Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .

Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 4 Hansard (27 March) . . Page.. 927 ..

2. Why didn't the Committee direct the Government to provide more detailed costing information, especially when this was one of the terms of reference and obviously has a large bearing on any decisions.

3. Why did the Committee put so much credence to the costings provided by Maunsell in January 2001 when this costing was commissioned by an interested party - namely the ACT Government agency (Bruce Operations) and the ASC but only details new (inflated) costings for the Western option and did not update or do a comparable costing for the Eastern option.

4. Why did the Committee accept the inclusion of $3m in these costs for 'other works' (Masterman St etc) which are unrelated to the Western option per se?

5. Why in relation to costs/benefits was no mention made of the significant cost savings afforded by a 100kph Freeway standard road (such as the western alignment) compared to an 80kph arterial road (such as the eastern). These cost comparisons were detailed by Voorhees as part of the thinking behind the Y plan with regard to efficiency of transport links and were contained in a submission to the Inquiry by Save the Ridge in November 2000.

6. Why was significant new environmental research ignored, including that published in late 1999 and early 2000 by Dr David Freudenberger (CSIRO Wildlife) which show O'Connor Ridge contains one of the highest value remnant woodland areas in the ACT, currently supporting a wide variety of bird species, many of which are endangered or threatened. This research was presented to the Committee but totally ignored.

7. Why were the views of Save the Ridge misrepresented in the Committee Report?

The Table at the rear of the Committee Report erroneously records Save the Ridge (page 174) with

  • a question mark in the column headed "For GDE" and

  • "Not East" in the column headed "East or West Route".

This is in total contradiction to the evidence that was presented to the Committee both in written submissions and in verbal evidence at the public hearings. Attachment A contains specific quotes from the transcripts of our public hearing which clearly show our position is For GDE and to the West . We have evidence that ours was not the only submission that was misrepresented in this way in the Report.

8. Why has the Committee misrepresented the views of the majority of those who made submissions to the Inquiry? In November 2000, eighteen months after the Inquiry commenced, the Government 'changed the goal posts' by removal of the connection to Barry Drive. Practically all submissions to the Inquiry were made before this change was made and not unsurprisingly focussed on the Government's original proposal for GDE. For the Committee to interpret submissions made to the Inquiry as 'votes' for or against an unstated and unpublicised question of supporting a changed interpretation of east or west is misleading in the extreme.

9. Why does the tally of these 'votes' on page 138/139 of the Report only add up to 683 when it is stated that 891 submissions were made to the Inquiry?

Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .