RDA Tropical North Chair Professor Hurriyet Babacan, Cook Shire Mayor Robyn Holmes and RDA Tropical North CEO Sonja Johnson inspect the proposed $1.6 billion Lakeland Irrigation Area Scheme at last year’s launch of a detailed business case for the project. Photo: Cape York Weekly.
It’s not every day somewhere like Cape York has the opportunity to unlock a large-scale project with the capacity to inject $500 million into one of the remotest economies in the country.
Even rarer is it for a plan concocted in the urban-centric halls of Parliament House to so perfectly align with the ambition of a project in a spot most politicians couldn’t point to on a map, so you’ll forgive the zealous interest I showed when I realised one of the key elements of Peter Dutton’s strategy to “get Australia back on track” could have been describing the proposed Lakeland Irrigation Area Scheme (LIAS).
The Opposition Leader all but kicked off his election campaign when he unveiled the plan – uninspiringly called Let’s Get Australia Back on Track: the Priorities of a Dutton Coalition Government – to the party faithful in Melbourne on 12 January, and while it is light on policy detail, it was three of the bullet points under the aim to grow a stronger regional Australia that piqued my curiosity. It’s on pages 28 and 29 of the plan, for those playing along at home.
The first is a commitment to “[i]nvest in practical local water infrastructure projects to support agriculture, industry and economic development”, while the second is an undertaking to “[s]upport existing regional industries to grow and foster new manufacturing and processing opportunities to capitalise on the competitive advantages of our regions”.
The third bullet point, and one that admittedly gets thrown around every time there’s an election on the horizon, is a promise to unlock the economic potential and growth of Northern Australia which, last time I checked, included Cape York.
If those three goals don’t align with the predicted outcomes of the $1.6 billion LIAS project, I don’t know what does.
When my excitement subsided, I contacted the Liberal National Party’s (LNP) Jeremy Neal and Labor’s Matt Smith, the only runners who have formally announced their candidacy for Leichhardt, to get a feel for what they thought about the project and what they believed an additional half a billion dollars a year would mean for economic and social prosperity in the northernmost part of the vast electorate.
Labor’s man declined a phone interview, with his media adviser – who, as it so happens, is also Queensland Senator Nita Green’s spin doctor – telling me via email the call wouldn’t be possible “as there is a lot on” this week. Looking at the candidate’s social media, that appears to involve commentating basketball games and attending as many community events – and photo opportunities – in the vote-heavy metropolis of Cairns as humanly possible. When Mr Smith’s comments did appear in my inbox, they were disappointingly nothing more than a throwaway willingness to “consider any project that stacks up economically and environmentally,” before handballing responsibility to the State Government to drive the LIAS bus.
Mr Neal, who the LNP is banking on to ensure Leichhardt remains blue after long-serving MP Warren Entsch rides off into the sunset, has flagged support for the project, but perhaps not as enthusiastically as one would expect – for the liking of this bitter, twisted old scribe at least – for something that would provide the water security needed to crop 10,050 additional hectares in the Lakeland region and trigger a tenfold population boom for a part of the electorate crying out for locally-driven economic stimulus.
If a potential $500m-per-year economic injection that will result in a forecast 3,000 people eventually calling Lakeland home doesn’t get the candidates seeking to champion the best interests of Cape York out of their camp chairs and singing from the chandeliers, what the hell will?
The LIAS concept deserves more than being a political afterthought only mentioned in passing and viewed as the slightest of blips on a candidate radar, especially when its potential to provide jobs, new industry and a local food security option for our region is factored into the equation. Candidates wanting to represent us should be aware of the project, speaking to stakeholders and fiercely advocating for it as one of Cape York’s most significant current opportunities, not turning their backs and offering a hollow commitment, as long as someone who isn’t them takes the lead. The project deserves better than that. So do Cape York voters.
Yes, this looks much more important than a 10-minute phone interview to discuss a $1.6 billion project with the potential to inject $500 million into the Cape York economy annually, and boost Lakeland’s population to 3,000. Photo: Facebook (Matt Smith – Labor for Leichhardt).
