{"id":36393,"date":"2013-06-17T22:36:26","date_gmt":"2013-06-17T12:36:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/?p=36393"},"modified":"2020-09-17T11:52:50","modified_gmt":"2020-09-17T01:52:50","slug":"scott-backs-yes-vote","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2013\/06\/17\/scott-backs-yes-vote\/","title":{"rendered":"Scott Backs ‘Yes’ Vote"},"content":{"rendered":"

June 17, 2013<\/strong><\/p>\n

Member for Maranoa Bruce Scott has thrown his support behind the “yes” vote at the September referendum which would provide Constitutional recognition of local government.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnder the Howard Government, we developed a policy to directly fund local government through the Roads to Recovery Grant because we wanted all of the money to be spent on roads and local priorities and not lost in another level of administration,\u201d Mr Scott said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s important to end the duplication between Commonwealth, State and local governments because too often the Commonwealth provides funding administered through the state government to local government. This creates further bureaucracy and results in less taxpayers\u2019 money being spent on the ground or directly to the community.\u201d<\/p>\n

The issue was rejected in 1974 and 1988.<\/p>\n

Mr Scott said history had shown that if a major political party or State opposed the referendum, it was unlikely to be passed.<\/p>\n

\u201cConstitutional recognition of Local Government has been widely debated for decades however it would require a majority of Australian voters and a majority of States for any change to proceed,\u201d Mr Scott said.<\/p>\n

Mr Scott said while he agreed with the concept of constitutional recognition of the third tier of government, he felt the Federal Government had handled the matter poorly.<\/p>\n

\u201cAustralians are always cautious about altering our Constitution and more time should have been given for public debate,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe public needs to know the pros and cons of an issue as important as this before they are asked to vote \u2018yes\u2019 or \u2018no\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr Scott’s LNP party colleagues at State level have also backed the referendum but have requested changes to the wording.<\/p>\n