Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .

Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 7 Hansard (2 July) . . Page.. 2207 ..

MR SMYTH (continuing):

The same can be said for the simple comment he made about suburban shopping centres - again, pull the pin from the hand grenade, throw it in the crowd and walk away from the scene of the crime. Mr Hargreaves claims that money is being spent only on Civic, that we have an obsession with Civic because of the Olympics. Let us look at the work that is being done in Hughes, Narrabundah, O'Connor, Manuka, Kingston, Yarralumla, Weston Creek, Kippax, Curtin, Hall, Dickson, Charnwood, Hawker and Watson. What can you say, Mr Speaker? Either they have all been moved to Civic or Mr Hargreaves is just plain wrong. Some $10m has been spent in the precinct management group's efforts to improve our ageing shopping centres.

And then Mr Hargreaves makes the amazing accusation that we have never done anything in Tuggeranong. The reason that we have not done much in Tuggeranong is simply that things there are not of an age that they need attention. Most of Tuggeranong has been built since 1975, much of it was not built until the 1980s. As those shopping centres are ageing and it becomes appropriate, we will do what we need to do. The suburbs of Manuka, Kingston, Yarralumla, Hughes, Narrabundah, O'Connor and Curtin were all built well before Tuggeranong and Tuggeranong will get the attention it deserves when its shopping centres need upgrading. Again, he makes silly comments and simply walks away from them.

Mr Speaker, I think the absolute example of Mr Hargreaves' ineffectiveness in this portfolio is when he talks about road safety and speed cameras. Until recently - until Mr Hargreaves claimed victory for the Labor Party, in fact - the Labor Party, according to their spokesman, was steadfastly against speed cameras because they were just about revenue raising. But I noticed last week, I think, that he claimed a victory for the Labor Party in that we had announced that the chief police officer would be controlling speed cameras.

Mr Stanhope: You did a backflip, Minister.

MR SMYTH: Guess what? It was always our intention that the chief police officer would control the speed cameras.

Mr Stanhope: You did a big backflip.

MR SMYTH: I hear the Leader of the Opposition interjecting about backflipping. That is the standard of interjection from the Leader of the Opposition. We get these little one-liners across the chamber, "Backflip, backflip". The point is that we have always said that the speed cameras would be part of a coordinated road safety strategy that involved the police, the NRMA, Urban Services and the community. And then we had the bleeding from the Urban Services spokesman for the Opposition that what the Government needed was a strategy. "Where is the road safety strategy? How could you announce the introduction of speed cameras without having a road safety strategy?".

Mr Kaine: Very easily. You can prove that.

Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .