Page 4051 - Week 11 - Tuesday, 23 October 2018

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School bus services—petition 17-18

MISS C BURCH (Kurrajong) (10.29), by leave: I rise once again to voice community concerns about this government’s unfair and unsafe cuts to school bus services across our city. A few weeks ago in this place Minister Fitzharris accused the Canberra Liberals of scaremongering on this issue. The minister denied that the community’s concerns regarding children’s safety were legitimate and maintained that children as young as five would be perfectly safe on public buses and at interchanges.

More recently we have seen an extraordinary backflip by the minister, with 78 school buses previously on the chopping block now being maintained. Why? If there were no safety concerns and we were just scaremongering, why have we now seen such a backflip? And why, if there were no safety concerns, do we have today a petition with signatures from over 500 parents who do not want their children catching public buses?

While the Canberra Liberals welcome the minister’s backflip, this is still not good enough. We still have over 50 schools without dedicated school bus services and over 30 primary schools without dedicated school bus services. The government still has not adequately explained why some schools have their buses back while other schools are still being disadvantaged. These concerns are real, these concerns are genuine and these concerns deserve to be heard.

Economic Development and Tourism—Standing Committee

Report 4

MR HANSON (Murrumbidgee) (10.31): I present the following report:

Economic Development and Tourism—Standing Committee—Report 4—Inquiry into Government Procurement (Secure Local Jobs) Amendment Bill 2018, dated 28 September 2018, together with a copy of the extracts of the relevant minutes of proceedings.

I move:

That the report be noted.

This is the fourth report of the Standing Committee on Economic Development and Tourism. The report was circulated out of session on 28 September. On 2 August this year the Assembly referred the Government Procurement (Secure Local Jobs) Amendment Bill 2018 to the committee, to report back no later than the end of September 2018. The committee received nine submissions and held a public hearing, and 12 witnesses appeared.

The committee noted at the outset of this inquiry that the subject matter before it was one on which the members held strong views and that the committee was unlikely to be able to reach agreement on a number of areas. We are realists in this committee; the committee agreed to use this report to summarise the evidence presented to it and


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