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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 4 Hansard (10 April) . . Page.. 898 ..

MR HARGREAVES (continuing):

There seems to be an assumption in the Commonwealth's decision that any fast rail project would never justify the expenditure of government money. Australians would not be travelling anywhere if that had been our historical attitude. Governments have played the major role in the development of Australia's transport infrastructure. There is certainly no suggestion, even now, that we should stop government funding of roads. Governments cannot escape their responsibilities for planning and providing transport infrastructure.

This responsibility is even more important in the regional context. The future of aviation in the Sydney/Canberra corridor could be very limited. Setting aside the national factors to which I have already referred, airline services between Canberra and Sydney are now extremely unattractive. The pricing of Qantas flights in that sector is now at ridiculous levels. But it appears that the structure of the local aviation market means that business travellers are not price sensitive and that the cheaper services are not attracting much support. This is very bad news for the region and the airport operator.

I note that the airport operator's response to this situation was to claim in its recent master plan variation document that fixed-wing movements in and out of Canberra will increase from 107,000 last year to 283,000 by 2050. This seems fanciful. Who is going to be on the planes? The document also seems to specifically exclude any growth in 747 traffic, which it estimates will be restricted to visiting government traffic and not for tourists. So much for the international airport.

The estimate seems to imply a massive population growth in the ACT over the forecast period to well over a million people. What are the implications of that, and can we believe it? Does the airport operator really believe that there will be over a million people living in Canberra in 2050? Where will their houses be located? More importantly, a population base of this size could easily make a rail service viable. All of this points to the need for continued study of alternative transport technologies.

I note that the Leader of the Opposition commented on the federal government's decision following Mr Anderson's announcement on Tuesday, 26 March. Mr Humphries was reported in the Canberra Times on Good Friday, when he announced that the ACT Liberal Party would continue to lobby the federal government to "keep the high-speed train on the drawing board". Mr Humphries also said:

The Canberra Business Council has also criticised the federal government's decision.

In the spirit of bipartisanship, I welcome the support of the ACT Liberal Party and the Business Council, and I commend this motion to the Assembly.

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