Page 580 - Week 02 - Thursday, 9 March 2006
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We have already seen the efforts that the government had to go to to get taxis to improve their services for people with a disability. If the government would commit to a subsidy scheme similar to the taxi subsidy scheme, as well as address needs for driver assistance, with the introduction and rollout of this legislation, this would help immensely as a starting point.
Another issue that we are concerned about is concession fares. There are provisions in this bill for the service contract relating to the administration of the contract to allow for free or reduced fares for travel and for the issue and acceptance of free or concession passes. The Greens recommend that the minister prioritise the establishment of a concession fare system, similar to that used by ACTION, for all demand-responsive services.
The Greens look forward to the long-term viability and expansion of demand-responsive transport in the ACT and see this bill as a small step to bigger things. In particular, we look forward to the full integration of the ACTION bus service with an efficient and well-patronised light rail system—you knew I had to say it some time—and demand-responsive transport services to make buses and light rail fully accessible to all.
MRS DUNNE (Ginninderra) (4.44): I could not let an opportunity such as this go by without making some comments on the importance of demand-responsive public transport. I congratulate the minister for this piece of legislation that sets up a framework for demand-responsive public transport.
I am pleased that, over the years of collaboration that the minister and I have had on public transport matters, he has learnt a few things. I have now seen them come into place. I hark back to the taxi inquiry that we both participated in, in the previous Assembly, where these issues about demand-responsive public transport were one of the key recommendations. I am glad that the government has taken it up and that we now have a situation where somebody who contributes to an inquiry can carry it through in another role. I am glad to see that.
This is a good start. This is only the start. Demand-responsive public transport is very difficult, as the flexibus system and its shortcomings will demonstrate. Mr Stefaniak, in this place, has spoken about some problems with the flexibus system in Belconnen to show that members of the Assembly use public transport and that sometimes there can be a real problem in doing so. There are a whole lot of things that will make demand-responsive public transport work.
There is a flaw in this bill, which Dr Foskey’s amendment attempts to address, and that is that, at the moment, the way this bill is structured, there can essentially be no competition between any attempt at demand-responsive public transport and the existing ACTION services. The analogy I used the other day when I was discussing this amongst my colleagues is the way things used to be in the bad old days of the conflict between government and non-government schools. You could not get permission to open a non-government school if it competed with an existing government school. That is the whole problem. We are trying to build an economy in the ACT which is predicated on competition. There are many close to Mr Hargreaves who understand the concepts of and the necessity for competition. I hope that those lessons will be learnt.
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