This week, due to pressure from community members like you the Queensland Government was forced to back down in it’s response to Peter Costello’s Commission of Audit recommendations to fully privatise Queensland’s essential services such as power and transport.
There is no doubt the political consequence of unequivocal community opposition to privatisation has spooked the Government into squibbing it in their response to the audit recommendations. What the Queensland Government has proposed is privatisation ‘stealth’ and we have every confidence that our communities will see straight through it.
Energy - The Government has indicated they sell our power generators and while they say they will not sell the poles and wires, they will allow private firms to invest our public network companies like Energex and Ergon.
Rail – City passenger and network infrastructure will allow for private providers to bid to operate services and to carry out maintenance under franchise or lease arrangements.
Ports – The commercial operations of Gladstone Ports Corporation and Port of Townsville Ltd for long term leases to private operators.
Hospitals - Expand contestable markets in metro areas for private provision. Increase more non-government sector delivery of outpatient services and for rural and remote health services.
Community and disability services - Introduce contestability to community health and disability services. The Queensland Government requires all funding from Australian Government to provide the NDIS.
It is absurd to say we will still own the poles, wires, trains and ports, whilst behind the scenes, outsourcing en masse is occurring. Buildings and poles don’t provide services, people do. The network will not maintain itself, nor will it repair itself after extreme weather or natural disasters.
Rather than act to protect Queensland, the Government is outsourcing work to be sale ready for the highest bidder. This will put the price and reliability of our Queensland owned and operated services at risk.
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