The LNP and the Treasurer are trying to mislead Queenslanders, Katter’s Australian Party (KAP) leader and Member for Traeger, Robbie Katter has said.

“The government has seen how toxic a blind, ideological pursuit of emissions reduction is, and has tried to con Queenslanders by scrapping renewables targets – without walking away from emissions targets!” Mr Katter said.

“Scrapping renewable targets and helping CopperString are good things, and we congratulate them for that, but the government can’t get away with only doing half the job.

News that the Mount Isa Copper Smelter and Townsville Refinery will remain operating is good news, but the hard work is still to come, the Member for Traeger and Leader of the Katter’s Australian Party (KAP), Robbie Katter has said from his home city of Mount Isa.

“This is a start and it’s at least reassuring us that our critical sovereign capability needs to be preserved,” Mr Katter said.

Katter’s Australian Party (KAP) Leader and Member for Traeger, Robbie Katter, has criticised the slow rollout of the National Flood Warning Infrastructure Network (FWIN) program, warning that Charters Towers and other North West communities are being left exposed.

Mr Katter said he welcomed the Federal Government’s $236 million investment to improve and integrate rain and river gauges, and the decision to centralise responsibility for the system through the Bureau of Meteorology (BOM).

The Mount Isa Copper Smelter remains hanging in the balance, with the Queensland government seeming to tacitly sit on the sidelines, the Member for Traeger and Leader of the Katter’s Australian Party, Robbie Katter has said.

“It really worries me that all we are seeing and hearing is the Government in Queensland saying, ‘Glencore should be good citizens because Mount Isa has been good to Glencore’,” Mr Katter said.

“That just doesn’t cut it,” he said.

Despite winning government in the regions, the LNP are proposing to make the Brisbane bubble even bigger by cutting a seat in North Queensland!  Robbie Katter, the Leader of Katter’s Australian Party and Member for Traeger has said, reviewing submissions to the Queensland Redistribution Commission (QRC) review into electorate boundaries.

“Queenslanders outside of the south east are already strangled by the one size fits all approach from Brisbane, so expanding the number of seats down there will only further dilute the voice of the rest of the state,” he said.

“Like a phoenix from the ashes, Mount Isa’s rodeo is back, and has found its community spirit again,” the Katter’s Australian Party (KAP) Leader and Member for Traeger said on the opening day of the 2025 Mount Isa Rodeo.

After a year-long fight for fairness, the small, family-owned piston-engine helicopter businesses that risked it all during the 2024 Pentland-Torrens Creek fire have been reimbursed by the Queensland Government.

Today Queensland has lost one of its true giants, Sir Leo Hielscher.

His passing marks the end of an era, but his legacy will endure in steel, concrete, and in the lives of millions of Queenslanders who continue to benefit from his foresight and conviction.

I thought I knew a fair bit about Sir Leo, but the more I look into him, his accomplishments, and his ability to ‘get it done’ the more I discover and admire him more.

“I’m not going to leave any stone unturned in the pursuit of keeping Australia’s Mount Isa Copper Smelter operating,” Katter’s Australian Party (KAP) Leader and Member for Traeger has said from a chilly Canberra.

“Here we are, with the copper smelter; if it falls, it’s a house of cards – the fertiliser plant, the rail, the next generation of miners who want to help Australia benefit from the $700 billion in resources which are in the ground in the North West – that all goes if the smelter goes,” Mr Katter said.

For most of the last 18 months, the future of the Mount Isa Copper Mine and Smelter have demanded my intense focus.

Much has been said about the critical nature of the Mount Isa Copper Smelter and the associated Townsville Refinery; its importance in Australia’s world trade, the 17,000 jobs it supports, and the future of Mount Isa itself.

Since the first announcement that the owners would be closing this critical infrastructure, I have sought out knowledgeable industry leaders who know this stuff best.  Mine managers and engineers, financiers, deal brokers, market experts, the list goes on.