Sustaining growth

Public transport is poor in most outer metropolitan areas and expensive private toll tunnels are seen as the only viable option to free up increasingly grid-locked peak hours in the city.

All infrastructure in South East Queensland is totally inadequate. And because people are seeing the inadequacies, both state and local governments are now telling Queenslanders they will have to pay much higher taxes, rates and water charges in future. That’s to make up for all that lost time when those same governments bragged about how Queensland was the “low tax” state. Now, the claim to have “kept increases to a minimum” is the new virtue.

Are politicians going to try to slow down growth in any way until we fix any of these problems? The answer is 'No'.

State and local government are addicted to the extra revenue they get from a growing population. And many politicians and local government councillors are addicted to the campaign funding they get from “civic-minded” developers - legislation to constrain growth is unmentionable.

So, come to South East Queensland.

You won’t have enough water. You may well not have electricity if there’s a severe storm. You may get run into by one of the hundreds of speeding semi-trailers sharing inadequate urban roads with you each day. You probably won’t get to see a doctor when you’re sick. And you may find that taxes and rates go up way beyond inflation in coming years.

But the sunshine is lovely.