50 per cent, the worst is 100 per cent. Estimates of 80 per cent. So, it’s the worst this district has seen. I mean, in the 70s, there was very severe conditions of drought – for floods then, they’ve had droughts here too but what really snapped this more than anything was the combination of the floods and then the winds. I was at a property this morning, the flooding impact was not actually that significant relatively speaking. What killed their herd was the wind and the exposure. So it was the combination of these two events together which really proved just deadly.
JOURNALIST: On Adani, are you concerned that this ABC report on the black finch could be the death nail for the mine? What’s it going to mean?
PRIME MINISTER: Look, I’m always concerned about jobs and I’m always concerned with people playing games about jobs. We support the mining industry. We want to see mining jobs and we want to be able to see projects stand on their two feet and be given a go on the basis of their commercial realities. We don’t think they should get special legs-up or subsidies or anything like this. But I think the people of Queensland are dealing with enough at the moment without having decisions to take away their jobs.
JOURNALIST: Just one more, will the Government accept Brian Burston’s vote in the Senate going forward?
PRIME MINISTER: How he votes is up to him. We’re not negotiating any votes with him. That’s not how it works. We’re not seeking his vote on things. What he does is up to him. What they all do. You know, you could say the same thing about the Greens. I mean, they all wreak their havoc in one way, shape or form from time to time but last night I was pleased to see that we were able to get some very important legislation passed in relation to superannuation.
JOURNALIST: Do you have a view on the suspension of the parliamentary pass of James Ashby?
PRIME MINISTER: No because I’m not the Speaker and I’m not the President of the Senate. I’m happy to leave those matters to those guys.
JOURNALIST: The Government’s been warning about rapists and paedophiles and murderers being among those brought into Australia under the Medivac regime. Isn’t there a risk that this sort of extreme rhetoric could imperil the US deal to take 1,200 refugees?
PRIME MINISTER: No, I actually met with our Ambassador yesterday and the US deal is fine. I mean, we’re just telling the truth about what’s going on with all that. I’ll tell you one thing, you know, I’ve got to tell you, we’re here trying to put a reconstruction plan together for North Queensland. The fact that I have to go and spend half a billion dollars in the next two years and $1.4 billion over the next four years to reopen a detention centre that I don’t need to open, four days ago, the fact that I have to do it now because the Parliament decided to make a stupid decision, makes me pretty angry because I want to invest that money here, not on a detention centre that I now have to open because of people who made a very bad decision. Thanks very much.