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

Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 4 Hansard (30 March) . . Page.. 1147 ..

MR HARGREAVES (continuing):

My preference was for cutting this provision out of the national road rules and sending it back to the maintenance group to look at and see whether there is some way in which a compromise can be reached for the conditions in the ACT and not necessarily slavishly stick the New South Wales one onto the ACT. Mr Speaker, pragmatism will hold forth here. Half a cake is better than no cake at all. Mr Speaker, I wish to signal that, reluctantly, the Labor Party will be supporting Mr Rugendyke's amendment for the reasons that I have expressed. I think that we are making a mistake, but I would rather make a small mistake than suffer the fate of having the whole lot maintained in these road rules. I will not go on any further. I signal the Opposition's support for the amendment.

MR SMYTH (Minister for Urban Services) (3.37): I wish to speak to the amendment, Mr Speaker. It is important to correct the record on some things that Mr Hargreaves just said. I do not recall anybody saying that we will look silly if we buck the national road rules. I do not believe anybody has said that. He said also that these rules have been modelled slavishly on what happens in Sydney and Melbourne. That is not quite true, either. All of us, all jurisdictions, had a place in putting together these road rules. In fact, many of them conform very closely to what we already have in the ACT.

Mr Hargreaves: Not this one.

MR SMITH: You can see that quite clearly from the small amount of change that ACT drivers have had to undergo. Mr Hargreaves interjects, "Including this one". Section 135 of the old Motor Transport Act said:

Those words were in the negative, but what we had there was an intent to stop people using cars without permission - in other words, secure your car. Is not Australian road rule 213 a better way of doing so by actually telling people what they should do to make sure that their vehicles are secure, that their cars are not taken without their permission, that their cars do not end up as stolen vehicles in a high-speed chase by police and that their cars do not injure somebody as an unintended consequence? Mr Hargreaves said, "Send it back to the national monitoring committee". We did; the ACT took up all of these issues with the national monitoring group recently. That is why I have been able to say that we will change the provision for the use of bicycles on pedestrian crossings that have traffic lights. That has been back to the national monitoring committee. You have to pay attention, Mr Hargreaves.

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