Last month I completed travels throughout regional Queensland travelling almost 10000 Kms and through over 30 Local government areas. These annual travels had started over 20 years ago travelling to the communities in Cape York and the Torres Strait.

Precruitment has for many years enjoyed working with the Aboriginal Shire Councils on Cape York and in the Torres Strait. Primarily we have provided recruitment services into the communities. In addition, we have been involved in promoting the arts at a strategic level, sponsorship of employee programs, assisted with youth employment programs and provided cultural awareness training with the communities.

This month our consultant Cameron, enjoyed his first trip to Cape York to visit the communities that we work with. Cam has been enjoying working with the Aboriginal Councils and it was a great opportunity to be invited to meet with them on their traditional lands. He thoroughly enjoyed the beautiful and diverse landscapes and the welcome he received from each of the communities. Travelling in his 4WD with a rooftop tent, he was able to experience some fantastic camp spots on the lands and throughout the Cape. Cam can now really appreciate the beauty and benefits, as well as the remoteness, diversity and challenges, of living and working in the Cape. Thank you to our clients and the Aboriginal Communities that made Cameron so welcome on his first trip to visit you.

Our thoughts go out to the communities and families of Aurukun and Doomadgee with the passing of two leading figures this month. Mayor Jason Ned and Bruce Martin, RIP.

The recent annual Chamber Economic Forecast function presented a positive outlook for regional Queensland. Our economy is on track to be back where it was pre-covid with a strong diverse economy. Tourism numbers are heading in the right direction with solid international numbers returning in particular from Europe the US, UK and NZ and domestic travellers remain at record levels to Queensland. Interestingly, rate hikes have had little impact on regional real estate prices. This is a result of the relatively low base of our housing market over recent years.

Employment is forecast to remain strong with low unemployment. The Energy & Jobs Plan will bring $7.5 billion to North Queensland alone with additional funding across regional Queensland. Projects include huge wind and solar farms and the Burdekin project for the world’s largest Pumped Hydro station. There will also be the ‘SuperGrid’, thousands of kilometres of poles and wires to be built throughout our state. All this sounds great for the economy but let’s hope there is a strong environmental program to clean up the fallout of decommissioned infrastructure and reforestation of our beautiful landscape and forests with all of this planned construction.

We wish all of our valued clients a healthy and prosperous New Financial Year and thank you for your continued support.