Page 48 - Week 01 - Tuesday, 11 February 2020
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MR STEEL: I thank the member for his supplementary. We are very confident now that we have recruited an additional 87 bus drivers. We have had some leave through attrition during that period as well. I have also announced funding of $1.4 million which will go towards recruiting a further 43 drivers. With those additional drivers and the actions that we are taking, we are confident that we can step up the frequency of services on Saturdays from term 2.
We will continue to work towards further improvements to weekend bus services going forward. The big change that was made under network 19 was to increase the span of services, particularly later at night. The Canberra community has really responded to that. That has been one of the reasons why we have seen a massive increase in the number of journeys taken on public transport under network 19.
MISS C BURCH: Minister, will you apologise to the Canberrans who have been left stranded as a result of your huge, drastic cuts to weekend services?
MR STEEL: Certainly we are looking at improving weekend services. We have been communicating with Transport Canberra customers about changes that were made last year to the bus network. We will continue to communicate with them and provide better systems for communication, as well as stepping up the frequency of services delivered on the weekend.
Frequent rapid bus services have remained unchanged since the start of network 19, and they have been a major element because we were delivering a seven-day network for the first time. People may remember that there was no seven-day network prior to that, with the same services on the week days operating on the weekends. The community has responded very well to that, and those services have been reliably delivered.
Mr Hanson: Madam Speaker, my point of order relates to direct relevance. The question to the minister was whether he would apologise or not. I ask him to answer that question directly.
MADAM SPEAKER: The question was concerning weekend bus services and I believe he has been relevant to the question. The minister has concluded.
Transport—driver education
MR HANSON: My question is to the minister for road safety. Minister, I refer to the recent changes to the learner permit logbooks. Minister, in the new logbook, under the driver competencies section, the list goes from competency 5 to competency 7. Can you please advise what is competency 6?
MR RATTENBURY: As Mr Hanson has identified, we are transitioning to a new graduated licensing scheme. This is designed to improve the capability of young drivers so that, when they find themselves driving alone, they have better skills in that early stage of their licence, when they are most vulnerable. In terms of his specific question, I am aware that there was misprint in the first batch of books that went out.
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