Page 3114 - Week 11 - Tuesday, 10 September 1991
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Over the years the buildings have been let go to an extensive degree, and clearly something has to be done with them. The committee reported on this matter - and it is a good report, brief and to the point. I am amazed; I did not realise that so many members of the Assembly had been involved in the committee. Indeed, a clear majority of members have been involved during the comings and goings and toings and froings of the committee.
The committee has come down with some 14 recommendations which, in the main, are good recommendations. I think that is indicated by the fact that the Government has, for the most part, supported those recommendations, and I think it might be appropriate to put them into the record. The recommendation that the Heritage Committee, in consultation with NASA, fully document the sites and the history of the Orroral Valley space tracking station and the Honeysuckle Creek space tracking station has been agreed to by the Government. That is good.
The committee recommends that suitable plaques be placed at the sites of the stations to commemorate Australia's involvement with space exploration, and the Government has agreed to that; that the Government ask NASA to recognise and acknowledge the role played by the Honeysuckle Creek space tracking station in the Apollo moon project at other NASA sites throughout the world, and that has been agreed; that, in consultation with the managers of the Tidbinbilla tracking station, the public display at that place include information on the involvement of Orroral and Honeysuckle, and again the Government has said that the Environment and Conservation Bureau, with the operators of Tidbinbilla, will implement that recommendation.
It further recommends that the Namadgi Visitors Centre publicly display information on the history and role of the stations, and that is going to be implemented; that tourist information on the history and role of the stations be made available at appropriate tourist information centres, and I think that is going to be implemented by the Government; that Orroral Valley and Honeysuckle Creek stations not be made available for private development, and that has also been agreed to by the Government, although I wonder about that.
I notice that the reason it has been agreed - and almost certainly it is a bit of a nonsense recommendation - is that the cost of supplying power to those sites is quite astronomical. The committee also recommends that the stations be demolished in accordance with recommendations further set out, and the Government comes to that point later; that all environmentally hazardous materials be removed from the sites of the stations, and again that has been agreed; and that following demolition the sites of the Orroral Valley and Honeysuckle Creek space tracking stations be rehabilitated and revegetated, and that also has been agreed.
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