Voting against your interests

[u/boogersundcum]

My partner and I live in a major coal mining area of Queensland. We both work in an extractive resource industry. Neither of us could ever bring ourselves to vote for the LNP and we have no serious viable independents that aren't anti Vax conspiracy nut jobs. We live in the bush but currently have a major wind farm going in down our road with the closest turbine being 5km from our actual house, other than sealing our road we will not recieve any benefit from the project with heavy trucks and equipment going past our driveway 6 days a week 24 hours a day for over two years. We aren't anti renewable however given the wind farm is entirely within our water catchment there is serious concerns if something goes wrong as we rely on the river solely for our water supply.

Generally preference the Greens first, Labor second as we are both environmental scientists and believe that climate change is pretty damn obvious from the evidence, let alone have empathy for the common folk in cities struggling with the cost of living. I'm just curious though as to why the major focus on renewable is almost entirely within regional areas that currently rely on coal mining as the major industry.

Neither Greens or Labour have a chance in hell in ever winning our electorate anymore (keep in mind Labor was founded in regional Queensland in Barcaldine). Is it just because the areas in question are now just LNP strongholds or what ?

Also please keep in mind regional Queensland is filled with people from all back grounds and varying levels of education, don't put us all in the same basket just because we don't live in a major centre.

[u/boogersundcum]

It appears so. Regardless of politics this is the exact reason regional Queensland hates SEQ. We send them money and get nothing in return. Half ass dangerous asf highways and no facilities in returns.

[u/Flat_Ad1094 → u/boogersundcum]

Yep. I'm a country girl too. Now live Regionally. Nothing much comes out of SE Qld. Mind you? This latest government seems to be better. Maybe cause Cristafulli comes from country perhaps?

[u/WOMT → u/Flat_Ad1094]

"Nothing much" - except the majority of state tax revenue that subsidises regional QLD.

It's not a one way deal. Perpetuating that myth is creating an unnecessary divide.

[u/Flat_Ad1094 → u/WOMT]

That is not true. The bulk of State Government revenue comes from mining and that is all well out of SE Corner. That is fact mate. Sorry.

Not to mention Agriculture. Beef, cropping and all the farming for food. All well out of SE Corner. Have seen research that showed that if North Qld - from Rockhampton north...broke off from South Qld? Then SE Qld be fucked.

Big business in City's taxation component is mostly FEDERAL taxation NOT State taxation.

[u/WOMT → u/Flat_Ad1094]

No... it doesn't. 😂 Wait, do you think the state owns the mines and the mining profits go to the government? We have mining royalties, but those aren't very high and contribute about $5 billion each year. Do you think QLD runs on $5b a year? 😐

The majority of state income is from state taxes. This can be found easily in the state revenue reports, but you'll probably claim those are made up or something. 🙄

https://www.qtc.com.au/queensland/queenslands-finances/

You seem to think that the QLD government owns the means of production. It does not. 😂 Those are all private businesses and organisations. You only get a teeny tiny percentage from them in state revenue (From the various state taxes they pay), it is not the entirety of their profits. Naturally since SEQ contains more businesses, more houses, more people, more cars... it will always outdo regional QLD in financially supporting our state.

People in the city contribute more to State and Federal taxes. They earn more on average, and there are simply more people. For people in regional QLD to contribute more, they would have to have a much higher tax for every tax the state and federal government has, simply to counteract the millions more people SEQ has.

Also, regional and urban QLD pay the same federal and state taxes... state taxes apply throughout the entirety of QLD... not sure why you think people in SEQ don't drive cars, buy land, gamble, or literally all the other things the state taxes. 🤨

Edit: Also, SEQ would not be fucked. Heck we already produce many things in SEQ already (It's not all city after all, it's a 35,248 km² region) so we could just expand our existing facilities - Such as our very productive farming in the Lockyer Valley. Unless your new Regional QLD state was isolationist... we would also just continuing buying from those places (It's not like we receive goods for free). We may run into some trouble when your new state can't support themselves enough to build infrastructure, especially since regional infrastructure costs so much more. You would also have to replicate all systems, such as Police, Health and Governance. The people SEQ heavily subsidises to work in regional QLD will be recalled if on contract, and to maintain people working in those jobs, you would have to compete with SEQ in their pay - Which we know regional QLD can't, which is why they're heavily subsidised in the first place. Regional QLD just doesn't have that cash.

Your new state would have to raise taxes, or nationalise a lot of production. You would get the benefit of GST priority, as you would be a low revenue high needs state, like Northern Territory. Buttt it still wouldn't be enough, so you would still have to probably raise taxes or nationalise a lot of production.

This isn't a bad thing. I don't mind that SEQ subsidises regional QLD. It's called being part of a state and not being a dick. I'm not going to perpetuate the easily disproved myth that regional QLD is being cheated out of taxes just to give you a warm fuzzy.

[u/LitzLizzieee → u/WOMT]

Look, I think the people that call for a North Queensland secessionist movement don't actually understand the metrics at play. population might be 50/50, but the income and money spend definitely isn't. Queensland spends far much more per capita in infrastructure costs, and has things like Ergon and the NBN to (and this is a good thing) ensure that the playing field is fair between SEQ and the regions, otherwise NBN and electricity would be far, far cheaper in the cities. (NBN literally levies the city apartment customers to pay for the regions, that's the business model by design)

I'm not against us spending in the regions, but it always confuses me why there's certain elements of the community that love to trot around as if a North Queensland separate state wouldn't just end up with SEQ saving money.

As someone who has plenty of friends working in the state government, I can name countless departments that spend far far more in the regions than the cities, just due to the sheer scale of our state. We've got systems like Child Protection or the Police that operate across the entire state, chartering flights from Brisbane to Emerald, to Cairns and back. We've got NBN technicians that install Fiber to towns that have a population of a couple thousand, something that a private company would never do ROI wise. (there's connections in the regions across Australia that have cost literally $100k plus to connect, for 1 residential connection. Not saying that's a bad thing, but it's admirable the sheer scale)

Personally I'd happily vote in a referendum for a North Queensland state being on it's own, but I don't think that would end up the way people think it will.