Page 626 - Week 02 - Thursday, 21 February 1991
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publicity - will flock back, I am sure, to the site. Usage has dropped dramatically over the years because people know that it is a deathtrap.
Mrs Grassby: Drain the lake. Close all the roads.
MR DUBY: This argument of Mrs Grassby's calling for the draining of the lake is absolutely and totally spurious. I must ask you, Mr Speaker, to protect me from the heckling coming from the other side.
MR SPEAKER: Order! There is too much noise.
MR DUBY: The argument put up by Mrs Grassby that the lake be drained because it poses a problem through someone drowning in it is absolutely spurious. Four deaths have occurred at a known specific location on the Murrumbidgee River. In addition, there have been a number of incidents which have been very life-threatening at the downside of that upper Casuarina weir. Whilst people have drowned in the lake - indeed, people drown in their bathtubs - there is no specific example of people consistently being exposed to danger at swimming places around the lake or, indeed, at other places that people can use for swimming such as the other swimming facilities throughout the city.
What we are looking at here is something very similar to, for example, a traffic black spot. When we know that there is a corner or a particular traffic hazard that causes deaths regularly, it is inherent upon the Government to take whatever steps it can to minimise the danger to the public at that site. For us not to do so would be a dereliction of duty. Then again, duty and public service appears to be something that is alien today. As I said, that argument, that because there is risk in the lake or risk in other areas they should be banned also, was simply ridiculous.
Mr Speaker, I think that anyone who reads the statement that I have made in the house today will realise that there are numerous other places along the Murrumbidgee which provide free swimming facilities.
Mr Moore: Just like there are places other than the Ainslie tip to take your rubbish.
Mrs Grassby: And other places to send your kids.
MR DUBY: Mr Speaker, I must insist.
MR SPEAKER: Order!
MR DUBY: In addition, the removal of the upper weir at Casuarina Sands in no way impinges upon the viability of that site as a public swimming recreation facility. Mr Speaker, it is clear, in my view, that there is more to this than meets the eye. For whatever reason, Mrs Grassby has taken it upon herself to hold herself up, for some
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