Page 2253 - Week 06 - Friday, 27 June 2008
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could house travelling school groups, event patrons and other visitors to Canberra. The budget also allocates $450,000 for road access for the bushfire memorial off Uriarra Road, which will include car parking facilities and pedestrian access to the memorial and across Stromlo Forest Park.
Another key initiative—and I am pleased that Mr Smyth drew attention to this—is that, following the review of the sports grants and the particular schemes that we have in place, in consultation with the sporting industry, the government has reopened the sports loan subsidy scheme for new applicants. This scheme has been funded for $781,000 over four years, and that fits in very neatly with the “where will we play” vision, which I am again pleased Mr Smyth has drawn attention to. Had he been listening in the last couple of days and perhaps focused on some issues in his portfolio, he would have noted that I announced on Wednesday up to $1.2 million for Capital Football for a synthetic surface at Hawker enclosed oval.
At yesterday’s major industry seminar in the next stage of the “where will we play” vision, where we pulled together more than 100 sport and recreation industry representatives to discuss the next stage, I outlined the government’s commitment over the next four years with a $16 million provision towards the goal that we have outlined that no sports ground in the ACT will rely solely on the use of potable water by 2013. Mr Smyth asked directly in his response to the budget where the government’s financial commitment was in this area. On top of the $3 million we have provided this year, there is another $16 million, so that takes the total to $19 million to support this initiative. That, of course, is in addition to the reopening of the sports loan subsidy scheme, which will enable the government to provide assistance to some of the sports and to applicants around a range of other projects that can assist towards achieving that overall goal.
It is again worth reminding Mr Smyth, now that he is paying attention, that ACTSport, the peak industry association, has welcomed these initiatives. I am sure that Mr Smyth, when he is in contact with ACTSPORT from time to time, will be aware of their support for these initiatives. I was very pleased to see more than 100 representatives from the sport and recreation industry at yesterday’s seminar that was chaired by Tim Gable from the ABC as master of ceremonies. It brought together a range of experts in terms of the next phase of delivery of these important commitments. We did provide $3 million in funding this year, including a range of grants to a range of organisations. They are all important in delivering on our outcome.
In turning to the tourism side of the portfolio, I am very pleased with the range of initiatives that we have been able to fund in this year’s budget; most particularly, additional funding for the Australian Science Festival, the Australian Tourism Exchange, the Canberra festival of running, the e-strategy and rebuild of the visitcanberra.com website, the important event assistance program, the Rugby League World Cup match and the international mountain bike events—I know Mr Smyth has not been a particularly strong supporter of that.
Mr Smyth: You show me one point where I have been against the expenditure.
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