Page 39 - Week 01 - Tuesday, 7 April 1992
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MR BERRY: The letters will be answered. I do not recall the letters; but, if there are letters that are unanswered, I will inquire into it and they will be answered.
MR HUMPHRIES: I ask a supplementary question, Madam Speaker. When?
MR BERRY: As soon as one can conduct the inquiries. You have raised the issue today. If you would really like me to drop the bundle now and go straight up there, check out the records and do it, well, I can do that. The issue that seems to concern Mr Humphries so much is that some people have not received an answer to a letter among thousands of letters that come to the Government from time to time. We will make sure that your question is raised and it is inquired into, and the letters will be answered.
ACTION Ticket Offices
MR STEVENSON: My question is to the Minister for Urban Services, Mr Connolly. A constituent has informed me that the ACTION bus ticket office at Belconnen has been closed on a couple of occasions when she has tried to buy tickets during business hours. As supplying books of tickets at a discounted price encourages people to use public transport and is an excellent idea, could the Minister indicate the hours of business of ticket offices throughout Canberra, and is it necessary to occasionally close those offices during normal business hours?
MR CONNOLLY: I thank Mr Stevenson for his question. I also thank Mr Stevenson for the courtesy his office showed to my office in advising me that he wanted some detailed information on this matter. I was able to instruct my officers to prepare the detailed information and thus answer his question. The offices, generally speaking, are open from 7.00 am till around about 5.30 pm. In most cases there is a break for lunch of about an hour. There are four offices run by ACTION, at each of the interchanges - Belconnen, Civic, Woden and Tuggeranong.
The peak time and the peak demand seems to be in the morning hours from 7 o'clock onwards. They shut for lunch because it would involve double shift arrangements to have somebody there to relieve, and the view has been taken that that is not a necessary expenditure. While that does mean, on one view, that the offices are closed for an hour, and that may have been when Mr Stevenson's constituent sought to purchase a ticket, it should be pointed out there are some 70 other locations in the ACT where people can buy pre-purchase bus tickets - usually newsagents or other shops usually conveniently located to interchanges and often open for rather extended hours themselves, because the traders wish to take advantage of the passing parade.
So, the answer is that they are open generally from 7 till 5.30 at the interchanges, but often with a 12 o'clock till one o'clock shutdown for lunch; and that is probably when Mr Stevenson's constituent was unable to purchase a ticket. But tickets are available elsewhere.
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