By DANE LILLINGSTONE
DAVID Littleproud knows he’s got enormous shoes to fill in replacing Bruce Scott but he isn’t letting it show.
Winning the Liberal National Party (LNP) preselection for the Federal seat of Maranoa last month, he is an election away from inheriting one of the safest political seats in Australia.
Having grown up in Chinchilla, he has spent the past 16 years living in Warwick and the past 20 years working in banking and agribusiness.
Agriculture is a sector he is deeply passionate about.
“Agriculture and tourism are probably the two common threads that link every community right across Maranoa,” he said.
At the heart of what Mr Littleproud wants to achieve is connectivity for rural areas, which he said, came from a mix of improving transport and telecommunications.
“If we get that infrastructure right, innovation builds off it,” he said.
“We’ve actually got the raw materials the world wants. It’s now about us getting them into Asia and the rest of the world.”
To improve transport, he said, it was important to make roads safer and he strongly supported the rail link between Brisbane and Melbourne.
A big part of his vision is increasing telecommunications coverage, through things like the NBN, to benefit education, health and business.
“You can go 20 kilometres out of Warwick in any direction and you get no coverage,” he said.
“As you go west it gets worse and worse.
“I know of a producer who lost a couple of contracts because he couldn’t put a photo of his hay online. That’s an inequity we need to fix. We need to get our internet speeds up, and up to scratch.”
Closer to home, Mr Littleproud said he supported Emu Swamp Dam.
“No matter where you put a dam, there’s no solution that everyone will tick off and say it’s the best option,” he said.
“Barnaby Joyce has stipulated that he supports ESD and we’re going to invest money in it. So it is important to me that while we’ve got that focus and attention and ability to actually build something, we’ve got to go and build that dam.”
He said Warwick and the Southern Downs could grow through tourism.
“If you look at the average wage in Warwick, I think our responsibility is to try and lift that up so there is more disposable income,” he said.
“When I was Warwick Chamber of Commerce president I was a big believer in promoting tourism. I know of probably a dozen people that have come and lived in Warwick because they came down for Jumpers and Jazz or the Warwick Rodeo, walked down the street, and said you know, I want to live in Warwick.”
He said that as a politician, he would like to remain open with the community and all tiers of government.
“I enjoy talking to people, and I’m not afraid for people to ask me questions and hold me accountable,” he said.
“These communities will thrive but we’ve got a short window and I think that’s about making sure that we collectively work together with all the tiers of government.”
Mr Littleproud said he expected a federal election around September next year and that he would be getting around the Maranoa electorate as much as he could before then.
