For Immediate Release

Gundagai's youngest Councillor, William Maslin, is not convinced that Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's $42 billion economic stimulus package is going to achieve the outcomes Mr Rudd anticipates.

Cr Maslin said today, that the Australian Government would be better off creating government sponsored jobs through nation building infrastructure projects.

“Lets use this doom and gloom period as an opportunity to get those important infrastructure projects underway such a road, rail, hospitals and schools, so when the good times return, we are not trying to play catch up while paying off a huge national debt.”

“At the end of the day, with the stimulus package in its current form, we are going to look back in a few years at how the situation has been handled and we are going to say, what do we have to show for our $40 billion plus investment”, Cr Maslin said.

Borrowing money to be handed out wily nily is not going to boost business confidence nor is it going to encourage business investment. A $950 handout is only going to last a week or so when the extra repayment is made on the mortgage… then what?

Giving people jobs while building infrastructure will boost business confidence and investment and most importantly will last much longer than a week. It will also give the markets confidence and you will find that the doom and gloom should turn around to more stable times much quicker.

Take Gundagai for example. We need $50 million to upgrade Gocup Road and $3 million to cover upgrades to our Main Street and water and sewage infrastructure. Spend the money on that and we will be creating employment opportunities, investing in much needed infrastructure and of course promoting confidence in the community.

Australia needs another big project similar to the Snowy Hydro. Again, renewable energy could be another good project once again. If Mr Rudd is so serious about the environment, let's make some serious investment in wind and solar energy generation?

“I encourage Mr Rudd to think seriously about the pain he is about to put the Nation through before he does some bad deals to ram this legislation through the Senate”, Cr Maslin concluded.

End.