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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 11 Hansard (25 September) . . Page.. 3235 ..

MRS DUNNE (continuing):

This motion calls on the minister to table the evidence, and I suspect that he dare not do that. I suspect that he will wait until this Assembly has risen, so that he can avoid the scrutiny of this Assembly, because he is a timid minister who has been well and truly caught out. He knows that he has not got a clue, and he knows that we know that he doesn't know.

MR CORBELL (Minister for Education, Youth and Family Services, Minister for Planning and Minister for Industrial Relations) (4.10): Well, I feel rightly told off, Mr Speaker. For the most part, I am not going to seek to respond to the taunts and name-calling of Mrs Dunne. What I will do is outline the argument why the Assembly should not support Mrs Dunne's motion today. But first I will give some background.

The ACT government commissioned a study in July this year to investigate the potential environmental health impact of Gungahlin Drive extension on elite athletes living and training at the Australian Institute of Sport. The ACT government did that because it was prepared to operate in a collaborative and cooperative way with anyone who is potentially affected along the alignment of the proposed Gungahlin Drive extension. This is not a government that does not do things because it thinks there might be a problem. This is a government that does things because it seeks to collaborate and work cooperatively with all the parties involved. To this end, Dr Ken Fitch, a sports physician from Western Australia, agreed to undertake the study.

A copy of the final report was provided to the Department of Urban Services and the Australian Sports Commission on 16 September. It is currently being assessed by the Australian Sports Commission, and the government has also considered the details of the report, along with details of the consultation process the government has undertaken with affected communities along the route-Aranda, Kaleen, Gungahlin itself and other stakeholders in the Bruce precinct.

As I have already indicated at question time, the government will be responding within the fortnight on the outcome of all of those assessments, including the assessment of the Fitch report. Mrs Dunne got at least one thing wrong. The ACT government has paid for this report, not the Australian Sports Commission. But it is a joint report. The terms of reference were agreed with the Australian Sports Commission, and the contractor, the tenderer, was also agreed with the Australian Sports Commission.

The agreement between the Australian Sports Commission and the ACT government is this: once the report is completed, both organisations will have a copy and the report will not be made publicly available until it is launched by both the ACT government and the Australian Sports Commission. The chief executive of the Department of Urban Services, Mr Thompson, was scheduled to meet with the chief executive of the Australian Sports Commission, Mr Peters, earlier this week. Mr Peters has requested that that meeting be rescheduled to next week. The purpose of the meeting is to discuss the report.

In these circumstances it would be highly peremptory for this Assembly to call on me-in fact, require me-to table a copy of this report and effectively break the undertaking that this government has with the Australian Sports Commission. Those are the facts of the matter. The government is not seeking to hide this report. This report will be made

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