Transcript of Doorstop – Mandurah, Western Australia – Monday, 25 February 2019

Subjects: Mandurah Train Station car park project, Christian Porter’s bus, public transport.

ANTHONY ALBANESE: This is a very exciting announcement. I visited here during the Canning by-election – this station. I have been back to Mandurah three times in the last 12 months and what is very clear is that commuter car parking is at a point whereby it is broken. It needs new infrastructure and that is why our commitment of $16 million, to be supported by the State Government, is about us supporting people’s capacity to get on to public transport and it is so important.

This line is a great legacy of course of a previous State Labor Government. Labor Governments do public transport. The Coalition get dragged kicking and screaming to do anything on public transport and this is important here in Perth. The whole METRONET project is the centrepiece of infrastructure investment here in Perth, the capital of WA, and it is great to be back here again.

MELLISA TEEDE: It is so important. This train station is a major hub for a very large part of the Canning area. So people from Preston Beach, people from Waroona will be able to come here and know that they have a good chance of getting a car park. But I’d also like to say that this will be another major State Labor project and that I will make sure that, if we win government and we get this station built, that we have apprentices actually employed in the construction of this.

REPORTER: Why is it so important that you encourage people to use public transport?

TEEDE: We all see the congestion on this freeway and it is so important that we encourage people to take public transport to be able to move about (inaudible) … you know support our young people when they heading off to work and uni and as I said particularly the outer regions as well, knowing they can come in here to Mandurah and catch a train.

REPORTER: And just on transport in the Peel Region, have you identified any need up in Lakelands and will there be an announcement on the Lakelands train station?

ALBANESE: Well what we are doing is we are working our way through it one at a time and we will be making further announcements during the campaign across Perth and indeed across WA about infrastructure.

TEEDE: I am talking to people in Lakelands and definitely there is strong desire from sections of that community to have a station there. I have to say equally there are some people that say that as long as we have adequate parking here and Mandurah and I understand the State Government is going to be looking at Karnup that will take the pressure, to give them access. I am still listening to what the people are saying and take on board and have those conversations with David as my State counterpart.

ALBANESE: Can I also say that this is an example of Labor’s priorities. Labor’s priorities are practical. We are about putting more investment into schools, more investment into TAFE and universities, more investment into health care. When it comes to transport we are about improving the road network but we are also about boosting public transport and that stands in stark contrast to the current Federal Government.

We have Christian Porter today exposed as getting essentially a free bus from someone who just a week ago, a former state MP, was appointed to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal as a part of a very politicised list just last Thursday. He calls it the Porter Transporter. I think we will be calling it the Porter Rorter because it just continues on and it follows on of course from the Mathias Cormann scandal, whereby he doesn’t seem to notice that someone else pays $3000 of airfares. It follows on from the fact that we have Tim Wilson here today chairing a Parliamentary Committee when one of his relatives is responsible for promoting these Parliamentary Committee meetings around the country. This really is a Government that is unravelling and isn’t focused on practical issues like the one that we’re dealing with here today.

REPORTER: Yep. And just back to the car park, what’s the consultation been to establish that need? How do you know that (inaudible) are needed?

DAVID TEMPLEMAN, LABOR MLA FOR MANDURAH: The sign says it all. The sign says it all: car park full. Look, let’s just be very clear. State Labor and Federal Labor are together on this. We recognise very, very clearly that we need to keep on investing in public transport. We’ve got a track record. I can remember very, very clearly when the Liberal Party argued against the railway line to Mandurah. It was outrageous, but the people of Mandurah saw through that pathetic argument and voted with their feet. Now we see that this railway line to Mandurah, allowing people to connect from other parts of the region here – they voted with their feet.

Now what we need to do is invest more money so that more people can have access to this very, very successful railway line, which of course is part of the State Government’s METRONET Program. The METRONET Program is a comprehensive program about linking people through the Perth Metropolitan area and down through to here, and of course through to Byford in the eastern part of Canning, so that they can get to good quality jobs, so that they can get to good quality education, so that they can actually go and visit their families and friends.

This line is very successful for seniors. A lot of people travel up and down this line to see their families, and also to seek appointments in Perth. That’s brilliant. We want more people on trains, less in cars. Go on the freeway up to Perth on a weekday, or any day, and people know about the congestion. But this is an absolutely magnificent commitment by Anthony, and Mellisa, who’s advocated so strongly for this, and now matching that commitment, a Shorten Labor Government is going to ensure that this happens.

REPORTER: And sorry Robyn, obviously your constituents can’t walk to the train – how good is this to have extra parking?

ROBYN CLARKE, LABOR MLA FOR MURRAY-WELLINGTON: It’s going to be great, because as you know in my electorate we’ve got one bus service from Pinjarra to Mandurah, but for the rest of the electorate they have to drive and this is their only car park really that they can come to, to have access to the train line and to get up to Perth. A lot of them are retirees, they need medical appointments at the hospitals, and when they arrive here at nine, ten o’clock in the morning to try and get parking there’s just nothing available. So this is a great announcement from Federal Labor. What David reiterated – it’s been a Labor Government that has been the forefront of rail infrastructure and I’m so proud because I can go back to my electorate and say that we are building a multi-storey car park and there’ll be extra parking now available to the constituents of Murray-Wellington.

REPORTER: I know this is early days and you don’t know exactly what it’s going to look like, but is there going to be some security elements in there?

TEMPLEMAN: Look, CCTV security is very important. We’ve got to make sure people get on and off their train system safely. This already has of course a fairly comprehensive CCTV but obviously with a new multi-storey car park those will be very active considerations. Let me just underpin this – only the Labor Party has a track record in delivery of quality public transport in this state. We were the party that electrified the system throughout Perth. We were the party that extended the rail both north and south. We’ve got the METRONET plan of course, which connects circular connectors east and west, and of course we have a commitment that is there to be seen – stark contrast to the Liberals which of course closed the Fremantle line in the past and never had their heart in actually delivering quality public transport. We have got a track record. With Mellisa as our member for Canning, and with Anthony as our Federal Transport and Infrastructure Minister, this project’s going to be delivered.

[ENDS]