Page 3912 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 4 December 2007
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It is interesting that the Chief Minister’s press release refers to “recent advice that it may be possible to rebuild the bridge while it is open to traffic”. How come that advice has only suddenly appeared at this late hour? There has been advice for some time now that this could be done. If the Chief Minister were serious about it, the Heritage Council actually said at the start of this process that the best outcome for the bridge was for it to be rebuilt. You have to wonder what has dragged the government kicking and screaming to this position. As I said in the debate on the second appropriation bill, it looks like it is another fine mess you have got into, John Hargreaves, and yet again his colleagues are digging him out of it.
It is interesting that the government are going down the consultation route and will make their decision based on a random phone survey of 1,000 people to be conducted by an external market research company starting next week. I guess that could be characterised as the “How badly do we suck in the electorate” survey, because the government know that this is biting at them. I refer in particular to the three Labor members in Brindabella, Mr Hargreaves, Mr Gentleman and Ms MacDonald, who have betrayed their electorate on this issue. They have been mute; they have done nothing to try and save the bridge at Tharwa and to help the people in the community in Tharwa. Mr Hargreaves should come down and apologise to the people of Tharwa for the angst that he has put them through. It is interesting that, in part of the backflip from the Chief Minister, he says:
The Government is committed to preserving the built heritage of our region …
Well, that is now; it was not the case last year. The sentence in the press release goes on to say:
… and few examples of this heritage are more iconic or have a higher value than the Tharwa Bridge.
Apparently, that high value or iconic status did not exist 12 months ago, when they shut the bridge and decided to try and rebuild it. So there are a number of inconsistencies in the government’s approach. I think the most glaring inconsistency comes in the last dot point in the last paragraph on the first page, where it says that one of the options to be canvassed is—and I quote:
… proceeding with the decision to build a new bridge. This option would almost certainly result in the demolition of the old bridge …
That is not something that Mr Hargreaves has made at all clear to people in this place. I will check the Hansard, because Mr Pratt asked this question and all we got was prevarication from the minister. The shame of this is that it has happened at all. For the last 14 months this bridge has been closed when, as Mr Pratt has said in this place on many occasions over that period of time, he has had advice that the bridge could remain open, that with small amounts of money it could be made safe, and that with less money than was required to build the new bridge, which as we now know would almost certainly result in the demolition of the old bridge, it could have remained open. The inconvenience that the people of Tharwa had been put through could have been avoided.
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