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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 7 Hansard (26 June) . . Page.. 2213 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

I have a suggestion for members of the Labor Party opposite. They have put it to this place that they have always been opposed to fees at Tidbinbilla. They say that, notwithstanding the evidence, they would have never contemplated the concept. They can indicate their bona fides on that subject in a very simple way here today. Mr Corbell is about to speak and make some comments to close this debate. Let him commit the Labor Party, when returned to government, to abolish these fees. If he believes that these fees are inequitable, let him kiss goodbye to the quarter of a million dollars revenue generated for Tidbinbilla by promising to abolish the fees. It will not be hard to do. It will take just a stroke of a ministerial pen to write, "Simon Corbell, MLA, Minister for the Environment". I invite him to make that commitment now.

MS HORODNY (4.24), by leave: I still have a concern with the proposal, Mr Humphries. The main concern is that 88 per cent of people going to Tidbinbilla visit the enclosures and 12 per cent use the barbecue areas and do not visit the enclosures. The 12 per cent are the people I am concerned about. If people just want to go into that reserve to walk to Fishing Gap or any other places or just to have a picnic, they will now have to pay.

The concern I have is where the money is to be spent and where the money is to be collected. I wanted to separate the groups of people who are going into the costly areas, the animal enclosures, which is where the majority of the upgrades will occur. If most of the money to be generated from these fees is to go towards those animal enclosures, then it is visitors going to those areas who should pay. People who are merely passing through or stopping to have a picnic should not be paying for those facilities.

When I spoke with Mr Humphries the other day about how much of the money would be spent on the larger area of the park, particularly on weeds or kangaroo fertility control, my understanding was that very little of that money would be going into those conservation measures. Once again, I wonder why money that will be used in a small proportion of the park will be raised from people who use the park more generally, who wander through or have a barbecue there. People who just want to walk through or to have a picnic will now, I believe, not go into the park. These are the people who will now be excluded. They are the people you have already factored into the drop - - -

Mr Humphries: They can pay $10 to get a year's access, Lucy.

MS HORODNY: People who are just walking through do not want to pay $10. That is the inequity in what you are proposing. That is what we tried to work around. We proposed a voucher system so that people who are just wandering through do not need to pay and those who are going to enclosures do pay.

Mr Humphries: Do you want to employ rangers to enforce it?

MS HORODNY: No. Mr Humphries was very concerned that a lot of people would cheat - would park and go into the animal enclosures. Mr Humphries, there are people now all around Canberra who park their cars, do a bit of shopping or whatever and come back to their cars and by chance they have not been picked up. Are you factoring that in?

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