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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 4 Hansard (17 April) . . Page.. 1006 ..

MRS CARNELL: When Ms Reilly shows this Assembly where I stated that the 18,000 were in the ACT, I will be very happy to do so. I made it very clear, and even tabled the documents, that those 18,000 were across Australia. That sort of a decrease in the Australian Public Service over that period of time reiterates the point that was made, and made constantly. The Federal Government, under the previous Labor administration, stopped employing young people in this city and produced a problem. It produced 18,000 redundancies over that period of time - which, of course, was helped along brilliantly by the 1,019 redundancies offered by Ms Follett over that period of time.

The reality is that this city cannot afford wholesale redundancies in our Commonwealth Public Service. Rather than just belly-aching, we are out there trying to do something about it. I was pleased to see this morning that the Department of Finance, in planning to organise its redundancies, is ensuring that they are spread right across Australia and that Canberra is not being targeted. That is the approach that we will continue to urge our Federal colleagues to take. Mr Speaker, when six departments were moved out of this city under the previous Labor Government - when the Industry Commission, the CSIRO and all of those areas were moved out - what was Ms Follett saying? Ms Follett was saying that she could understand it, because all governments had to live within their budgets. I agree.

MS TUCKER: My question is directed to the Minister for Urban Services, Mr De Domenico. It also is in regard to the development in Condamine Street, Turner. I did give the Minister some notice of this question. One of the main objections raised by the LAPAC and the 50 or so residents who attended the meeting last week was that the entrance to the development was opposite the entry to Turner Primary School and just below the crest of a hill. The people at that meeting, including me, went for a walk after the meeting to have a look at how dangerous it was. The architect for the developer stated, however, that this entrance had been approved by the traffic section of the Department of Urban Services. Could you confirm that your department has given this approval and explain how such a dangerous spot is acceptable for an entry to a major housing development?

MR DE DOMENICO: I thank the member for the question. Yes, I can confirm that the Department of Urban Services did give this approval. I cannot tell you why; but I can tell you that it was based on advice from traffic engineers with expertise in that sort of area. I am glad that Ms Tucker thought that it was unsafe when she walked there on the night of the meeting. I certainly have not been there. I will ask the traffic engineers to give me advice on what they based their recommendations on, and I will inform Ms Tucker accordingly.

MS TUCKER: As a supplementary question: Could you also find out whether the department was perhaps considering traffic calming along that road, to try to minimise the danger? Also, would you be prepared to consider the concept of developers who bring that many people into a street taking responsibility themselves for traffic calming?

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