Page 5197 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 27 October 2010
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due process in the determination of this facility. Announcements will be made in due course following a normal process.
An allocation of this level is clearly one that will be made in the budget context. There are two budgets remaining in this term of this Assembly, and the government’s commitment was during the course of this four-year term to make that $20 million commitment after the feasibility study was completed. That work is not yet completed. It will be completed in due course, and the government will make its final determinations in the context of future budgets.
The facility will open depending on the timing of budget allocations. That is pretty straightforward; there is nothing unusual about that. The commitment was to deliver financing for this project within this term of this Assembly. There are two budgets to go, and the government’s commitment is to deliver financing for the facility within this term of government.
The question of the configuration of the facilities will be determined after the feasibility study is complete and after the public have had their opportunity to comment on the possible configurations as determined by the feasibility study. That is not unreasonable. One of the options, as I have indicated to those opposite, will be a 50-metre pool. But that does limit the range of other facilities that can be provided. If that is the case then the facility will have a 50-metre pool and it will have less of a range of other things. That may well be the outcome; time will tell.
It is premature today to be suggesting, as the opposition’s motion does, that any election commitments have been broken, because no election commitments have been broken. The government is going through a process that I have outlined in the amendment that I have moved today, and I look forward to disappointing the opposition at some point in the very near future. I formally move the amendment circulated in my name:
Omit all words after “That this Assembly”, substitute:
“(1) notes that:
(a) the people of Gungahlin deserve to have access to the best quality swimming and leisure facilities possible;
(b) the proposed leisure centre will form part of a ‘wellbeing precinct’ sharing facilities with the soon to be completed Gungahlin College, town park and the adjacent enclosed oval; and
(c) the Government is preparing a feasibility study on the Gungahlin leisure centre pool options for public comment, which includes a 50m pool option and a 25m pool option; and
(2) calls on the Government to:
(a) ensure that the facility will cater for the broadest range of users within the available space and budget, including for uses such as learn to swim groups, aquarobics, lap swimming, waterplay, aquatots, water sports and hydrotherapy;
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