Labor and Liberals pledge new $10 million weather radar station
Both major parties have come to the table with a $10m pledge for a big part of new flood-warning systems in the wake of western Queensland’s record-breaking deluge.
Rockhampton
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Regional Queenslanders who have been battered by disastrous rainfall and flooding will be the beneficiaries of a new $10m weather radar station regardless of the election outcome.
Both Liberal and Labor promised the new facility within 24 hours of each other.
The start of 2025 has seen large parts of regional Queensland inundated by torrential rainfall and flooding.
On March 31 the Liberal Party announced the plans for the new weather station to cover areas that have recently been hit by devastating flooding in Western Central Queensland.
Opposition leader Peter Dutton said the announcement was a reflection that an LNP Government prioritises the needs of regional Australians after what he called the “neglect” of the current Federal Government.
“The Coalition knows that a new weather radar is of critical importance for communities and businesses in Central Queensland,” Mr Dutton said.
“The need for a weather radar in Central Queensland is not new. The Albanese Government could have acted at any time over the past three years, but they have been busy focusing on harvesting Greens votes and inner-city issues like the Voice than responding to the needs of this regional community.”
The LNP plan for the weather station to be located 10 hours southwest of Rockhampton.
“The community has called for a new radar near Quilpie and we will deliver it,” Federal Nationals leader David Littleproud said.
Less than 24 hours later, on April 1, Labor promised the exact same weather radar station to help warn regional Queenslanders of future flooding.
Details are currently scarce when it comes to exact location of the proposed station but the matching pledge comes in response to what the Federal Government is calling neglect by the previous Morrison Government.
“The commitment for the new radar would improve coverage in regional Queensland, after the former Coalition Government cut jobs and staff at the Bureau of Meteorology and refused to fund vital flood warning infrastructure for the state,” a Labor spokesman said.
“In 2021, the Morrison Government – of which Peter Dutton was a Cabinet Minister – was slammed for cutting funding to the Bureau and closing the Rockhampton office.”
This latest pledge by the Federal Government builds on an existing $236m investment by the current Federal Government to establish a national, reliable flood warning network to better prepare communities for flooding events.
The Bureau of Meteorology has begun acquiring more than 1,500 additional gauges, with about 1,000 of these located in Queensland – 200 of which will be acquired by the end of June 2025.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said Queensland won’t be left alone.
“We’re determined to support Queensland, by investing in infrastructure like this, as part of our record investment since coming to Government,” he said.
“We’ve got their backs right now, and will have it during the recovery and as they prepare for future floods.”
Federal Minister for Environment Tanya Plibersek also weighed in, attacking the opposition for failure to carry out critical work.
“Australians rely on the Bureau of Meteorology to provide timely, accurate and reliable advice,” she said.
“When we came to government, we inherited a backlog of critical work that the Liberals had ignored.
“Since then, we’ve been investing in new and updated equipment to make sure communities have accurate and efficient advice.”
A Liberal Party spokesman has slammed the assertions of neglect, including regarding the closure of the Bureau of Meteorology office in Rockhampton.
“This (the closure) was part of a broader process overseen by the Bureau to replace offices in various regional towns with automated meteorological equipment,” the spokesman said.
“The main reasoning for this was that automated systems provided communities with real-time access to more observations, and improved observations, and on a full 24 hour basis.”
The spokesman said accusations of refusal by the Morrison Government to fund vital flood warning infrastructure was false.
“The former Coalition government provided literally hundreds of millions of dollars to the Bureau of Meteorology for a range of extensive improvements to their infrastructure and services,” the spokesman said.
“In the years of the Morrison Government alone, this included hundreds of millions of dollars to safeguard the organisation’s future financial sustainability, and close to $100m for a series of new radars and rain gauges to address gaps in weather monitoring infrastructure in Queensland – at locations such as the Upper Burdekin, Taroom region, Flinders catchment, and Darling Downs region.”
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