NEWS
Bruce Gibson to stand for Palmer United Party Education is a priority THE federal leader of the Palmer United Party Professor Clive Palmer has announced business consultant Bruce Gibson (right) as his party’s candidate for the seat of Leichhardt in the upcoming September federal elections. Originally from Hope Vale, but now living in Cairns with his partner Mary-Joan and their four sons, Mr Gibson is the party’s first Indigenous candidate to be announced. Mr Gibson said he visited all the communities on the Cape, and if elected his goals would be to see Leichhardt improved to becoming a complete electorate, with equality for all from the Torres Strait in the north, through to Bentley Park in Cairns. “I’ll be looking at development, business development and getting money on to the ground to improve infrastructure like roads in the region,” Mr Gibson said.
Other candidates announced in Townsville on Monday were: company executive Ian Ferguson who will contest the seat of Dawson, Australian Army serviceman Martin Brewster who has been endorsed for Herbert and company manager George Brazier who will take on Bob Katter in Kennedy. “We are pleased to be endorsing such outstanding candidates with a wide range of experience to stand as the Palmer United Party candidates in these seats,” Professor Palmer said. “The Palmer United Party wants to make a difference for north Queensland, which has been forgotten by the major parties. “My companies have strong ties with the region and Queensland Nickel is a major employer and contributor to the community.”
for Indigenous people FOLLOWING on from last week’s introduction, this is the first installment in Gungarde Aboriginal Corporation’s program to capture Cooktown’s Indigenous past. Last week we interviewed six elders from Wujal Wujal - Jackey Ball, Doreen Ball, Kathleen Walker, Francis Walker, Traditional Owner Francis Lily Yougie and George Walker. Photo: CRAIG VELLA. Kulka - at the Women’s Group house and got some great stories about their history in the area. Here is a piece from one of the interviews. Francis Walker, sister to Kathleen and Lily, is a Kuku Yalanji person and was born in the Cooktown Hospital and is a Traditional Owner. Where were you educated? “I attended primary school at Bloomfield, secondary at a school in Brisbane and then on to a business college in Cairns.” What was your first job? “When I finished school I came back to Wujal and was lucky to get a job here as a Teacher aid.” Can you tell us a little about your past history in the area? “We were the last family to even move in here to our community of Wujal, and we were the first family to move back on to our traditional land and that transition has been a very challenging experience for our family in many ways.” What you would like to see happening for the future of Indigenous people? “As much as our culture and heritage is important to us, so is education, and it’s important that you come back and help your people look at ways we can improve and empower our people to see a better future for all of us and to help our old people and to keep the language going.” This is just a snippet of one of the stories told by the elders who will be interviewed. The overall outcome for this program is to build a greater respect for Indigenous people by increasing wider community understanding and awareness.
Would Clive make a difference? LOOMING over September’s elections is the shadow of Queensland’s richest View man - Professor Clive Palmer. from Clive is proving to be good at looming. the Hill It is his only strategy at the moment as he struggles to get his Palmer United Party off the ground and running in time for the elections. He has to establish his party’s credentials, make sure everyone knows what he stands for, and fend off the inevitable attacks from our entrenched political class. Not an easy job, but Clive is a capable man. He did not get to be a zillionaire by being dumb and lazy. Just having him standing around is a major irritation for Our Julia and Tony Ears. When one of them says something like “I will improve health care, I will make sure the rich pay taxes, I will cut red tape. . .”, the voters respond with - ‘What have you been waiting for? Why haven’t you done those things already? When Clive makes the same claims, we might be tempted to listen, and even give him a go at the elections. It is very annoying for Tony and Julia to have someone as smart and successful as Clive looking over their shoulders every day, and they really, really wish the media would stop listening to him. They are caught in a trap of their own making - they have made Australian politics so either-or, or so black or white, that they don’t know how to handle an outside opinion. Worse still, the public interest is moving away from Labor-Coalition bitchiness. Instead, the media are seeing little difference between the two major parties and are delighting in contrasting their tired old rhetoric with a new and shiny Clive. Would he really make a difference? Who knows for sure, but he cannot be worse than what we have now or are likely to have after the next election. Like him or not, he does have big ideas and he knows how to make them work. Are you busy for the next three years? If not, pull up his web site and you can fill in the application form to be one of his candidates for Canberra. Wouldn’t that be nice - if we had a genuine trail-blazing MP from up here?
6 – Cooktown Local News 30 May - 5 Jun 2013