QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE: TAKE NOTE OF ANSWERS

Senator ROBERTS (Queensland) (15:30): I move: That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister representing the Minister for Northern Australia (Senator Farrell) to a question without notice I asked today relating to the great Australian infrastructure project, GAIN. Despite me providing the minister with not only a notice of my question last Thursday but also the actual question, he was unable to provide an update on the progress of the project.

I was not asking for the project to be approved. I was merely asking for the minister to commit to ensuring the project was advanced expeditiously. Despite the minister saying advance notice gave him time to determine the status of the project, he clearly had not done so.

I'm stunned. Infrastructure should be bipartisan. One Nation is not trying to take credit for the 12 projects we're working on with proponents.

They're not our projects; they're Australia's projects. History will not remember the politics of the project; it will remember which government built it. To the Prime Minister I say: take the win, advance the project, grow Australia's productive capacity and deliver wealth and opportunity to all Australians—those who were here first and those who have come since.

These projects do not require any significant taxpayer investment. International merchant banks have seen through the net zero scam and are now desperate to finance actual, proper productive infrastructure. Australia is a prime destination for international capital, which has realised successive Liberal and Labor governments have neglected infrastructure for so long.

There is a plethora of opportunities here. While the financing is available for construction, it's not available for business cases. There's a simple reason for that: international capital does not trust the Australian government any longer.

After fiascos like Inland Rail, Snowy Hydro 2.0 and the Adani mine, who would trust us? Proponents want to see government skin in the game before committing their own money. This may be as little as millions for middle-stage development.

All of these projects have already had private funding for early-stage development. Australia is bringing in so many people our GDP is being sliced into smaller and smaller slices, and the public are feeling it. Any responsible government has a duty to grow the pie and increase GDP to maintain our standard of living.

The way to do that is roads, rail, port, pipelines and internet backbones. It includes tertiary processing of Australian minerals, coal and iron ore into steel for domestic use and export, taking advantage of our resources to undercut foreign steel and create breadwinner jobs—union jobs. I look forward to Minister Farrell updating himself on this project before we return in September.

(Time expired) Question agreed to.