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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 11 Hansard (25 September) . . Page.. 3234 ..

MRS DUNNE (continuing):

Mr Corbell, here and in other places, claims that he must proceed with the western route because of a mandate. His claim of a mandate is false and fatuous. Did the people of Banks and Gordon who voted for Labor and who returned three members in the seat of Brindabella cast their vote for a preferred alignment for the Gungahlin Drive extension? I think not. The fact is that the people of Gungahlin have been betrayed by the intransigence of the Stanhope/Corbell government, not by ours. We had a road ready to go. All that the incoming government had to do was pick up the momentum and build it. But no, they chose to play politics. Why do they do that? Because they made a commitment that they can't deliver on.

There was always going to be a problem getting the Commonwealth to come on board when the policy initiative was to have such vast impacts on the Institute of Sport. The Commonwealth, over successive governments over 20 years, has sunk considerable millions of dollars into this institute, and it was not going to shrug off the vast implications of building a road outside the front door of the paramount institute for sporting endeavour in the country.

What have we seen as a result of this? This government has used the objection of the Institute of Sport to mount up the delays and to go into a protracted and prolonged exercise of blame-shifting. We saw it here yesterday with the Chief Minister saying that it was us that were at fault, it was the Commonwealth government that was at fault, it was the AIS that was at fault, and of course it is Wilson Tuckey that is at fault. When they run out of people to blame up on the hill and down here, they will turn around and look for other people to blame. One day we will find that they will be blaming Saddam Hussein, or anyone else that they can possibly think of, rather than take the medicine and face up to the fact that these are the people who are responsible for the delays in Gungahlin Drive.

This motion is a challenge to the minister. It is a challenge to him to table the report so that we can see it, debate it and have the necessary discussion about whether or not it does have the implications that it appears to have for the Institute of Sport. But I think that would be too inconvenient for this minister, who really does not like this umpire's report. Facts make life very difficult for this minister, especially when you are the minister for half a road. This minister reminds one often of Monty Python. He reminds me of the man in the skit who had a bee and a fish, both called Eric, except of course we all remember that Eric wasn't a whole bee; he was half a bee. This is a minister who has half a road. Perhaps we should call it Eric the Half a Road. Half a road; half a bee-it doesn't work, does it? No. Anyway, we have a minister for half a road, or perhaps for half a road that doesn't exist.

This is a minister for unkeepable promises. The fact that he is in here today and it is being demanded of him that he table this is an instance of the fact that he cannot keep his promises-that he doesn't want to face up to the reality. This minister has betrayed, cynically and savagely, the people of Gungahlin. This is a minister who needs to show some backbone and put the information on the table, and if the evidence is against him, as it appears to be, he has to admit that and face up to the fact that this is not the road to be built. This minister needs to get on, without delay, and build the road that was ready to go-the four-lane road that he stopped. He cannot continue to get away with the road that is not a road. The Gungahlin Drive extension is not the only thing that has been halved-so too has the credibility of this minister.

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