ADDRESS TO THE AUSTRALIAN COUNCIL OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT

AS17/2009
25 June 2009

Parliament House, Canberra

Thanks very much Ellen.

I acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which we meet and pay my respect to their ancestors and elders.

Welcome to the second Australian Council of Local Government meeting.

I want to acknowledge the Prime Minister and my other ministerial colleagues who are here with us this morning.

I want to acknowledge Mayors and Shire Presidents.

I want to do something that the Prime Minister will understand me singling out because it's important that we always recognise the importance of our local community. My Local Mayor is here, Sam Iskandar.  You've got to always acknowledge the Local Mayor, so good to see you here, Sam.

I want to also get something off the table - State of Origin. It's over.  It's over. We lost. Queensland won. So I'm hoping that gets the reference out of the Prime Minister's speech.

Today, the Rudd Government continues our partnership with local government.

We want to partner with you on a basis of mutual respect, to work together about the challenges facing our communities.

Challenges such as the global economic recession. Challenges such as dealing with recent natural disasters, which of course are likely to become more severe as our climate changes.

We want to talk to you about the progress we've all made since the inaugural meeting last year, in particular the rolling out of the Regional and Local Community Infrastructure Program.

I know that you're flat out building the 3,300 community infrastructure projects that have been approved around the nation - an important component of our plan of nation building for recovery.

Now is not the time of course to lose the momentum which we've gained.

We want to encourage you again to make sure this important component of our Economic Stimulus Plan is continued to be rolled out.

There have been some 137 announcements in the Strategic Projects component. I, myself, we added up, it was something like 64 launches I did in 16 days. It is a great way to see the country - both our major cities and our regional towns and small communities have projects that are terrific.

Projects such as the Sea Cliffs Sports Club at Holdfast Bay in South Australia. That project injected $95,000 into the local economy and employed local electricians, carpenters and plumbers.

The $17,000 provided for the tennis courts upgrade in Blayney in regional New South Wales - it employed four tradespeople.

As much as it pains me to use a Queensland example today, the $828,000 we provided for the Goondiwindi Natural Heritage and Water Park upgrade has employed a large number of local plant operators.

That's what our partnership is about, reaching into every community around the nation. All 565 local authorities have benefited from this Program.

This is the first time that there has been that direct input through local government, through the elected representatives.

It is an acknowledgement that you know what the priorities of your local community are much better than ministers or public servants in Canberra.

A devolution of decision making power, a conscious one by the national government to local government, an acknowledgement that local capital works are a very effective way of providing fast stimulus when it was needed.

And I say to you, it still is needed and we need to continue to push forward.

Of course that isn't all that we have done. We brought forward in the Budget the Financial Assistance Grants funding for the first quarter of 2009/10. We did that because now is the time that your local economies need that funding. That was an important component, well received by local government.

When Victorian councils were affected by bushfires and Queensland councils by floods, we brought forward again Financial Assistance Grants to a time that they were needed. That flexibility comes from a good relationship - it comes from you being able to make reasonable requests and us agreeing to them.

The fact that we have record funding in the Budget for Financial Assistance Grants, record funding for Roads to Recovery, record funding for the Black Spots program, are all signs that we want to move forward on these issues.

But we also want a reformed program. We want governance to be improved. Last night's announcement by the Prime Minister of the Centre of Excellence for Local Government is an important component of that.  

We want to make sure that we can all learn from each other in terms of best practice in local government. How can we meet financial challenges by becoming more efficient in the way that we do business?

That is the theme of today - building resilience in local communities.

After this plenary, you will move into breakout sessions. Each session will be chaired by ministers and parliamentary secretaries. I thank my parliamentary colleagues who have engaged in such a positive and constructive way because they all know how important local government is in their electorates, in their communities.

After the breakout sessions we'll re-convene here to look at the progress made over the course of the morning.

Last year, people walked away being - even people who were somewhat not as optimistic as they could have been about last year - walked away saying 'that was great, that was a great beginning, that was a great first step.'

Today is an opportunity to take further steps in building this important new national partnership between the national government and local government.

I thank you for your attendance here today.