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  • Tony Abbott doorstop - Floods in Queensland

    14/01/11

    Subjects: Floods in Queensland

    E&OE……………………….…………………………………………………………………

    TONY ABBOTT:

    Look, I’m here in the flooded part of metropolitan Brisbane with Jane Prentice, the Member for Ryan and Teresa Gambaro, the Member for Brisbane and also with the Deputy Leader of the Coalition in the Senate, George Brandis.

    This is the first day back in for the shopkeepers here. It’s obviously a pretty heartbreaking business cleaning up a dreadful, dreadful mess. Some of the shops will be out of action for a long time. I think everyone is buoyed by the tremendous support that they’ve been getting from the community. We’ve had a lot of citizens just come down and volunteer to help with the clean up. There are also members of the Brisbane Lions and the Brisbane Broncos football clubs here to help. So, it is both a tragic situation and also a demonstration of the great Australian readiness to rally around in a crisis.

    I think at the moment, people’s energies are being consumed with this clean up. I think the important thing is going to be to maintain that spirit, that focus, in the days and weeks and months ahead, particularly when small businesses are doing it tough, particularly when perhaps the local economy is dampened by the damage to farms and mines which will inevitably have a significant economic consequences.

    I think it is really important in the days and weeks and months ahead that all levels of government do all whatever they reasonably can to support small business. You can’t have a community without an economy to sustain it. Small business is the lifeblood of our economy. We’ve got to keep small business going and that means that the insurance, the banking and the government sectors have all got to embrace small business in a spirit of cooperation and partnership in the days and weeks and months ahead.

    QUESTION:

    Mr Abbott, a lot of the shopkeepers here have expressed concerns about insurance companies and whether they are going to get a quick claim. Do you understand their concerns about not getting full entitlements?

    TONY ABBOTT:

    Look, I think where people have got insurance policies, those policies must be honoured swiftly and in full. We can’t have legalism, bureaucratism, or obstruction from insurers. They really do need to honour the policies that people have been paying out good money on for years. Where people don’t have policies that is where it is important for governments to do what it reasonably can to help. I’m pleased that the Gillard Government has announced $25,000 of recovery grants but it’s going to be very important that these grant programs are administered effectively and in a very timely fashion.

    QUESTION:

    Where do you think the Government is going right? Where’s it going wrong in their response?

    TONY ABBOTT:

    This isn’t a time for politics. I think that it’s good that both state, federal and local governments have responded very well to the immediate crisis but it’s one thing to respond to a crisis, it’s another thing to manage the recovery in a timely and effective way and that’s what we now need to start turning our attention to.

    QUESTION:

    Do you think that it will come down to locals coming back and supporting all these businesses once they reopen?

    TONY ABBOTT:

    I think that’s very important. I think that’s extremely important. I know that Jane Prentice and Teresa Gambaro will be closely following the progress of all these local businesses and I’m sure that as each one of them reopens, their local Coalition members will be down here to make sure they get community support. I think that once the cleanup is concluded and the rebuilding starts, it’s going to be very important to support small business, local small business in every way and obviously that means as far as is humanly possible using local suppliers, using local contractors and using local tradesman.

    QUESTION:

    Can I ask another subject, any reaction today about Indonesia’s top court refusing to commute Martin Stephens’ sentence?

    TONY ABBOTT:

    Look, I think today I’d just prefer to focus on the flood recovery effort and I might have more to say on other subjects on another day.

    [ends]
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