A division of the Liberal Party of Australia
OPENING OF THE SS YONGALA ROAD
12 December, 2009
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OPENING OF
THE SS YONGALA ROAD
ALVA BEACH
Saturday, 12th December, 2009
Ken Steel the project co-ordinator and member of the Alva Sports, Recreation and Community Association and Past President. Eddie Smallwood noting the important part that he played and Neil Green as well. Now Neil would be one of those who would almost qualify for Mayor of Alva Beach or Premier of Queensland or could even take it a bit further than that. Neil is certainly a very, very active guy when it comes to anything fishing and anything related to the community and I am as pleased for Neil as I am for the community that this project is up and running at the moment because certainly a lot of Neil’s thought and efforts went into this project over many, many years.
Can I start off by again repeating what Ken said and that is congratulating all of those who have been, in any way, part of this fabulous project. I know it hasn’t been easy right from the start. I think getting the $100,000.00 was probably the easiest and since then I know the Council’s gone through some trials and tribulations. I know the guys working on it from the Council whilst they were working there they did over and above what they had to do, but particularly all of the people at Alva Beach and those Friends of Alva Beach who have laboured long and hard to make sure this facility happened. Congratulations to you all and thanks to you from a very, very grateful community.
I had a look at a facsimile of the plaque that’s being unveiled and reading the plaque is like a Who’s Who of the Burdekin District and it’s certainly, as well, like the Royal Family of Alva Beach. I’m delighted that those names are all recorded on this for posterity.
Ladies and gentlemen, Alva Beach has been a great place that most of us have been associated with for a long time. I think Lesley and I used to come down to the dances here many years ago before we ever got married, and we’ll stop there. But it was always a part of life in the Burdekin to come down to Alva.
Neil has mentioned the Federal Government’s Recreational Fishing Programme. That was a promise we took to the 2004 election and as John Howard said to me, we need to do something to help families and help communities to encourage family recreational pursuits. So we developed this Recreational Fishing Grants Programme which involved $15 million over 3 years, I think, from memory. Anyhow it was to make the Recreational Fishing experience better, more accessible and really to encourage families to enjoy the fishing experience. After the 2004 election we started this programme. I had to have an Advisory Committee because many of you may not know that you don’t, in Government, just sort of say I like that we’ll give it some money. It all has to be done properly so that the Auditor General can be satisfied. It and it has to be done fairly and evenly and so I needed an advisory committee to assess all of the applications and to make sure they were within the guidelines and to fairly distribute the money. Now I picked people, relevant people, from all over Australia but as the Chairman of that Committee I appointed the then Deputy Mayor of the Burdekin Shire Council, Mark Haynes to be the Chairman of that Australia – wide advisory committee. I knew Mark would be very fair, he would be honest but he would also appreciate that fishing’s important in North Queensland. Now, Neil is sort of right, when he said that the original guidelines for the grant really didn’t include funding of roads. Neil had spoken to me about this project and he had sold me particularly on the fact that the Yellow Zones would be here and you’d be able to get away from where the commercials were taking all the fish out of the creek. I thought it was a good idea but the Department came up to me and said ‘Look Minister, I know you’re very keen on this but unfortunately it’s not within the guidelines that the Government had designed for the programme. I said to the Secretary of the Department, “well, that is very unfortunate, we obviously made a mistake in the guidelines so can I suggest you go back and have another look at the guidelines and perhaps we should amend the guidelines to be able to incorporate a project that might improve access to fishing areas”. And so, the guidelines were changed and lo and behold in came the Burdekin application. It went to the Advisory Committee and it was properly and very assiduously assessed and came out with the grant. It is also good to note that in the Burdekin district, Morris Creek and the Jerona Landing got some money. The barra re-stocking programme got money in this area. The floating pontoon at Plantation Creek was part of this Recreational Fishing Grants Programme. Also the great facilities at Groper Creek, and I see Mayor Fahey here, the Mayor of Groper Creek. We opened those last year and also Molongle Creek was supported. So there are many projects funded right throughout Australia I might say, and many in North Queensland. But it is good to see the Burdekin got some consideration - and I don’t cast any aspersions on the fact that the Chair of the advisory Committee came from this area! But I do know that they were all properly and fully assessed.
Ladies and gentlemen, I just want to, as well, congratulate George de Jong who’s the current President. George has done a fabulous job. I haven’t had the pleasure of formally meeting George before today, I don’t think, but he’s a legend and his reputation goes well before him. So, George, congratulations to you and your team for finally bringing this together.
Now ladies and gentlemen I am told that the name suggested or picked for this project is the SS Yongala Drive and I think that that couldn’t be more appropriate. The Yongala, of course, was a vessel that sank about 11 nautical miles off the coast here in 1911 with the loss of life of 122 passengers. But since those sad times the Yongala has become a symbol, almost, of tourism in North Queensland and it’s fabulous to see this road being named after the Yongala. I am also told, and I didn’t know this, someone’s done some research for me, that the ship, Yongala, was named after an aboriginal word meaning broad water and pronounced ‘Yonggluh” as I understand it and so it’s very appropriate of course that Eddie Smallwood and Joe Henaway were so intimately involved in this whole project. It is great to see the involvement of the people who originally inhabited this area.
So, ladies and gentlemen, I think, with that we are to unveil the plaque and cut the ribbon but at this stage can I again congratulate you George, all of your committee, the Council who played a magnificent role, anyone at all who has had anything to do with this, well done. It really is an example of a ‘community at work’ a community that interacts with all levels of Government and achieves something that will be for the lasting benefit of the community. Congratulations to you all.