Katter says "Thank you" to the fighters

Elections aren't won by blokes in suits. They're won on the backs of the people who stand out in the sun and the rain, handing out how-to-vote cards for days on end. So, this victory belongs to them. God bless every one of you. I can't thank you enough.

The same goes for my wife Susie, my five children, and even my grandchildren, who have worked tirelessly throughout this campaign to make so much of it happen. I certainly couldn't have done this without them. To my staff, who give their all (and then some) daily for the people of Kennedy... Thank you.

Thank you to my staff Alice, Carly, Dom, Rachelle, Kahla, Ella, Elise, Alana, Kylie, Emma and Sarah.

I didn't get re-elected because I'm some sort of outstanding character. I'm just a boy from Cloncurry. More members of parliament might get similar results if they actually served their electorates and listened to the people every once in a while, and not some party room in Brisbane or Canberra.

You just do the job, and the cards fall where they might. I've had to make decisions that would be politically costly for me. Julia Gillard closed the cattle market into Indonesia, and I knew unless she was removed, that market would stay closed. Those people were my friends; that was my industry. Yes, I'm a mining man, but I've always had cattle. And I represent maybe the largest cattle electorate in Australia, so I couldn't just sit around and do nothing about it. I made an unpopular but necessary call, and by 10.30pm that same day, Rudd was prime minister. Within two weeks, the market was reopened, and within two months, the price of cattle doubled. 

I now sit in my living room looking up at a picture of Edward "Red Ted" Theodore, a man who believed that saving our country from the Great Depression was more important than his political career and did what he believed to be the right thing, despite the enormous personal cost. To me, that is the only way to approach being a member of parliament.

Now, the Bridle Track Tunnel must be built. In February, we had 400,000 North Queenslanders trapped by flooding in the south and the west. If that rain depression had continued, there would have been 100 lives lost instead of only six. When we get that tunnel, it removes that danger immediately and forever. And it's only a tiny one kilometre of tunnel. Beyond its use as an escape from floods, it will open up the most diverse mineral province on earth. We can't get the ore out now because there's no port nearby. The finalisation of that road and tunnel opens up a wealth of opportunities for the Far North and North-West.

As an Australian, I have to live with the shame of how we have treated the First Australians of this country. I lie in bed at night knowing the ALP removed the market gardens and the right of First Australians to own land in their homelands. Jason Ned, who mustered more cattle than probably anyone in human history, up until the day he passed away, could not get a pastoral lease. Well, why won't you let them have pastoral leases and freehold titles? The original inhabitants of this country and they're not allowed to own a block of land, and they continue to die much younger than they should, from diabetes and related diseases because they can't own land to grow their own food! If it was a proper and fair world, Jason Ned would have died with a pastoral lease, the same as every other cattleman in Australia. 

I think Queenslanders, and especially the young people, are finally realising they are living in the most restrictive society on earth. You can't even boil a billy on your own property without applying for a fire permit, which takes two months to get approved! You can't even protect yourself in your own home, even with your fists; they'll prosecute you instead of the one who came into your home and deserves to have his backside kicked from here to the Northern Territory. And that's what we (the KAP) plan to do with them. Free country? You live in the most unfree country on earth.

Well, the people of Kennedy know the major parties aren't fighting for them. If you ignore the North, if you ignore the bush, you do it at your own peril. The people are rising up in righteous anger, and I don't blame them one bit.