Page 3567 - Week 12 - Tuesday, 20 November 2007
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MR PRATT: I table the following paper:
ACTION buses—Security concerns—Media articles (12).
In the spirit of openness, minister, I thank you for your support. Over subsequent budgets we have heard the promises from the minister, the recycled, over and over promises that all buses will have CCTVs installed. We hear again that, as part of the second appropriation, funds will be made available to install CCTVs in all ACTION buses. What a surprise! ACTION patrons and employees alike wait with bated breath for this to actually happen.
I was pretty happy when the minister took note of the deteriorating situation in those interchanges. I have said before and I said it last week during a debate that we had here—ironically, about the second appropriation bill expenditure—that the minister had indicated good faith in May of this year in wanting to step forward and to do something about safety at interchanges. He said that he identified and acknowledged that real situation and that he would take steps by July of this year to do two things, firstly, to embark on installing CCTVs and, secondly, to increase staff to make sure that ACTION staff manning these interchanges would be safer after last light.
Last week in this place the government presented an appropriation which indicated that they would embark on a program of something in the order of $250,000. That program really will not see CCTVs fully installed across all of our bus interchanges in the immediate term. This is a matter of urgency but, as we saw today from the minister for emergency services, when it comes to safety, a matter of urgency involves a program often of two to three years duration. This government has no sense of urgency when it comes to addressing matters of safety and security. We see that again in the way that this government is ponderously and very slowly, perhaps incrementally, moving now to have a look at these bus interchanges.
We will probably not see significant changes in these interchanges for some months, but the matter is pressing. The security and safety of bus interchanges and on buses is a pressing matter. For Ms MacDonald to say that we are underpinned by effective infrastructure is not an absolutely correct picture, is it? The infrastructure at our bus interchanges is deteriorating. They are not particularly pleasant places. They attract crime. People have known that for quite some time, but we have yet to see any definitive statement by this government that they are going to move to fix these up. There are rumours that Woden bus interchange may be refurbished, but we have yet to see dollars committed and statements made indicating that there are programs underway to address these sorts of issues.
I want to talk now about fleet replacement. Fleet replacement is an integral part of our public transport system. The announcement of 25 new buses a year does not really equate to new buses, despite the spin that this will value-add to the existing fleet. These buses will only bring the ACTION fleet up to where it should be, give or take 10 per cent of fleet capacity. In fact, we could probably say that the Stanhope government has no fleet replacement strategy. Again, in an answer to a question on notice, the minister failed to outline any strategy to address the issue of
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