We are owed more in funds

CAIRNS got a rare case of notentirely-depressing news when the most recent State Budget was announced — finally our funding allocation was on par with the rest of the state. We can look at it two ways. On one hand, it was a credit to Cairns MP Michael Healy who after his first year in office managed to turn around an entrenched habit of royally screwing us over.

On the other hand, this mob was quite likely terrified after the shocking result in the federal election and knew that if it kept giving us peanuts, we would ensure it went into anaphylactic shock.

The truth is somewhere in the middle — but we are still nowhere near getting what we are owed.

The Palaszczuk Government’s refusal to look at funding Nullinga Dam raises all sorts of questions, especially about the methodology used in the business case that ensured the proposal was a fizzer.

Now Cairns Regional Council is leading a push to get the decision overturned and to have the business case thoroughly investigated — and rightly so.

We got something akin to our fair share in the last budget — minus a few key projects — but we are deep in the dumps if you look at the past eight years.

Had our funding allocations been on par with Fitzroy over that period, we would be $3.2 billion richer.

Against Toowoomba, it tots up to a $2.9 billion shortfall for Cairns, and $1.2 billion compared to Townsville.

We are not asking for anything we do not need or deserve. We have paid our taxes and it is about time we got something back for it.

The Federal Government is now in the perfect position to save the day, play the hero and give us a fair go. Chris Calcino chris.calcino@news.com.au