Senator RENNICK (Queensland) (15:17): It's great to be back here in 2021 with my first speech on a motion to take note of answers. What a time to be alive. The distinction between this side of the chamber and that side has never been more stark, because this side of the chamber believes in progress. This side of the chamber wants to take Australia forward. What does that side of the chamber want? All they want is to continue on JobKeeper and JobSeeker. There are plenty of ways to keep people in work, like by building infrastructure, which is something that state governments need to be doing. On Tuesday, the RBA came out and issued another $100 billion in bonds. Let's build infrastructure. Stop tearing dams down in Queensland. If you want to get jobs out there in the regions, let's get them into coalmining, farming, logging and fishing. It's interesting that Senator Sheldon raised the Chairman of Virgin Australia in his first question. I actually remember what she said last week in the Senate inquiry as well. She wanted a coordinated framework between the states to—guess what?—keep the borders open. This is the thing about the state governments; there's been a real contrast. The Liberal government of New South Wales and the Premier of New South Wales, Gladys Berejiklian, have kept the borders open the whole time, with the one exception of Victoria when it did blow up out of control. But the state Labor premiers keep locking down over—wait for it, wait for it—one. One case. Now, what kind of confidence do these people have in their own health systems when they panic over one case? What are their contact tracing and testing systems like and, more to the point, what are their quarantine systems like when they have to panic? The Queensland CMO couldn't understand how the virus could possibly spread in a hotel with ducted air conditioning. Seriously, you don't need to be a rocket scientist to work it out. You don't need to be a rocket scientist to work it out. Did that do daily testing? Did the state premiers do daily testing— The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Rennick, could you resume your seat? I have listened really carefully. The motion to take note was on questions from Senators Polley and Green to Ministers Birmingham and Payne. Whilst they did go to JobKeeper and JobSeeker, they were largely focused on tourism. You've mentioned JobSeeker and JobKeeper once, but you're really getting way off the topic now. Senator RENNICK: Madam Deputy President, I apologise: I will be more specific. Just last week, when the borders reopened, tourism jumped by 100 per cent in Queensland. The southerners wanted to come back to Queensland, which I must say I was quite surprised about. I talked to a cabbie here on my way down during the week and he was very angry with Queensland. He said that, given what the Premier had done in locking them out previously, he wasn't going to go back to Queensland for holidays. The whole reason why I'm talking about keeping borders open is so that we can get the tourists who would normally go overseas and have a holiday somewhere in the Caribbean to come to our beautiful city of Cairns, North Queensland, outback Queensland, the Gold Coast, the Sunshine Coast and, of course, my homeland of the Darling Downs. We want to see the southerners come up to Queensland because we love tourism. When I grew up, tourism was the fastest-growing industry in Queensland. The late, great Premier Sir Jo Bjelke-Petersen turned Queensland into the tourist capital of the world. We had World Expo 88 and we even had George Harrison of the Beatles buy an island up there; everyone was flocking to the islands. Unfortunately, under Labor, tourism in the regions was destroyed. They destroyed maternity wards in the regions. That would be another way to create jobs in the regions. You don't always have to go back to the industry you've been in. Maybe you could think about restoring some health services and reopening those 30 maternity wards that Labor have closed for the last 30 years. But can I just point out that the federal government has spent $28 billion in direct economic support for homes and businesses in Queensland—more than three times the $8 billion spent by the Premier of Queensland, Anna Palaszczuk. You cannot continue to do lockdowns on short notice. As you can tell, I got my hair cut on the weekend. I was talking to my barber, and he lost 1,500 bucks on the weekend that we did that three-day lockdown—$1,500! Industries cannot survive if we don't have a clear and coordinated framework between the states. The states are the ones which perform health—that is in the Constitution. Or, should I say, that's not in the Constitution, and this is the thing that Labor keeps forgetting to mention. They like to say that we have to do quarantine, but, guess what? We don't have to do health, but we give $60 billion every year in block payments to state governments. So, if state governments want to give back the $60 billion, we'll take quarantine and health, because they go hand-in-hand. (Time expired)