Page 2093 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 6 August 2014
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MR CORBELL: As Attorney-General, I am responsible for parking operations, so I am happy to take the question from Mrs Jones. The short answer is no; the government is not receiving any revenue associated with the introduction of paid parking in the parliamentary triangle, in those areas administered by the National Capital Authority.
MADAM SPEAKER: A supplementary question, Mrs Jones.
MRS JONES: Minister, how much parking fine revenue does the government hope to raise through new means?
MR CORBELL: There is no definitive figure as part of a subset of that overall increase. But what we anticipate—and this is reflected in the budget papers—is that, first of all, there will be improved revenue collection due to a much lower failure rate of ticket machines in existing ACT government-owned car parks. As members would be aware, the previous ticket machines have been replaced with new technology. There was a significant failure rate of the old parking machine technology which led to uncollected revenue or revenue being foregone. We expect a much lower level of revenue being foregone because of a much higher level of reliability of the new ticket machines.
The government is putting in place additional parking inspectors, and that obviously will generate additional parking revenue due to increased enforcement activity. The government has put in place these additional parking inspectors because of the significant number of complaints that it was receiving from members in the community about parking problems, in particular, parking problems in neighbourhoods—parking on verges, parking on public land—which is causing problems in neighbourhoods. Certainly I have been getting a significant number of complaints about that, including from members of the Assembly. The government has responded to that by putting in place more parking inspectors to improve enforcement and compliance and make sure everyone is treated fairly and equally as we are able to respond to more complaints as and when they arise.
MADAM SPEAKER: Supplementary question, Ms Berry.
MS BERRY: Minister, what other benefits do these new ticketing machines provide for the Canberra community?
MR CORBELL: I thank Ms Berry for the supplementary. The improvements to the ticketing technology certainly facilitate a greater range of payment options for drivers—in particular, credit card payment, which we know has been taken up quite significantly by drivers using long stay car parks owned and operated by the ACT government. What we are also seeing, though, is the deployment of an increasing use of the app-based compatibility with the ticket machines. That is very welcome as well.
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