Page 2805 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 13 August 2019
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sectors alike is designed for providing job security for city services workers by making sure that we transition staff on temporary contracts into permanent positions.
We know that there is some seasonal work in the city services portfolio, particularly the city presentation team, and some areas of peak activity require some temporary or contract work from time to time. But we also know many Canberrans want to take on full-time, permanent, well-paid jobs, and one of my priorities as minister is to ensure that the people working in TCCS can focus on the task at hand rather than on whether their contract will be renewed. The measure we have been able to deliver in this budget will enable us to ensure that we transition 80 per cent of city services staff into full-time permanent positions.
These are some of the great measures in the 2019-20 budget that will enable us to build a better city and provide better community-focused services. I commend the Appropriation Bill to the Assembly.
MS LE COUTEUR (Murrumbidgee) (4.29): The Greens welcome quite a few wins for our policy ideas in this part of the budget. The Greens have a very strong commitment to a more sustainable city, and that very much involves the portfolios of TCCS: Transport Canberra—how we get around; and City Services—how we look after the physical environment we live in.
We are very pleased with some of the recent improvements in public transport. The biggest issue there, of course, is lack of capacity. Network 19 has clearly been a success, and I think it demonstrates very much that if you give people a better bus service, they actually will use it. If you look at the district of Weston, bus use there has gone up nine per cent. The simple fact is that there are now four buses which go from Cooleman Court to Woden—basically, one every quarter of an hour.
I am not saying that the bus system is perfect. Clearly, there have been some significant issues in terms of local buses being cancelled. The issue there is a straightforward one of lack of capacity. I banged on about this before; everyone knows that I would love to see more capacity in our public transport, and in particular our bus network.
On that note, I am pleased to see that 84 new buses have been funded. But it is entirely unclear to me exactly how many of these will be additional buses rather than replacement buses. During estimates it was said that all of the old orange buses would be got rid of. I have mixed feelings about that. We are still using them. They are hot or cold, depending on the weather, but I would like to see us expand the number of buses rather than replacing them with newer buses. It is really important to invest in new capacity and expand our network.
I would like to see us stop investing in fossil-fuel-powered buses. Other jurisdictions have managed to move to electric buses. I would like to see the ACT doing that—and if not electric buses, hydrogen buses. I am not claiming to be a technological expert, but clearly we need to phase out fossil fuels. We have made a decision as an Assembly; we voted for the fact that there is a climate emergency. If there is a climate
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