Page 575 - Week 02 - Thursday, 9 March 2006
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poor economic management over a long period of time and the exit strategy of the Treasurer. He is left to deal with the most visible area, at times, of ACT government activity, and that is urban services.
I think Mr Pratt needs to demonstrate more sympathy, because the minister is between a rock and a hard place. He has to come in here and defend his performance as Minister for Urban Services when he knows things are in a mess and that the people of Canberra are unconvinced. Of course he has no money with which to do it, as he basically acknowledges. Mr Corbell would have us believe that the private sector development around the town is what it is all about. I think he misses the point that the amenity of our neighbourhoods, our suburbs and the appearance of our districts are really what people want to see addressed.
To give you an idea of the sorts of issues involved to illustrate the level of concern out there among the people of Canberra I have drawn down statistics from my office over the last few weeks. From the middle of February, 95 urban services complaints have been raised. I give credit to Mr Hargreaves in that he responds promptly in relation to these matters and, if they are maintenance issues, they are generally actioned promptly.
The growing body of complaints we are seeing in Canberra causes me concern and I would think that would also cause the minister concern. In fact the complaints are overtaking health as a major area of concern, followed by taxation and policing issues. When I look down this list from the correspondence, I see that the big ticket items—parks and ovals, roads and footpaths—comprise 26, 14 and 15 complaints just in the past few weeks. That indicates that things are visibly wrong with the ACT urban infrastructure. These are the views of ordinary Canberrans. These are the things that trouble them and matters on which they expect better performance by the territory.
It is going to be a problem when you have had a government that has thrown money away without regard for the consequences to the maintenance of our city. I can understand the difficulty he is faced with because, in many respects, Mr Hargreaves is in the front line dealing with probably now the most critical of consumer complaints—the state of the city. These issues have been afoot for some time. One of the very first things I raised when I was elected was the state of footpaths, lighting and so forth in some of the inner southern suburbs such as Yarralumla, Forrest, Deakin and Griffith. All these complaints remain to a large extent unresolved, and they go back some time. It is not an acceptable situation, especially when you have older people in Canberra suburbs who have suffered injuries and falls as a result of either tree roots breaking up footpaths or inadequate lighting in those neighbourhoods.
I know some areas on the northside have been looked at but I continue my plea for better basic infrastructure for suburbs in both the inner and medium southern areas. Many complaints I have referred to today have come from the Woden area. These issues are certainly not coming from the Liberal faithful but from ordinary residents who are clearly deeply concerned. I turn to the Canberra Times letters to the editor to see the sorts of comments that are coming in. Here is one from Gloria Stewart of Turner, who talks about the fact that she believes Canberra is becoming a grotty capital. She says, “As a long-time resident of Canberra and as a recent resident of the inner city, I am astounded at the state of Northbourne Avenue.” And it goes on. Looking at other parts of Canberra I note that, in the Southside Chronicle on 28 February, it says:
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