Page 4702 - Week 15 - Thursday, 16 December 1993
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MR HUMPHRIES: That is right. Madam Speaker, of course those facilities, at that level particularly, are not widespread throughout the ACT. It follows that being unable to supply such facilities in all parts of the ACT, at least at the present time, generates an issue of how the community should deal with the problem of people using alternative venues such as the chess pit in Garema Place, seats in public streets and other public edifices which might form suitable platforms for skateboarding.
Madam Speaker, the recommendations of the committee reflect the concern that there should be facilities of this kind, particularly in Civic, where there is no facility at the moment, and at Woden, where there was such a facility. The committee resolved that a facility should be established by the ACT Government in both those places. The committee also recommended that the section 56 car park near the Griffin Centre, being located near both the bus interchange and the youth centre in Civic, would be an appropriate location for such a Civic based facility. The committee further recommended, in its second recommendation, that there be an education program coordinated through such groups as the Cyclists Rights Action Group, the Council on the Ageing and the Youth Affairs Network to educate people in being appropriate and sensible users of public facilities.
Madam Speaker, the one element of the committee's report with which, regrettably, I have to disagree is the recommendation that the present Bill not be proceeded with at all. There is obviously a range of issues concerning that Bill. There is a range of issues concerning enforcement of the Bill. I can see an interjection coming on, Mr Connolly, so you might as well have it out now rather than wait. Do not hold it in; it is not good for you.
Mr Connolly: The logic of Mrs Grassby and Ms Szuty has prevailed.
Ms Ellis: Thank heavens for the women.
Mr Connolly: Thank heavens for the women, yes, indeed. Trust the women, as they say.
MR HUMPHRIES: I hope that you feel better after having got that off your chest. Madam Speaker, it remains my view that there are two quite distinct interests at stake in this legislation. As I have said, we have the views of groups that feel that there is a problem with making our shopping centres and bus interchanges effectively places of public recreation, physical sporting-type recreation, and those who feel that using these places is a right that anybody should be able to exercise. I feel that in supporting the recommendation to reject the legislation out of hand the committee has accommodated the concerns of one side of this debate but not the practical problems of the other.
Madam Speaker, I want to read a few things that were said to the committee in the course of its deliberations. Mrs Sue Doobov of the Council on the Ageing spoke quite forcefully about the problems that older people face when they feel intimidated and possibly isolated by the presence of people travelling at great speed in public places, which is what skateboarding often amounts to. Mrs Doobov stated the problem as follows:
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