I will miss this place. I will miss the people and I will miss the communities of the Northern Tablelands.

The Hon. Adam Marshall has today delivered his valedictory speech as the Member for Northern Tablelands. This is what he had to say.

There is no greater honour in life than to be entrusted to represent your community, no nobler pursuit than to serve your community and no greater responsibility than to advocate for the needs, desires, and aspirations of the people you represent. Those were the first words in my first speech in this place almost 11 years ago to the day—on the other side of the Chamber. I hope that I have been able to live up to those bywords over those 11 years because they certainly have been bywords for the way that I have tried to undertake my work.

I acknowledge everyone who is in the gallery, particularly the students from Walcha Central School, who cannily changed their plans to make it work today. Thank you to those year 11 legal studies students. I am really going to miss all that banter that you all just witnessed, by the way—not. I am really heartened by everyone who has taken the time to come here today. It is a long way to travel from the Northern Tablelands. Now, without our regional seniors travel cards, it is just that little bit more expensive to get here.

I am the first member for Northern Tablelands to deliver a valedictory speech. Bill McCarthy unfortunately died in office, Ray Chappell was defeated at an election, and my immediate predecessor, Richard Torbay, resigned suddenly.

For me, today is not just about putting a full stop on 11 years in this place; it is about closing a chapter of 20 years in public office. On 28 March 2004 I was elected to Gunnedah Shire Council as a bright, wide-eyed and probably quite naive 19-year-old. It is wonderful to have Mayor Jamie Chaffey here from Gunnedah shire. He is continuing the fine tradition of mayoral leadership in that community and is also the chair of the Country Mayors Association. That experience of nine years on Gunnedah Shire Council stood me in good stead when I came into this place. Members who have come from local government know all too well what a great grounding it is in learning how to serve your community, fight for your community and speak up without fear or favour.

I still remember, quite vividly, the day after I was elected mayor of Gunnedah shire another great Country Party stalwart Roger Corfield Anson Wotton—he used to explain how to pronounce his last name by saying, “It’s ‘wotton’ as in cotton, not ‘wooten’ as in rootin'”—pulled up in his old, conked-out Mercedes-Benz and said, “Jump in the car. I want to take you for a spin.” He said to me, and I have never forgotten it, “Whatever you do in politics, remember this: If you always put people and their issues at the forefront, the politics will always take care of itself.” Hopefully, I have not only taken that on board and lived by it but also been able to act it out. I will be forever grateful for Roger’s wise advice and counsel.

I am also delighted to have here today in the gallery my year 6 teacher, Mr Gary Humphries. Like my parents, Mr Humphries is not a political person at all, but he instilled in me a great love of speaking and self confidence—so it is his fault. Before that I was quite retiring; I sat at the back of the classroom and would not say much. Education has been a very important part of my life. I am also glad that the deputy principal from my high school days, Mr Lindsay Paul, is in the gallery. Ironically, he ended up being principal of a high school in my electorate—and so life goes full circle. I always enjoyed Mr Paul’s speeches at the annual school presentations, but I most enjoyed the fact that he always finished his school presentation ceremonies in under an hour and a half. As a country MP who, like others, did about 20-odd school presentations at the end of each year, I greatly appreciated that. It is great to have him here today.

When I came into this place, I felt blessed but also cursed, in a way. I took over the mantle of representing the Northern Tablelands from Richard Torbay. Whatever people may think about him, I know he was a good friend of yours, Mr Speaker, as he was mine. I watched closely how he serviced the electorate. Something in the way that he did his work resonated with me—going back to what Roger Wotton said about putting people and issues first and politics second. I have never seen, to this day, an MP who worked as hard, turned up to the opening of an envelope and actually took up the cudgels here in Macquarie Street for those issues without fear or favour.

I feel very strongly that when we are in this place representing our electorates, we are mere custodians of a very important office. There are only 93 of us in here; there are eight million people out there. How lucky are we. How fortunate are we, for just a blip in time, to be able to be the voice of our communities. When I came into the role, the bar was set incredibly high. That made me incredibly nervous, but it also made me determined not to let people down and not to really change a lot of how he did his work in the electorate. I hope, as I depart this place this coming Monday, that hopefully that bar is still just as high—maybe a little bit higher. But hopefully I have not let people down and that legacy is there of vigorous, vocal local representation.

On that, I know over the years I have enraged various people, particularly in my political party, with some of the stances I have taken. But I have done so because of my fundamental belief that when you come to this place, sure, you fight elections hard and they are won and lost, but when you take up your seat in this place, it is your job to be the voice and the advocate for your community—not just the people who you agree with, not just the people who voted for you, but everyone, from the large communities to the very small. Over the years I have worked with people from all walks of life, all backgrounds, and people that will never vote for me or my political party, but I do not care. That has been completely irrelevant. People are people and they deserve a voice and representation.

Today I know a lot of people are expecting a few mic drop moments, a few truth bombs and all of that, and David Elliott’s presence today probably helps confirm some of that. But I am 39, and when I walk out of here I am going to hopefully have another career. In that vein, I have decided to save some of those stories for another time, away from Hansard, which will be on the record forever. But I have thoroughly enjoyed my 11 years, staying longer than I had thought I would and probably longer than many would have preferred. It has been an incredible ride.

During that time I have been very privileged, I feel, to work with some amazing community groups and individuals, not least of which are my local mayors, deputy mayors and general managers. They are here today, all of them. Every single one of them is here today, and I want to acknowledge you all and your predecessors because the relationship, particularly in the bush, between a local member and their local mayors and councils is absolutely fundamental.

Back home, we have always tried to adopt a “team Northern Tablelands” approach. That is, it doesn’t matter whether we agree or disagree or our different political stripes; we work together and we are stronger together. I always use the slogan that, in the regions, the deck of cards is always and will always be stacked against us. We are only a third of the population. Regardless of political stripe, the regional seats are a minority of the 93 seats in this place. To combat that, we need to be united as a region if we are to have our voice heard here and we are to extract as much cash as possible from this place and take it back home for important projects.

I think that “team Northern Tablelands” approach, if you will excuse my indulgence, has been incredibly successful. Over the last 11 years, the capital investment in the Northern Tablelands has been record-breaking—nearly $3.3 billion worth of capital investment, 1,883 individual projects. I was looking through the figures just yesterday: 22,354 kilometres of new bitumen seal throughout the Northern Tablelands; 44 new bridges, retiring all those old timber bridges; four new hospitals, two that have been built and two that will be built, and we need a bit of extra money for the Glen Innes Hospital, Minister Park; 18 new fire stations; schools; ambulance stations; and the list goes on. But that, to me, is bread-and-butter stuff. That is what good local members should be doing, whether in government, opposition or otherwise. That is the job—to extract money from Macquarie Street to repair infrastructure, maintain infrastructure and help the community develop new projects and initiatives.

In that bundle of 1,883, there have been some incredibly memorable ones. It is good to have Duncan Gay here today because my most memorable one is a bridge that I drive over probably six or seven times each week. It is called the Emu Crossing Bridge at Bundarra, if anyone is up that way. That community had to wait 98 years for their new bridge, so I blame all governments of various political persuasions over the years. We found a letter from the old Gostwyck Shire Council back in the 1920s petitioning the then Government—I do not know who was in government; Duncan was probably here, but who was in government I do not know—for a new bridge. It was a low-level crossing that used to flood over, which the schoolkids loved because they couldn’t get to school.

But that community banded together. It was a real community effort—Bob Crouch, Dave and Mel Lowell and the whole community. During the by-election campaign for Northern Tablelands, Duncan actually came up and announced $3½ million to fund a new bridge. The community was absolutely ecstatic. The media was quite cynical and said to Duncan, “Is this contingent on Adam Marshall being elected or the money does not happen?” He paused and he looked down the barrel of the camera and just said, “Adam will be elected”. I thought that was a great way to not answer but answer the question. I put that one away in the back of my mind for a later time.

When that bridge was opened in October 2015, the whole community turned out. Every shop closed in the village, the school closed, and everyone walked across that bridge. It was a great community day. Only 300 people live at Bundarra, but for them that project has been transformational. Every single member of that community has never forgotten that and never forgotten those who were involved. That, to me, is emblematic of projects like that, which we bandy around in this place and weaponise and stuff like that. But that is the transformational power of projects in a regional setting. That community has never looked back since then. Projects like the special activation precinct at Moree, the industrial park at Armidale airport, the funding that’s been put aside for future water security projects around Armidale, the Malpas Dam pipelines—those are the projects that will truly benefit our region for many decades to come.

Also, in my time in this place, I was very fortunate to serve for five years in Cabinet. I do not want to make a big deal of that because it is not why I got into this place; it was just the cherry on top—a huge opportunity. I infuriated Premiers and my ministerial staff because I hated being in Sydney and I could not wait to get back to the electorate—probably why I only lasted five years, among other reasons. But we will not canvass those here today—something else for the dinner afterwards.

In that time there were some significant challenges that I just want to dwell on for a few moments, particularly in the agriculture portfolio. Coming into that role after the 2019 election—right in the heat, literally, of the worst drought that this state and our farming communities had ever experienced—was a baptism of fire. To roll out over $2.4 billion of direct financial assistance to our primary producers was not only difficult—and I still remember being grilled by Dom as the then Treasurer about all this money that was going out the door and the drought maps and all of that. But Dom was great. He did not want to spend the money, but he did. That is all I will say about that. That assistance not only helped our primary producers get through the drought but to actually bounce back rather quickly when seasonal conditions turned around. If the drought was not bad enough, we then had a mouse plague and we also had COVID, which presented difficulties right across government. We had to try to make sure that we had flexible arrangements so that the agricultural sector could continue to function.

On that point, I will say this: I will never forget seeing how the sausage was made, to use a phrase, in terms of that COVID response. Unless you were there watching Brad Hazzard, Dom Perrottet and Gladys Berejiklian work through something that no leaders had ever had to confront, and being able to sit a little bit on the inside and watch how that played out and the leadership that was shown—gosh, we were very fortunate as a state to have those people in that room at the time. I say that with genuine sincerity. Those were difficult times and we came through. I pay tribute to that leadership.
While I am talking about those ministerial times, I also pay tribute to Scott Hansen (former director-general of the Department of Primary Industries), who has joined us in the gallery. Like me—well, he is actually unemployed; I am soon to be. It was lovely to see, by the way, that the person who sacked Scott was also sacked very recently as well. That was a bit of bittersweet justice. In my 20 years working in local government and State Government, Scott is without doubt the best public servant that I have ever had the pleasure to work with. He is someone who has the regions at his heart, but who is not afraid to tell a Minister quite frankly about what needs to be done or what should not be done. I thank Scott very much. Those times were quite heady—drought, mice and the COVID response. I thank him, not just for being here today, but for the service that he has given our State for 10 years in his role. It is very important.

Returning to the electorate, I cannot thank the community enough. I have been so blessed to be in this place and so blessed to have such strong support from the community. From the outside, people look at the numbers for the Northern Tablelands and think, “Oh, that’s just a safe National Party seat.” That actually belies the complexity and the diversity of the Northern Tablelands. It is not a rural constituency base. It is an electorate that is diverse and complex, and politically it has demonstrated that it will support anyone who is willing to stand up for it. Since its recreation in the 1980s, it has had Labor MPs, Independent MPs, and National Party MPs. The electorate has been represented by various political parties, but once it picks, it tends to stick. That is, if the local member looks after the electorate, it will in turn support the local member.

I am very hopeful—in fact very confident—that the next member for Northern Tablelands, Brendan Moylan, who has joined us in the gallery today, will continue that legacy of fighting hard in this place for the community and speaking up, no matter how difficult the issue is, for what the communities need. I know that Brendan has the capability to do that because of his experience and his background. With Brendan, I think the electorate will be trading up in terms of the quality and calibre of the local member. That will send shudders through some people in this place. His background and experience and his commitment to the region will stand him in very good stead in this place. I look forward to working with him in the coming weeks, whenever the by election date is set, to make sure that he is the one that I can pass the baton to to continue the work.

I have a few thank you’s to finish with. I thank my electorate office staff, who are all here today. I particularly thank Lisa Williams, who has been with me for the whole 11 years and was with Richard Torbay for six years before that. Lisa is absolutely magnificent. We live and we die based on our electorate office staff, and she is incredible. She knows everyone in the electorate and knows all the issues. I am not someone who likes to sit in the office. I hate being in the office, and when I am there I like to shut the door and write my little birthday cards—which I like doing. Lisa and the electorate office staff really hold the fort together across the Armidale and Moree electorate offices. To all my staff, I thank you very much. I have been very well backed up for many years by my staff, most of whom have been there since the very beginning. I do not know how they have put up with me, but they have, and I sincerely appreciate that.

I thank my ex-ministerial staff, who have all gone off to have amazing careers—Julie and Luke; he is here today; and one of my chiefs of staff—Alex Hall, Amy Moynihan, and John O’Moore and many others that will be coming along later in the day. Some members who are now in government will appreciate how we rely so heavily on those people to support us. In those people, I have had amazing support. Their job was always to reel me in on various things. Sometimes that did not work, but I thank them all the same.

As I leave this place, I do so with mixed emotions. I will miss this place. I will miss the people and I will miss the communities of the Northern Tablelands. I absolutely love them. They are amazing—the large communities, the small communities. I will miss that day-to-day personal interaction, there is no doubt about that, but I am very excited about the future as well. I never intended to stay a long time in this place. I always wanted to get in, give it 110 per cent, and pass the baton to the next person while I was still sprinting and—to use some acting parlance—while the audience was still clapping. I hope that I have been able to do that. I hope that I have not let the people of the Northern Tablelands down, that I have been as strong an advocate as I have tried to be, and that I have been able to deliver some outcomes. None of those outcomes have come about because of me; it is all about a team approach, and the team is absolutely essential.

Lastly, I thank the National Party very much for having me and for putting up with me. I thank the party for all the support. The history of our party is an interesting one. Way back in our history we were called the Progressives, and that is something—I did not mean that to be a joke! I actually meant that quite seriously. The history of our party and the reason I am a Nat, and a proud Nat, is because the party is not one that is bound together by an ideology. It is not bound together by a desire to fight wokeism or leftism or whatever is the latest phrase coined by Sky News. The purpose of our party is to aggressively represent the people of rural and regional New South Wales: the most socially disadvantaged, the most geographically disadvantaged, the ones with the lowest life expectancy and the lowest educational outcomes. It is not about representing the big end of town or the business community or the unions or the workers or whatever; it is about representing everyone and doing so without a bias towards a certain core ideology. It is about simply representing people based on geography, and it is about representing people of all backgrounds to help them achieve their aspirations and their goals. That is why I am a member of the Nats, and that is why I am very proud to be so and will continue to be so.

I thank my colleagues in this place who have been with me along this journey. It has been a wonderful ride. I see Janetta Matchett, the State Electoral Council chair of the Northern Tablelands, in the gallery. Long suffering, she has put up with me, particularly during election campaigns. I have now patented my special technique of drilling corflutes into trees across the electorate. Matt Kean will be happy with that. For me to drill them into trees, the trees still have to be standing, so he would be happy with that.

We joke, but that is essentially why I love our political party. We are people from all sorts of backgrounds, and long may that be the case. If I could give any parting advice to the party room, it is to use the time in opposition wisely and avoid the temptation to be oppositional for the sake of being oppositional. Use the time to craft and think deeply about good public policy for the bush and to work constructively with any member of this place that is willing to help achieve that, whether it is the Government or otherwise. I have copped a bit of flack because I have been willing to work with the Government since it has been elected, but I have done so in the spirit of getting stuff done for my electorate.

I cannot thank the Premier enough for his help and the commitment he has shown to the Moree community to deal with serious and difficult youth criminal justice issues. Those solutions cannot come without the support of the Government. We do not control anything in opposition; the Government controls everything. If I want something done in my electorate, we have to work together. For that, I am very grateful. That is what our party needs to do in opposition: Be constructive, be practical, think of good policy and resist the temptation to throw stones because it is cheap and easy to do; actually do the hard work.

Again, I thank everyone. It has been an incredible ride. I will be leaving this place, but members might still see me around a little bit. I am closing a chapter on elected life. I have loved it; I do not regret anything for a moment. I will be cheering you all on from the side and wishing you all the very best. You can make an enormous difference in this place. The partnership with Greg Piper on the Port of Newcastle bill was a particular example where we skewered the government of the day. That was us, wasn’t it? I knew that.

Members can make enormous change. Use the time you have here wisely. Most importantly, as I have done, enjoy the ride enormously and enjoy what comes next. Thank you and farewell.