Page 4124 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 26 November 2014
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I imagine right now that there are some staff in the Capital Metro Agency and perhaps in government agencies listening to this via the webstream. My message to those staff is that I respect the work they are doing and their service to the government. There may be some public servants that personally agree with light rail and some that do not. But all are professionally undertaking the work tasked to them by the government, and we respect that.
My colleagues and I have been vocal about the decision to construct light rail and our opposition is only going to get stronger. I say this to emphasise that our issue is with the Chief Minister, Minister Corbell and Minister Rattenbury, who, along with their colleagues, are responsible for the multibillion-dollar Labor-Greens deal to go ahead with light rail before having evidence to support their decision.
At 6 pm, in accordance with standing order 34, the debate was interrupted. The motion for the adjournment of the Assembly having been put and negatived, the debate was resumed.
MR COE: The opposition will continue to do what we have an obligation to do—to challenge the government, hold them to account, criticise bad decisions and suggest alternatives. Our parliamentary democracy depends on oppositions doing these tasks and we will do so with vigour.
The reality of the political genesis of this project is captured on page 13 of the full business case. I quote:
Given the background to this project, including analysis previously performed and decisions already made by Government, this Full Business Case considers the business case for a 12km light rail route from the City to Gungahlin. It does not extend to an analysis of alternative transportation means or routes.
This is an important paragraph in the full business case. In effect, it says that the Capital Metro Agency is tasked with justifying building light rail from Gungahlin to the city. The experts cannot determine the need, they cannot determine the route, they cannot determine the mode and they cannot determine the staging. That was all done by a few MLAs. Of course, there are many very capable and competent people working in the Capital Metro Agency and elsewhere in the government, and it is a shame that the government did not put these questions to them regarding the need, route, mode and staging.
For a couple of years the government has been spruiking the benefits of light rail because of the benefit-cost ratio of 2.34. In fact Minister Corbell put this in context a year ago, on 27 November, when he said:
Anything over two is considered a beneficial project in terms of return to the economy.
What does that say about a BCR of 1.2? On 6 August he said:
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