Page 921 - Week 03 - Thursday, 19 March 2015

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that has been adequately made by many experts. That is why we have such a marginal BCR. Even the business case says that under minor adverse circumstances the project will slip below one—minor adverse circumstances. We are going to see a situation whereby we are not even getting the money back. And that is including the fanciful assumptions that Minister Corbell has included in this business case—the fanciful assumptions or, worse still, fantasy.

This is a project which should be scrutinised. This is a project which the government should want to talk about. Yet they do not want a committee; they do not want more questions. Madam Deputy Speaker, we very well know that nobody in Belconnen has ever received a piece of literature from you that mentions capital metro; not once has there been a letterboxed item from your office which mentions capital metro. That is a telling point. I have not seen a piece from Dr Bourke. I have not seen a piece from Minister Burch, Minister Gentleman or Minister Berry—not once. How many people in Weston Creek have received a piece letterboxed from Minister Corbell to say, “I am bringing capital metro to Canberra”? The fact is that the only time they seem to talk about this beyond the corridor is in the ACT government-wide update, the community notes. That seems to be the only time.

The government does have a real problem with this issue. Only three per cent of Canberra’s population are going to be within walking distance of a tram stop. Therefore, rather than creating modal shift, it is going to increase the amount of multimode trips. At best we are going to see people parking and riding. At worst we will probably see more people driving as a result of light rail. I actually think we are going to see more people driving as a result of light rail. We will be saying much more about that over the coming months.

I am disappointed but not surprised that those opposite are not supporting this motion to bring a level of scrutiny. We will keep moving motions; we will keep putting in MPIs; we will keep asking questions; we will keep trying to get a fair level of scrutiny in the committee process; and we will keep putting in FOIs. The challenge to the government is to actually respond to those requests. To date, many of those have gone begging. I urge members to support the motion.

Question put:

That the motion be agreed to.

The Assembly voted—

Question so resolved in the negative.

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