· Where the GST from regional areas is spent in Queensland by the Beattie government?

· What health & dental services country people get in comparison with Beattie's Green Zone in SE QLD?

· What money Beattie gives regional areas to match the wanton waste occurring in the Green Zone with billions of dollars being misused leading to rat hole traffic congestion, worsening atmospheric pollution, and a rabid quality of life?

It will be found that Beattie is a total failure even though he has milked regional areas of most of their GST to spend in the Green Zone. He has at the same time transformed the Green Zone into a much less desirable and liveable place.

A double whammy, Pete. Not to mention all your citizens are preparing to drink water laced with effluent. Take another bow.

Beattie and his undemocratic band of Green Zone gestapo should be sacked and replaced by regional Local Authorities representing their regions.

However, as Beattie has shown in the past, he will abuse his power and do what he wants and not what the people concerned want.

He is a dictator; this is the worst government Qld has ever had.

The people would accept the change a lot better if they were consulted.

A change like this should be done carefully and this would take a lot longer than the time alloted.

If they get it wrong it will have severe consequences on rural communities and the people who live in the rural towns.

What is the rush to have it all in place by March next year?

Why not spend the next three years working through the whole scenario with the people affected and install it before the election in three years time.

If it is going to be forced upon us, at least get it right the first time.

Is Beattie so arrogant that he hasn't learnt anything from the debacle of the Veg Management Act, the Wild Rivers Act, the overbearing attitude of the government with rural water, the lack of planning for water in the south east corner, the mess of rural roads, the hospital mess, the electricity mess, the ambulance mess, and it goes on and on?

When the result of this forced amalgamation is yet another mess, who is he going to blame this time?

Please, people in the SE corner, stop being so gullible and believing his insincere apologies and start to see him for what he is: a dictator.

For example Cobram, Numurkah, Nathalia and part Yarrawonga Shires were merged into the new super improved Moira Shire. All those aforementioned Shires owned buildings, plant and had money in the banks. Towns had jobs, infrastructure and a strong sense of identity.

Three years later, plant was mostly sold, a large number of buildings sold, massive retrenchments, Numurkah was Shire HQ, Cobram did building approvals, Nathalia had what was left of the road plant and Yarrawonga hosted the Tourism Offices.

To aid communication Moira Shire paid for a $6M Microwave communication system that was a fiasco.

The first Annual Report for Moira Shire published three years after amalgamation disclosed a $12M LOSS, huge borrowings to pay for staff retrenchments and communictaion infrastructure.

Can Qld Shires and Townships afford amalgamation? Short answer...NO!

There are winners and losers, the winner may be the town with the new Amalgamated Shire HQ; the losers, everyone else.

Why doesn't Andrew Fraser give a detailed report of the money spent directly by councils in their local shires and the subsequent multiplier effect and benefits that float through as a result.

Look what happened to the small hospitals when the hospital boards were taken away from the smaller towns.

When will he ever learn that there is never a blanket solution to any issue across Qld - not veg management, not shires.

We are not only fighting for no amalgamations but for our rights and freedom - our right to be consulted - our right to a referemdum which was once in the LG Act.

We cannot sit by again and do nothing.

People across our great state have to unite, not just from the west but every Queenslander and use people power to stop this dictator.

The responsibilities of the State would devolve to both the Feds and Local Govt with the Feds taking on police, main roads, environment and primary industries etc, and Local Govt could do what it does best, look after local issues.

This way, we would not have any more bothersome waste by a State Govt as there would be none.

It may be better if we had larger local Governement areas with common intersts.

Does Australia need an entire Socialist Government if Federal Labor wins the forthcoming election later this year?

We need to find credible people to run as true Independents, usually of the Nationalist tag.

Unfortunately, the bush is always run by urban warriors who don't know outside their concrete jungle except what they see on the idiot box or in environmental magazines.