"When you are trying to pay back the credit card you don't stop paying the kids' school fees" said Matthew Canavan tonight at a dinner in Rockhampton hosted by Capricorn Enterprise.

"We have big mess to fix up in Canberra but if we don't keep investing in places like Central Queensland then what we will be left with will resemble something like the Augean stables.

"Central Queensland puts the money on the table that allows us to pay for public services. We must keep supporting industries that produce wealth and create jobs.

"Ultimately it is how much money you make that determines how much money you can spend. The more prosperous we are the more we can afford health, education and welfare spending.

"That's why the Coalition invest $10 billion in the Bruce Highway, invest $100 million in more Agricultural research and development and develop a northern Australia agenda to create new areas of wealth in our nation.

"Over the past decade our productivity growth has been poor. If we can just lift that back up to the historical average, we will stabilise our government spending to GDP without any changes to government programs.

"But we can't bank on that. We can't guarantee that Australia's 22 years of uninterrupted economic growth will continue forever.

"That's why the tough decisions need to be made next week to get our budget back into some kind of economic health now.

"We survived the last economic crisis because of the strong position we were in. Unfortunately after 6 years of Labor we are in a much weaker spot now."

Senator-elect Matthew Canavan spoke last night at a "Welcome to Rockhampton" dinner hosted by Capricorn Enterprise. He will take his seat in the Senate on July 1 and base himself in Rockhampton -- the first Senator to do so in more than 20 years.

8 May 2014