In February 2017, Annastascia Palaszscuk came to Rockhampton and the local WIN News reported that she “did not want to talk about the Rookwood Weir.”
At the time the Queensland Government was using every delaying tactic in the book to stall the development of the major project. The previous year, the Liberal National Federal Government had announced that it would pay for half of the Rookwood Weir and not ask for a cent back.
All the Queensland Labor Government had to do was to invest the other half, and they could charge for water access so as to make a return on this investment.
Despite the offer, the Queensland Government demanded yet another business case on the weir. There already had been report after report on the weir after the former Labor Premier Peter Beattie had promised to build the weir in 2006.
So the Liberal National Federal Government paid $2 million for that business case too. Even after that came back with a positive report in 2018, the Queensland Government entered into an unseemly slanging match with the Federal Government about the need for extra funding. The costs of building the weir had increased while the Queensland Government had stalled.
The Liberal National Government announced that they would provide the extra funding and finally – two years after the initial Federal Government commitment – the weir was ready to be built.
This week the Labor party has finally opened the weir. They want lots of congratulations for finally building a project they first promised 17 years ago, and had to be dragged kicking and screaming to finally build.
Of course this being the petty Queensland Labor Government, they did not invite any of the local LNP politicians along to the opening ceremony. They will try to keep us out of the photos but everyone local knows that this weir would not have been built if it was not for the efforts of Michelle Landry and Ken O’Dowd over many years. The support of Nationals party leaders Barnaby Joyce and Michael McCormack has been crucial too.
The opening of Rookwood is a great day in Central Queensland’s history. The Fitzroy river has the largest catchment of any river in eastern Australia but for the Murray-Darling. Yet until Rookwood there was only one major dam on the Fitzroy, the Fairbairn Dam near Emerald. Rookwood will now double agricultural production in Central Queensland. This will mean more long-term wealth, jobs and opportunity for our region.
Dams are like the opposite of wind and solar farms. Solar and wind provide a sugar hit of jobs in construction and then provide no local opportunities once built. For dams, there are a few jobs in construction but the real benefits come later when the increased agriculture provides jobs for generations.
You can tell Labor would never have built Rookwood by what they have done after last year’s Federal election. Before the election the Liberal National Government had set aside billions in investment for new dams across the country. Local Labor politicians supported some of these dams and their Federal colleagues gave no indication that they would remove the funding.
Then in their budget after the election, Labor pulled all funding for dams in North Queensland including the Urannah Dam in Central Queensland.
Building Rookwood is great but we should not rest there. If Labor wants to take any credit for the Rookwood Weir, that was funded by the LNP, they need to prove what dams they are going to build next now that they are in charge.
