Fed up resident grills Miles, Crisafulli over Bruce Highway

The leaders have been blasted over the state of the Bruce Highway by a Central Queensland resident who is fed up with its condition. Here’s how they responded.

A massive pothole on the Bruce Highway south of Mackay along the Bruce Highway. Picture: Mitchell Dyer

The leaders have been grilled over the state of the Bruce Highway by a Central Queensland resident who is fed up with its condition.

Leyland Barnett from Rockhampton submitted the reader question selected as today’s to put to Steven Miles and David Crisafulli.

He wanted to know “When will there be some serious action taken towards upgrading and repairing the Bruce Highway north of Gympie”?

Here’s how the leaders responded.

STEVEN MILES

“Right here in Rockhampton we have one of the biggest Bruce Highway projects underway now.

“The Rockhampton Ring Road is a massive project and it will deliver faster travel times and a safer road.

“It’s amongst the $6 billion worth of projects currently underway, and I am in ongoing discussions with the Australian government on a priority list of safety projects that we can get underway quickly on the Bruce Highway if they agree to deliver funding.

“And we have allocated $250 million of additional funding to that package of safety upgrades.

“So here in Rockhampton, we have one of the biggest Bruce Highway projects underway right now, workers on site.

“I was there just a few weeks ago. It is a huge project, and it nearly completes the project of building ring roads around the big provincial cities.

“That’s been an important component of taking the Bruce Highway forward.”

DAVID CRISAFULLI

“Three words - when government changes.

“I look at what’s happened in the last 10 years and there has been an absence of a plan and a reduction in federal funding, because the government’s let Canberra off the hook and both have collided to form the goat track that is the Bruce Highway.

“Ten years ago when the government were elected, to their great credit at the time, they said that they would have a Bruce Highway Advisory Committee.

“That was a genuinely good opportunity to remove the politics and do a proper assessment on a needs basis of those pinch points that need to be upgraded.

“That body has met less than half a dozen times, and it is now over two years since it last met.

“I’m going to take that idea and reconstitute it. I think it was a good idea, so we will be having that, and our intention is to make sure that it provides a roadmap to upgrade that goat track.

“And the next element is to tell Canberra that they have to come back to 80/20 and I do note that Mr Dutton has said that he’s going to do that. That’s good. That’s 50 per cent of the deal done.

“We’ll be also using the federal election campaign as a referendum on the Bruce if we were to form government this time, and I reckon you’ve seen my track record in holding both sides accountable, in contrast to this government across health and roads, and it will be a particularly uncomfortable experience for those who don’t want to come on that journey.

“But I do believe we can work with Canberra to get back to that funding model, and if we again show them value for money rather than cost escalations and time blowouts, I think they will want to invest. They’ll see it as a really good opportunity.”

Originally published as Fed up resident grills Miles, Crisafulli over Bruce Highway