Kalgoorlie is the biggest town in Western Australia’s outback, but it is a desolate desert town with a population of 29,000 people, so why is the Mark McGowan government putting $1 million into military-grade CCTV equipment all around the town? It is a town in the middle of the outback, who could they possibly need to spy on with face-scanning CCTV equipment?

Experts have warned that Western Australia’s medical infrastructure will not be able to handle a delta-variant COVID-19 outbreak, now ask yourself for a second, why in the world would the Western Australian government want to be putting millions of dollars into security equipment in the DESERT when we should be putting millions of dollars into medical infrastructure, incase some-day we happen to have an outbreak of our own, just like the eastern states.

Kalgoorlie does have a quite daunting criminal history, and it still does with reports of Bikie gang activity in the town but Kalgoorlie already has CCTV equipment all over the town and the McGowan government has announced that they will deploy 5 specialist police officers into the Kalgoorlie-Boulder region along with the 950 additional police officers they are deploying in the town. So why are we putting so much money and manpower in a desolate desert town with some small-time thugs when we have a massive COVID Outbreak on the other side of the country, why are we not preparing for this?

Not only are we wasting money on desert towns, but we are also wasting a total of $52 million dollars on ‘road safety’ upgrades on the Coolgardie Esperance highway, which is a 350km road network that connects Esperance to Coolgardie, near Kalgoorlie, and we are throwing away another $20.4 million for sealing of shoulders and installation of audible edge lines on Great Eastern Highway, Goldfields Highway, and Coolgardie-Esperance Highway.

The WA government is concerned about a COVID-19 outbreak that we would not be able to handle, yet we are wasting $74 million dollars on roads that barely anyone uses and CCTV and police manpower on a desert town that doesn’t even need it because it already has CCTV and a police presence. Kalgoorlie’s crime rate is higher than WA’s average but does that really warrant $1 million dollars into military-grade CCTV equipment and 955 additional police officers in the region? We as taxpayers are standing by and letting this happen when what we need to do is stand up for what is right and tell the McGowan government to put more money into medical infrastructure during a global pandemic instead of putting it towards desert road upgrades and military-grade CCTV equipment in a nearly desolate town that really doesn’t even need it.