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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 9 Hansard (6 September) . . Page.. 2926 ..

MR MOORE: Thank you, Mr Rugendyke. The process is up to a stage where the acting chief executive officer of Health is in New South Wales at the moment seeking to finalise the mediation agreement. We will not know the level of cross-border payments until such time as that is finalised, Mr Rugendyke.

MR RUGENDYKE: I have a supplementary question. I understand that there are some disputes and areas of difference. Could you please provide an overview of the areas of difference and dispute? Could you also obtain detailed figures and costs from your department and table them in this place?

MR MOORE: Mr Speaker, I will make sure the Assembly is informed when the cross-border issue is resolved and how we intend to use that money. Of course, it is about treating patients from New South Wales, so the money will be used to improve our health services.

MR HIRD: Mr Speaker, those opposite are very quiet. My question is to the Chief Minister, Mrs Carnell, and it is a simple one. What efforts is this government making to ensure that the decision by the federal government is made as quickly as possible on the next stage of the very high speed train project?

MS CARNELL: Thank you very much, Mr Hird, for an important question. I am pleased that Mr Stanhope understands that it is an important question as well. Mr Speaker, this project is probably the most important project that could possibly get the green light in any of our terms in this Assembly. It is a $4 billion project. It will create something like 13,000 jobs during construction. It will create more than 2,000 jobs when it is up and running and it will fundamentally change Canberra and the region, but it is a very big project, Mr Speaker, and it has taken a huge amount of work over a long period to get it to the stage that it is now.

As members would be aware, New South Wales, the ACT government and the federal government formed a tripartite committee a number of years ago. We went out to expressions of interest and then to a second stage tender project. It was a two-stage process. The third stage of that was the choice of the Speedrail consortium to work up their project. That was done. The report has been on the table. As members would know, we have been part of the whole process all the way through, to the extent of commissioning Macquarie Bank to look at some of the figures, and hopefully to look at them in a very different way.

Mr Speaker, I personally have also gone to see a large number of members of the federal parliament, coalition members and members of the Democrats as well. That is why I was so pleased to see a press release from Mr Stanhope recently in which Mr Stanhope came out and said Howard should back the fast train. He said it was time that Mr Howard showed leadership and announced a positive decision with regard to the very fast train. Mr Speaker, I think it is really important that I quote some of Mr Stanhope's media release because it was so good. It said:

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