Page 617 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 21 March 1990
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participation in discussions with not only the Commonwealth Government but also the Governments of New South Wales and Victoria, the other governments involved in this most exciting project.
I am a little concerned to hear in the debate, first, the figure of $30m again being bandied about without any proof and, secondly, Mr Moore's restrictive comments as to where the route should be. He said he would support a route down the Hume Highway, the very western route, but not any other route.
This Government has encouraged public support for the very fast train project. We are undertaking specific studies on environmental and planning issues associated with the project. That involves looking at all possible viable routes and they have to be viable environmentally as much as anything else so I really cannot see what Mr Moore is concerned about. The most environmentally sound, cost-effective and practical route surely will be the one that will be chosen for this most exciting project and I do not think we can stress enough just how exciting it is.
Mr Moore: Why don't you send it through a national park?
MR STEFANIAK: This project has the potential to really make Canberra. It puts us an hour from Sydney, two hours from Melbourne. It has immense potential in terms of tourism and in the development stage, providing jobs initially and continuing to provide them. Canberra can be a commuter city for people going to work in Sydney. There are all sorts of benefits that this very exciting project will bring to the Territory and I think most members of this house appreciate that. I would certainly hate to see anything done by this house which would interfere with this exciting project which has immense potential for the citizens of this Territory.
MR JENSEN (11.55): Mr Speaker, I think it is appropriate to quickly sort out once again the emotional claptrap and misrepresentation that we have heard from Mr Moore, and also previously from the Leader of the Opposition, in relation to the provision of funds from the ACT budget towards this project.
The clear implication of both these members today, and in the case of Ms Follett also in the past, was that the $30m would come out of the current budget. That was the implication that was coming across. What a lot of claptrap and complete and utter misrepresentation. It is the sort of thing that we are getting from the Opposition members all the time. They cannot stick to the facts; they have to misrepresent the issues all the time.
When this debate was going on in the media, we saw headlines such as "Kaine gives $30m to the VFT project". The new director of the Conservation Council of the South-East Region and Canberra, Mr Rodney Falconer, came to me
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