Page 2226 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 22 June 2011
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What does that growth mean? That growth means extra freight. It means more goods in stores, in warehouses, in factories. Where do the Greens think this freight comes from? How do they think it is going to be managed? For example, 98,000 extra square metres of industrial land is to be released this financial year alone. And of course the Greens would be aware that the eastern broadacre assessment has identified future opportunities for industrial uses along this corridor, exactly where the Majura parkway is to be built. The freight task will continue to be managed to a very significant degree by road, and Majura Road is not up to the task of meeting that demand now, let alone into the future. So that is why the government is supporting the development of this very important project.
Do the Greens seriously want to say to the people who live in the inner north of Canberra that fewer heavy vehicles on Northbourne Avenue is a bad idea? That is exactly what they are saying, with the position they are adopting today. The fact is at the moment Majura Road is not able to accommodate the range of heavy vehicle movements we currently see on it—2,800 heavy vehicle movements a day and growing. It is growing because we know the national road freight task overall will continue to grow.
If we can see some of those vehicles come off Northbourne Avenue, is that not a good thing for our city? Is that not a good thing for the community that lives adjacent to that very busy transport corridor? Of course it is. And that is why the government supports this project.
So the Greens’ arguments try to paint this as an either/or, black or white, proposition. It is not. It is about building an important piece of infrastructure to service freight, to connect a major regional transport hub, to support growth in industrial land uses around the road and along the road corridor and to connect it up with the national freight network service by the major highways, the Monaro and Federal highways.
But the project is also important in terms of the government’s work in liaising with our federal colleagues. And the Chief Minister has worked very hard in negotiating with the federal government, lobbying and advocating the importance of the federal government following through on its own assessment about the viability of and the ranking that this project has been given by Infrastructure Australia. We remain hopeful that we will get a positive outcome in relation to that matter, and our advocacy will be continued and will be sustained as we seek resolution of that.
This is an important motion today. The government will not be supporting the motion proposed by the Greens and I urge members to support the motion moved by Dr Bourke.
MS LE COUTEUR (Molonglo) (11.17): Before I start with what I was going to talk about, I think I should respond to Mr Corbell’s comments about Nightrider. Mr Corbell, if a service is not advertised, it is not surprising that we do not have as many people catching it as we would have liked. And that is what happened to Nightrider. I am not sure if the word “sabotage”—
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