Bill Bates and David Young from the Boot Brisbane group have started a new live-streamed podcast on creating a new state of North Queensland. Guests so far have included former Queensland Speaker John Mickel and federal MP Ewen Jones, and I was happy to be their guest on Wednesday night:
Yes to a North Qld State podcast
We had a good chat about the economic and financial issues associated with creating a new state, including whether and how the state’s current debt would be shared with a new state of North Queensland.
My previous posts relevant to the NQ state debate include:
My comments on NQ exit in ABC online story
Is North Qld under-funded by the State Government relative to the South East?
Townsville Bulletin report on funding feud: Brisbane economist “under fire”
Senator Canavan’s ambitious plan for a State of North Queensland
The old Burns Philp company building on Flinders St in Townsville.
Queensland Economy Watch 
The interesting thing is Gene, that whenever they talk about an NQ State they include CQ (where the big mineral and agricultural wealth is created).
Kind Regards
Hon. Paul Lucas
Yes, good point Paul. They need to, otherwise it’s probably not viable. You could argue there are similarities between NQ and CQ, though, and both regions, rightly or wrongly, feel they are being let down by George St/William St. Thanks for the comment.
We should make no apology for spending more per capita outside SEQ – in all of our regions. Balkanisation is never a solution. It’s like the uniform electricity tariff. It benefits NQ, FNQ, and Western Qld. So it should. Were SEQ not in the same state as NQ it is but one example of an economic impost that the people of the north would have to pay.
It is no different from thinking it would make sense having Qld separate from Australia – we would be worse off.