Page 665 - Week 03 - Thursday, 15 March 2007
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DR FOSKEY: If we do not talk about governance, I am not sure how we are going to ensure that any improvements that might be made will stick.
I am assuming that the committee was consulted on this inquiry. Obviously Mr Seselja was not, unless he had a phone call in Taiwan. But I am assuming that they are happy with the very short time frame. To report by 30 June is quite a big ask. There is going to be a lot of material there. I hope that every single ACTION consumer’s issues and complaints—and there may even be some praise—are considered and incorporated. I hope that that short reporting time is not an indication of a lack of real attention to the detail.
I know that the government is talking about setting up a new timetable and, hopefully, putting more resources in, in October. I guess that is the time frame that is required to do those things. It is, I suppose, a form of consultation, and we should be happy about that.
While I am quite sure that Mrs Dunne is very happy that her motion was taken seriously—and it is hard to imagine that it would not be—I am sure that the government are getting at least as many complaints as I am, as a crossbench member, and the opposition are. So there is very clearly a need to reconsider. One of the things that we are seeing is attention to the bus timetable.
I am not quite sure how we are going to address issues related to, for instance, the Woden interchange and, no doubt, the Belconnen interchange. I hear anecdotally from young people that both those places are considered very dangerous places to be, especially on your own, and it does not seem to matter what time of day you are there. I have no idea what plans the government has in mind for the Belconnen interchange, but I know, because I was at a Woden Community Council meeting some years ago, that a consultant for ACTPLA presented plans for a new Woden interchange to be incorporated into a redesigned town centre. It all looked very good. I have not heard a word about it since; it is still on the backburner. These are the issues that we are going to have to address, as well as our timetable, if we want to make bus services more attractive.
The very people who are most reliant upon the interchanges, the elderly and the young, are the ones that are scared stiff of going there. We have had severe incidents in the last day or so, and it could well be that bus drivers are being targeted now. It is getting in the news. Maybe it is because the bus services are considered deficient by some patrons. But for young people, the interchanges have been dangerous for a very long time. It does not have to be dangerous in terms of physical violence. There are all kinds of threats. People are asking for money, with menaces, even if those menaces are verbal. That certainly happened to my daughter at the Woden interchange, which makes me believe, given that it was not a random incident, that it happens with great regularity.
It being 45 minutes after the commencement of Assembly business, the debate was interrupted in accordance with standing order 77. Ordered that the time allotted to Assembly business be extended by 30 minutes.
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