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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 10 Hansard (28 August) . . Page.. 3397 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

The other problem with that alternative is that it makes redundant the argument that the western route is the quicker route, the shorter route. If you build that dogleg in to save the residents of Kaleen, you eliminate the 300-metre advantage which supposedly the western route holds over the eastern route. The extra time taken to travel and the extra distance taken to travel that other route disappear. In fact, the western route, on my advice, becomes the longer route. So there is an inconsistency there. The proponents of the western route are going to have to work out whether they are in favour of saving the residents of Kaleen from the noise of the road or they are in favour of a route which is shorter than the eastern route. But they cannot have it both ways. It has to be one or the other.

The other point which needs to be made very clearly in this debate today is about another inconsistency in Labor's position. They told a public meeting held last week that they will commission an environmental impact statement under the Land (Planning and Environment) Act before any decision is made to commence work on the road. The environmental impact statement lies at the peak of a variety of environmental assessments that can be done under the land act. It is the most elaborate and most extensive form of environmental inquiry, and it is obviously for that reason the most expensive and the most time consuming.

Generally speaking, EISs that involve public consultation-and we can be fairly certain this one would-take in the order of a year to complete. You might be able to truncate an EIS by cutting some corners, but doing these things by the book seems to be the catch-cry that the Labor Party has brought to this debate. So we would assume that a standard properly conducted EIS would take in the order of a year to complete. (Extension of time granted.)

The advice from the Department of Urban Services is that to conduct an EIS, to conduct a further variation to the Territory Plan and to go about the building of the road in a realistic timeframe would make it impossible for the timetable the government has laid down in this matter to be adhered to. Again Labor have to decide whether they are going to say that they are in favour of having an EIS or they are in favour of there being an adherence to the government's timetable for the building of the road, but again they cannot say both.

As I said in debate about this before, this is a matter which will be before the electorate of the ACT in October. The government, by putting forward this variation today and having it voted on, will achieve nothing more than a variation to the Territory Plan, which like any variation to the Territory Plan can be amended. That is appropriate, and the government makes no bones about the fact that it will allow this matter that public airing which obviously it deserves to have in the context of this decision.

I want to make a couple of quick comments about Ms Tucker's remarks. Ms Tucker said we need to be more creative about transport to avoid the need to build a road at all. Ms Tucker clearly believes a road is not necessary in this location at all. For the record, let it be absolutely clear that, even with the most massive investment of ACT taxpayers into public transport in this city, you would be lucky to achieve a public transport take-up rate of, say, 20 per cent. It is about 8 per cent at the moment. With a massive public investment you might be able to achieve 20 per cent. The question is how you avoid the

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