Page 5340 - Week 14 - Thursday, 19 November 2009
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I have written to the Chief Minister about this, and he stated that he thought it was satisfactory. He said that it was not as good as it could be, as desirable as perhaps we would all like it to be, but that, given the circumstances, he was satisfied with the situation. He said that he would continue to monitor it.
But I want to flag again that I think that part of the network is extremely dangerous. I urge the government to consider alternative ways of dealing with that problem. Whether it means moving stop 10 from the bus interchange to somewhere else, I am not sure, but I do think that is a particularly dicey part of the network and I am concerned about the safety of all users there.
I would like to give a plug to another organisation that I think are doing a fantastic job, the NRMA-ACT Road Safety Trust. This was set up when Brendan Smyth was the minister for urban services a few years ago. Eddie Wheeler, who is the secretary/manager there, does a fantastic job. A few weeks ago, on 11 September, Mr Hanson and I had the privilege of attending the road safety postgraduate scholarship showcase event. That was quite enlightening—an opportunity to hear about some of the great research that is being done around the issue of road safety. The level of detail and the level of investigation that so many academics are going into with regard to road safety are really quite extraordinary.
It is, of course, a very serious issue, and one that I am glad is getting due attention—and appropriate recognition and appropriate funds through the ACT Road Safety Trust. I would also like to commend Professor Don Aitkin, who is the Chairman of the Road Safety Trust.
The NRMA are doing a superb job more generally as well. They produce much literature to support safer road use and to limit the undesirable incidents which occur on our roads. The figures that they publish are somewhat startling, especially with regard to drink driving. Drink driving contributes to one in five fatal crashes. That is quite extraordinary. If you look at that number that Mr Stanhope mentioned earlier—88 people—one in five are linked to drink driving, so roughly 17 or 18 people died as a result of drink driving. Those deaths are completely avoidable. It is a tragedy that alcohol is still one of the main killers on our roads.
In the time I have left, I would like to recognise the good work done by the Motorcycle Riders Association. Motorcyclists—not unlike motorists in general—often get a bad name. The Motorcycle Riders Association has been fantastic in showing that motorcycle riders are just like any other road users: they too are concerned with safety; they too want to use the roads in the safest, most efficient and most effective way. The advocacy work they are doing is very good. I would like to commend the president, Jennifer Woods; the senior vice-president, David Ault; the vice-president, Kathleen Parsons; the secretary, Nicky Hussey; and the treasurer, Sylvia Sinfield. They also have a number of project managers that are working on particular areas of the organisation.
In my remaining 30 seconds, let me say that I have had dealings with Leon Arundell, who is the Convenor of the Canberra Pedestrian Forum. He has got quite a challenge ahead of him. He has some very ambitious plans for how we can better use our roads
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