Page 3370 - Week 11 - Wednesday, 23 September 2015
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Mrs Jones and her motion. I am glad the government is following the Canberra Liberals’ lead and seeing that this is a priority. I am glad that they will be supporting Mrs Jones’s motion. I hope to see this money in the budget. If they are supporting this motion today, they acknowledge the priority. It had better be in the budget. We do not want to see the fiasco of the GDE reiterated. We do not want to see the delays that we have seen in many other infrastructure programs and plans by this government where the reality is that their rhetoric so often is not matched by delivery. Ultimately, words are cheap in this place; let us see the delivery. Let us see the action and let us see it in the budget.
MS FITZHARRIS (Molonglo) (10.40): I am pleased to rise today to talk about this issue. Yes, I was enthusiastic to speak but I was also enthusiastically listening to the debate because it is one we have been having throughout the course of my time in the Assembly. But just going to the listening, in this place in February when I gave my first speech I did say in that speech that as a member of the Assembly I felt it was my job to listen, advocate, explain and lead. Just on the issue of listening, advocating, explaining and leading, which I view as my role as an MLA in my community, I am amazed that the opposition is amazed that I might have gone out as a member of the government and spoken with my community about their priorities.
As I have explained on more than one occasion in the chamber regarding the Gundaroo Drive duplication, the history to my involvement in that issue this year was that as a long-term contributor to the Gungahlin Community Council, a previous executive member, I was involved in the establishment of a community survey. And in that community survey there were a number of questions about transport, an integrated public transport network which, I have said on many occasions and which the government continues to express, is a significant priority. That integrated public transport network goes to roads, it goes to walking and cycling, it goes to buses and it absolutely goes to light rail.
Thirteen hundred Gungahlin residents responded to that survey and made pretty clear in that survey what it was that they felt was fantastic in their local community. That included the education services, the growing recreation services, the sporting fields, the growth of the region, the community feel. But they also felt a little let down by the roads. They wanted action on roads.
The government knew this and when I went to my first community council meeting after being elected I had a discussion with members there around what were the priorities coming out of the Gungahlin Community Council community survey. One of those priorities clearly was roads and, within that, Gundaroo Drive. The design work had already been done on the duplication of Gundaroo Drive and we had a discussion in the community council about what role the community members felt that I could play in this.
Mr Hanson: What is your view on Cotter Road? This is about Cotter Road.
MS FITZHARRIS: Yes. I said on that occasion, “I have got a couple of options in front of me as a new member.” We ran through them and we talked about a petition and they said, “Yes, we would like you to do that.” So on the back of that, over 1,000
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