Mount Isa City Council | the lift was full, and I said ‘Good morning.’ Not one single person acknowledged me. They didn’t acknowledge anybody.” “When you live in country Queensland, you have a far better ability not just to meet people, but to make friends,” he adds. “That makes life more interesting.” Mount Isa is also home to people from a mix of backgrounds and ethnicities, which also makes things interesting, Mayor McGrady says. In the past, he recalls performing naturalisation ceremonies for many candidates from Europe and the Philippines. Today, he says the majority are coming from New Zealand, the continent of Africa and the sub-continent of India. “That’s one of the major changes I’ve witnessed,” he says. “But we’ve always been a thriving industrial community with people from many different nationalities, all living and working free from racial strife.” The other major change, Mayor McGrady explains, has been the slight downturn in the resources sector. In recent years in particular, Mount Isa Mines was taken over by Glencore, which made some people uncertain
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