Central Coast Dudded
The people who live on the Central Coast have been dudded on the issued of their high speed rail link.
On 25 November 1998 the Premier and the Minister for Transport at the time, Carl Scully, gave a strong commitment to the people of the Central Coast, the lower Hunter and New South Wales generally that the Government would spend $1.2 billion on a 68 kilometre high-speed rail link between Sydney and Newcastle to be completed by 2012.
The Central Coast Express Advocate on 25 November 1998, in the hype before the 1999 election, under the headline “All Aboard” published an article and photograph of the Premier at Woy Woy railway station. In the article the Premier was reported as expressing support for the Newcastle to Sydney high-speed rail link. The article stated: “It means we will be able to get more trains to run in the peak hours, so in an hour there will be 12 instead of 9 trains running.”
A full-page advertisement was placed in the Central Coast Express Advocate in March 1999-just days away from the 1999 State election campaign. It was entitled “Building a high speed rail link”. Commuters who opened this newspaper on Friday 12 March read that the New South Wales Government would spend $790 million building a high-speed rail link between Sydney and the Central Coast. The advertisement said: “Track straightening will cut journey times between Sydney and Warnervale by 15 minutes, with no loss of service. Trains will travel shorter distances at faster speeds.” A map showed Hornsby to the south and Warnervale to the very north. At the bottom of the advertisement were the beaming faces of Marie Andrews, Barry Cohen, Grant McBride and Paul Crittenden-the “Central Coast Labor team.”
After that election nothing happened, until in preparation for the 2003 election in an interview reported in the Central Coast Express Advocate of Thursday 3 October 2002 the Premier said there was no point using the existing rail network for a very fast train from the Central Coast. He was reported to say: “We need a new route, otherwise we would simply have the same problems we now have. We have looked at fast train systems in Germany and France, so it’s a matter of choosing the right one for us.”
But the Government had no plans to implement its announced proposals. These were political statements designed to get Labor through a State election. This was made clear on 29 February 2003, when the Treasurer, the Leader of the Government in the Legislative Council when asked by the leader of the Opposition, The Hon. Michael Gallacher, about the high speed rail link, said: “We have not committed ourselves to that.” That simple statement, ended years of anticipation for the people of the Central Coast.
So, last week, 17th September 2003, I said in the Parliament:
“I commend those who established the Government’s costings on this rail project. In November 1998 the then Minister for Transport, the Hon. Carl Scully, indicated that the 68-kilometre high-speed rail link between Sydney and Newcastle, which was to be completed by the year 2012, would cost $1.2 billion. Four months later, on Friday 12 March 1999, it was announced that the Government would be able to do that for $800 million. That represented a saving of $400 million in four months, which is quite remarkable. I commend the Government for that great cost saving. However, since that time the Government has saved even more. It has saved an additional $800 million by doing nothing about the rail link.”
” I have had a house on the Central Coast for the last 24 years, although normally I stay at Roseville in the city. But every week I travel to the Central Coast where I live between Gosford and Warnervale. Tuggerah station is my local station. I travel very rarely on the train-I normally drive-and I leave after midnight and arrive at my home at 1.00 a.m., or thereabouts. I spend one day a week on the Central Coast where I prepare parliamentary and other work. I return the following morning before dawn in order to miss those horrendous car journeys.”
“All my neighbours who work in Sydney travel by train. They go to Gosford and Tuggerah stations. I do not know whether people realise what that does to family life. I have realised, after seeing the families of my neighbours, that if they are spending between 4½ and five hours every day in travel time on top of their work hours it is a great destroyer of family life.”
“We are not talking about a rail problem; we are talking about a social and a family problem. It is no accident that Warnervale has one of the highest degrees of social dislocation in any community in Sydney. In my life at Wesley Mission I established social welfare centres in those areas in which the highest degree of social dislocation occurs. I targeted the Central Coast and Warnervale areas because of the high degree of unemployment, youth dysfunction, single parents and suicide.”
“I want to say a good word about that latter issue. Chaplain Eric Trezise, a local person on the Central Coast, has put together a team of people who are working specifically on the suicide issue. That has become a model for the rest of Australia in lowering the suicide rate.”
“But If the Government does not take seriously the business of providing a very fast train to the Central Coast the emphasis on social dislocation in that area will continue. This motion calls for a formal apology. However, I believe we should be calling for a formal commitment to better transport for the Central Coast and to a very fast train.”
“Sooner or later we will have to provide a better transportation system for this major populated area in Sydney. The Government’s credibility depends on that being done sooner rather than later.”
When the vote was taken, the Government was condemned for its inactivity.
THIS IS GORDON MOYES.
