WHY THE WAIT FOR PROJECT FUNDING

First off, a correction. Yesterday’s opinion said the federal government had not pencilled in the $195m of federal money left over from the Haughton Pipeline project in the budget.

In fact, it had.

Under the Townsville City Deal component in the budget papers there was an amount of $175m in the 22/23 financial year and another $20m for the 23/24 financial year.

That is good news for the region but still so many questions remain unanswered.

Why do we have to wait so long for projects to be delivered with this money?

And most of all, why haven’t any projects been named?

It’s now about nine months since the state decided to hand back the pipeline money, over a GST dispute, and Member for Herbert Phil Thompson guaranteed the people of Townsville the money would stay in the city.

Mr Thompson set up a group of influential locals to nut out the issue and decide what projects would be suitable for the project.

Today, the people of

It’ s all a mess and needs to be sorted

Townsville can see why there has been delays. It seems local councillors, state politicians and Mr Thompson all want a say on what to build.

Mayor Jenny Hill came out yesterday saying only projects that come under the City Deal banner should be funded. Mr Thompson seems keen to fund projects outside the City Deal, thinking helping out the Royal Flying Doctor Service is a worthy cause.

Further west, State Member for Thuringowa Aaron Harper thinks the money should be used on new piping under Riverway Drive so Stage 2 of the upgrade can commence.

It’s all a mess, and all three politicians need to get their acts together.

The sooner the money is spent the sooner people are back to work.