Page 2640 - Week 09 - Tuesday, 11 August 2015
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walk could be perhaps 500 metres or even a kilometre. Many people will also be discouraged from dining in and around the Melbourne Building as they find cheaper and more accessible car parks in other parts of the city.
Finally I turn to the issue of speed cameras. The government finally released a report from the University of New South Wales into ACT speed cameras earlier this year. The release of the report was delayed for months. Despite the fact the government received the report in June 2014, it took them until 2015 to release the report. Indeed, they refused to release it even under freedom of information. The reason for that was simply so the government could have more time to understand and work out how they could justify putting more speed cameras in and leaving dysfunctional ones in and around the territory.
The release of the report was delayed for months, and when it was finally made public it became clear why. The report showed that fixed speed cameras made little difference to speeding because people soon figured out where the cameras were and often just sped up after they had gone past the cameras. Often they were located in places that saw an increase in the number of accidents following their introduction—not a decrease but an increase in the number of accidents after the cameras were installed.
Further, the UNSW review also demonstrated that the government had not been collecting data properly and had not collected data prior to the installation of the speed cameras. You had people on a whim choosing locations, not getting data from them, not getting crash data and then trying to claim they were a road safety mechanism. I fear speed cameras in the ACT are not about road safety but are simply about revenue raising. That is what this government is—it is all about revenue raising. It is not about delivering fair and reasonable services for the people that pay the bills.
The report shows that serious crashes have increased in the past five or six years despite the fact that the speed camera program has been in operation. This comes after the Auditor-General found last year that the ACT speed camera system has made no difference to speeding. It is clear the government’s speed camera system is a mess, that there are no substantial plans to do anything different. All we saw was another glossy document to try and justify the UNSW’s findings. In actual fact, very little is going to change on the ground as a result of this report.
People have become cynical about the purpose of speed cameras when it appears they are just being used for revenue raising. I believe it is time to implement significant changes with regard to speed cameras, changes that are based around road safety and not about trying to cover up this government’s massive deficit.
MS LAWDER (Brindabella) (8.02): It is unfortunate and a little churlish that the contribution from Mr Doszpot was stifled, But as my father always said, “There’s more than one way to skin a cat,” so I will be delivering a few notes on behalf of Mr Doszpot. While I am having this discussion, please channel Mr Doszpot. I will continue to discuss the Chief Minister, Treasury and Economic Development Directorate.
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