Budget is a road to exclusion

Federal MP for Kennedy Bob Katter is fuming there was no money for an alternative to Kuranda Range Rd in the federal budget.

“There’s no money for the tunnel,” Mr Katter said.

“Talking about cheap housing, we can put thousands of houses up there 15 minutes from Cairns.”

The federal government previously committed $210m in the October budget, making good on a pre-election promise for “safety and capacity upgrades” on the 16km winding section of the Kennedy Highway from Smithfield to Kuranda.

“The budget is more relevant for what it didn’t give than what it did give,” he said.

Federal MP for Leichhart Warren Entsch also wanted to see funding for an alternative route. He favoured the Reddicliffe Highway proposal, which comes over the top of the Crystal Cascades and feeds into the western arterial road.

Advance Cairns has said if work started today to find a solution to cater for increased capacity and heavy vehicle efficiency, it would be 10 years before the benefits would be realised.

It wants the state government to allocate $20m of the $210m towards undertaking a preliminary evaluation and business case, saying the road was stifling economic development.

Mr Katter welcomed the budget’s $1.9bn for single parents, but said it was “just a buying votes exercise”.

He said the initiative to enable some people to get 60 days worth of medicine for the price of a single prescription from September, was “diabolical”.

“Owner operators of pharmacies will go down like nine pins, their income will be halved,” Mr Katter said.