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MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS

The 4464 meeting of the Brisbane City Council,held at City Hall, Brisbaneon Tuesday 24 March 2015at 2pm

Prepared by: Council and Committee Liaison OfficeChief Executive’s OfficeOffice of the Lord Mayor and the Chief Executive Officer

Dedicated to a better Brisbane


THE 4464 MEETING OF THE BRISBANE CITY COUNCIL,HELD AT CITY HALL, BRISBANE,

ON TUESDAY 24 MARCH 2015AT 2PM

TABLE OF CONTENTS

TABLE OF CONTENTS_______________________________________________________________i

PRESENT:________________________________________________________________________1

OPENING OF MEETING:____________________________________________________________1

MINUTES:_______________________________________________________________________1

PUBLIC PARTICIPATION:____________________________________________________________1

QUESTION TIME:__________________________________________________________________7

CONSIDERATION OF COMMITTEE REPORTS:___________________________________________21ESTABLISHMENT AND COORDINATION COMMITTEE___________________________________________21

A EX GRATIA PAYMENTS TO ELIGIBLE PENSIONER RESIDENTS OF THE BRISBANE GATEWAY RESORT AT 200 SCHOOL ROAD, ROCHEDALE__________________________________________________36

B ANNUAL OPERATIONAL PLAN PROGRESS AND QUARTERLY FINANCIAL REPORT FOR THE PERIOD ENDED DECEMBER 2014___________________________________________________________37

INFRASTRUCTURE COMMITTEE___________________________________________________________38A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – KEY CORRIDORS PERFORMANCE REPORT – JULY TO DECEMBER

2014___________________________________________________________________________48B PETITION – REQUEST FOR PRIVACY SCREENING FOR PROPERTIES ON MCALROY ROAD, FERNY

GROVE_________________________________________________________________________50PUBLIC AND ACTIVE TRANSPORT COMMITTEE_______________________________________________51

A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – DRIVER CONSOLE UNIT___________________________________51NEIGHBOURHOOD PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT ASSESSMENT COMMITTEE_____________________52

A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – INCLUSIVE BRISBANE PROFESSIONAL ADVICE ALLIANCE_________54ENVIRONMENT, PARKS AND SUSTAINABILITY COMMITTEE______________________________________55

A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – PRESTON ROAD PARK, MEADOWLANDS ROAD OUTDOOR GYM___58FIELD SERVICES COMMITTEE_____________________________________________________________59

A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – COUNCIL’S NEW RESOURCE RECOVERY CENTRES_______________61BRISBANE LIFESTYLE COMMITTEE_________________________________________________________62

A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – BRISBANE CITY COUNCIL AND CRIME STOPPERS PARTNERSHIP ‘THE COST OF CRIME’__________________________________________________________________65

B PETITIONS – REQUESTING COUNCIL BAN CHICKENS FROM TOWNHOUSE DEVELOPMENTS AND MULTI-UNIT DWELLING PRECINCTS__________________________________________________67

C PETITION – OBJECTING TO ROY HARVEY PARK BEING USED AS AN AUSTRALIAN FOOTBALL LEAGUE TRAINING FACILITY_______________________________________________________________68

FINANCE, ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT AND ADMINISTRATION COMMITTEE________________________70A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – DISASTER MANAGEMENT OFFICE UPDATE____________________73B COMMITTEE REPORT – FINANCIAL REPORTS (ACCOUNTS RECEIVABLE, RATES, INVENTORY,

ACCOUNTS PAYABLE, PROVISIONS AND MALLS) FOR THE PERIOD ENDED DECEMBER 2014______75

PRESENTATION OF PETITIONS:_____________________________________________________75

GENERAL BUSINESS:______________________________________________________________76

QUESTIONS OF WHICH DUE NOTICE HAS BEEN GIVEN:___________________________________84

[4464 (Ordinary) Meeting – 24 March 2015]

Dedicated to a better Brisbane


THE 4464 MEETING OF THE BRISBANE CITY COUNCIL,HELD AT CITY HALL, BRISBANE,

ON TUESDAY 24 MARCH 2015AT 2PM

PRESENT:The Right Honourable the LORD MAYOR (Councillor Graham QUIRK) – LNPThe Chairman of Council, Councillor Margaret de WIT (Pullenvale Ward) – LNP

LNP Councillors (and Wards) ALP Councillors (and Wards)Krista ADAMS (Wishart)Matthew BOURKE (Jamboree)Amanda COOPER (Bracken Ridge)Vicki HOWARD (Central)Steven HUANG (Macgregor) Fiona KING (Marchant) Geraldine KNAPP (The Gap) Kim MARX (Karawatha)Peter MATIC (Toowong)Ian McKENZIE (Holland Park)David McLACHLAN (Hamilton)Ryan MURPHY (Doboy)Angela OWEN-TAYLOR (Parkinson) (Deputy Chairman of Council)Adrian SCHRINNER (Chandler) (Deputy Mayor)Julian SIMMONDS (Walter Taylor) Andrew WINES (Enoggera)Norm WYNDHAM (McDowall)

Milton DICK (Richlands) (The Leader of the Opposition)Helen ABRAHAMS (The Gabba) (Deputy Leader of the Opposition)Peter CUMMING (Wynnum Manly)Kim FLESSER (Northgate)Steve GRIFFITHS (Moorooka)Victoria NEWTON (Deagon) Shayne SUTTON (Morningside)Independent Councillor (and Ward)Nicole JOHNSTON (Tennyson)

OPENING OF MEETING:The Chairman, Councillor Margaret de WIT, opened the meeting with prayer, and then proceeded with the business set out in the Agenda.

MINUTES:514/2014-15

The Minutes of the 4463 meeting of Council held on 17 March 2015, copies of which had been forwarded to each councillor, were presented, taken as read and confirmed on the motion of Councillor Ryan MURPHY, seconded by Councillor Kim MARX.

PUBLIC PARTICIPATION:Ms Nanette Marsdon – Objection to the development at 66 Longman Terrace, ChelmerFile number: 137/220/701/218

Chairman: I would like to call on Ms Nanette Marsdon who will address the Chamber on objections to the development at 66 Longman Terrace, Chelmer. Orderly, please show Ms Marsdon in.

[4464 (Ordinary) Meeting – 24 March 2015]

You may sit or stand, whichever you prefer. Ms Marsdon, you have five minutes; please proceed.

Ms Nanette Marsdon: Madam Chairman, LORD MAYOR and Councillors, thank you for your time. My name is Nanette Marsdon; I live in Victoria Avenue, Chelmer, next door to a proposed development by the Regis Group for a nursing home at 66 Longman Terrace. The Regis Group have submitted a development application to build a four-storey, 120-bed nursing home 3 metres from our fence line. The garbage wash-down area, generator and plant room will be 4 metres from our children's bedrooms.

Although they will have 38 car parking spaces below, the overspill from visitors, medical attendants and staff will congest our street enormously. I have no objection to its use as a retirement village. Up until the floods in 2011, we had lived next door to Arena, the Salvation Army retirement village on the current site that had 100 beds. It was a two-storey building that, although not pretty, still nestled unobtrusively in the street.

My objection is to the size, bulk and intensity of the building. I am not alone in this regard. We have had three community meetings in the last six weeks, each attended by over 40 people. There has been so much concern that, as a community, we have funded a submission by the town planner, Greg Ovenden, the heritage architect, Ivan McDonald, with a contribution from Holland Traffic Consulting, which is now with the Brisbane City Council.

This development is located in a low residential housing district. It is not only surrounded by beautiful Queenslanders, but also contains a local heritage property called Pontresina, which is regulated by the Heritage Overlay Code of Brisbane City Plan 2014. We believe that, because of Pontresina, we should have been notified of this development. Brisbane City Council's website states that it is a requirement to notify all neighbours when there is a proposal affecting a heritage listed site.

The Regis Group have failed to do this. They even remarked to my husband, 'How did you find out about this so soon?' They obviously hoped to submit their application and have it passed before anyone could look at it. Well, look at it we have, and it appears to us as though the Regis Group have submitted a pro forma set of plans, including a traffic report that they have submitted elsewhere with a few modifications.

They have not realised that, according to both the Sherwood Graceville Neighbourhood Plan and the Brisbane City Plan 2014, the height, scale, bulk and built form has to be consistent with the character of the local area. They have not complied with the regulations covering the heritage listed property; nor have they examined properly the impact on local traffic. The submission before Council by Greg Ovenden goes into the detail of how the Regis proposal has failed to tick the boxes of an assessable development and should in fact be impact assessable because of the heritage listed property Pontresina.

I am here to bring the human side to our objection. Chelmer has streets full of beautiful Queenslanders, including Hanlan Street, Longman Terrace and Victoria Avenue, all of which bound this application. As a community we treasure these beautiful buildings and abide by the restrictions put in place by Council with regards any modifications that we make. This building will sit on a ridge which is close to being the highest point in Chelmer, will tower above all of us, four storeys as opposed to two storeys, on every boundary. It is a concrete and glass building that is suited to the highly urbanised locations closer to the city. Nothing about this building remotely fits into the character of our suburb, not even a pitched roof.

Victoria Avenue is to house the proposed entry and exit for this development. Victoria Avenue is a dead-end street. There is no turning crescent at the end of the street so cars that enter accidentally use residents' driveways to complete a three-point turn in order to get out. Trucks have to reverse out if they make the same mistake. Our garbage trucks reverse down the street as they, too, cannot turn at the end of the street.

[4464 (Ordinary) meeting – 24 March 2015]

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In 2011, the floods filled our street. We became waterfront properties. Some were badly inundated. We helped each other and ever since have developed a strong sense of community and mateship. Victoria Avenue, as a dead-end street, has become the perfect playground for our children. They play tennis, scooter and cycle in the street, and we regularly hold street barbeques. The scale of this development and the traffic generated will jeopardise the safety of the children and the sense of community that was forged during the floods. We will be forced back into our homes and off the street.

I strongly urge Council to reject the current proposal by the Regis Group and ask them to start again. Regis needs to design a retirement village that contributes to our community, not detracts from it. Thank you for your time.

Chairman: Thank you, Ms Marsdon. Councillor COOPER, do you wish to respond?

Response by Councillor Amanda Cooper, Chairman of the Neighbourhood Planning and Development Assessment Committee

Councillor COOPER: Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and I thank Ms Marsdon for coming into the Council Chamber this afternoon. Certainly I think that you've put forward a very good argument to Council, and I have actually read the submissions that you've made, so thank you very much for providing that information.

Just to give you a bit of background and to make sure that everyone understands exactly what is being proposed here. This application was lodged on 27 November last year, so it was lodged under City Plan 2014, and is deemed to be code assessable. So, the level of assessment under the Queensland State Government's Sustainable Planning Act means the applicant is not required to undertake a formal statutory consultation with the community. Understand that that would be exactly the same if it had been made under City Plan 2000, and that is because the level of assessment is determined because there's only minor heritage works to be done to the heritage place, and that is how it is deemed to be code assessable.

Councillor interjecting.

Councillor COOPER: However, as you have clearly demonstrated, Council is interested in feedback from local residents, despite whatever the level of assessment may be. That has certainly informed the Council officers in their consideration of this proposal. I think you have been having quite a bit of discussion with the Council officer that is assessing the application. She certainly has been really happy to work and respond to some of those issues that you raised with her. I think you have had three different pieces of feedback that you have provided to Council along the way as part of that process.

I understand that you specifically say that you are not against aged care development, and you are not even against aged care on the site; you just have specific issues that you want Council to carefully consider in assessing the application. I absolutely understand that.

So I think your main concerns, as I read them, are that you are concerned about the number of storeys proposed, traffic, parking, the impact on the heritage listed property, and of course, I think the site was originally—well, in the 1970s there was the aged care home, Warrina Village, I believe was actually on the site. This building was demolished in July 2013, and then I am advised it was sold to Regis in November last year. It is a substantial site, over 6000 square metres. It is zoned community facilities health care under the neighbourhood plan.

There has certainly been Council carefully reviewing this application. It is for 120 beds, 116 of those being for private use, and four single-bed apartments with a semi-basement car park and the restoration of the Council heritage listed building Pontresina, which you talked about in your presentation.

There has been an information request issued to the applicant, and you have been following that, no doubt, through PD Online; that was issued on 30 December last year. The officers themselves identified a number of issues, some


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of which you highlighted. So, the height, building separation, setbacks, heritage impacts, servicing and tree retention were probably the major issues that were identified.

There has been a response from the applicant to the information request on 11 February this year, and the officers are currently reviewing that response. That doesn’t mean that those issues are resolved; that just means that we are assessing that information that has been provided. I understand there have been a number of changes made in response to that, so there has been an increase to setbacks to the northern boundary; there's been an improvement to the articulation; there's been some revisions to the design, and there's been a reduction to the number of balconies along the northern and southern boundaries of the application.

There was a query about the number of car spaces to be provided, which is 39 spaces, which actually is above what is required. So they are providing more than what is required as a consequence of this particular proposal. There have been, I believe, 75—that is what I have been advised—submissions on this application from residents, and certainly Council officers are very aware of the interest local residents have in getting a good outcome on this particular site. They are very keen to try and resolve issues.

So there certainly will be a response to—we have said that those submissions should be considered by the applicant, and the applicant should be prepared to address those submissions where they are relating to planning issues. I understand there has also been a referral that was missed to the State Government, so there is a requirement of the applicant to seek that referral from the State Government. That has been recently advised on 12 March that they have no comment, so the State Government have no issues or no requirements that they are going to impose as a part of any decision of Council.

That might be the case, but certainly Council is very keen to work through those issues and get a great outcome. We need aged care in our city. It is very important to all of us, to make sure that these are really important parts of our community, but you are certainly saying that you are not objecting to what is proposed in terms of the outcome, but you just want it to look as good as it possibly can and to fit into the local neighbourhood. So thank you very much for coming in. Thank you for all of your submissions that you have made. They certainly have been very informative for the Council officers to review. Thank you very much.

Chairman: Thank you, Ms Marsdon.

Before we proceed, I would just like to acknowledge former Alderman John Goss who has joined us in the Public Gallery this afternoon. So, welcome, John.

Professor Duncan Campbell - Technological developments and the regulatory framework to better inform Council of the beneficial aspects and opportunities of using unmanned aircraft to assist in the delivery of some Council servicesFile number: 137/220/701/218

Chairman: I would now like to call on Professor Duncan Campbell who will address the Chamber on technological developments and the regulatory framework to better inform Council of the beneficial aspects and opportunities of using unmanned aircraft to assist in the delivery of some Council services. Orderly, will you please show Professor Campbell in; thank you.

Professor Campbell, you may sit or stand, whichever suits you better. You have five minutes, so please commence.

Professor Duncan Campbell: Thank you, Madam Chairperson, LORD MAYOR and Councillors, and thank you for the opportunity to speak to you this afternoon. This arose from a discussion I had with Councillor MURPHY a couple of weeks ago. We were at a function talking about robotics and unmanned aircraft, otherwise known as drones, which I cringe every time I hear. It came in passing conversation that


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Brisbane City Council was very interested in using unmanned aircraft in a number of day-to-day applications, I guess, for delivering core business for the city.

My intent here is perhaps just to help your situational awareness and I think praise you on the opportunity that you have identified. Indeed, unmanned aircraft can resolve and address a number of challenges, and certainly are a number of opportunities that can be used. We are indeed doing a lot with the State Government and Emergency Services in this space right now.

With unmanned aircraft, you do need certification and you do need licensing to fly, and indeed, any business that the Council would be looking at doing, the regulator would be regarding that as commercial activity. I don't say that to be a deterrent at all; it is more just to understand, I guess, the parameters around this. So commercial activity does require a certification and the licensing, and at the moment there are around 200 organisations within the country who are certified to conduct commercial UAV operations—unmanned aircraft operations.

The majority of that list is around aerial photography, and I think we have seen lots and lots of good examples on the news, some legal, some perhaps not, but no doubt there is some great imagery that these machines can bring in in situations that otherwise would be regarded as too dirty dollar dangerous for manned operations. I think an important message to be received here is, I think these machines can offer far more than just aerial imagery. If we talk about intelligence on board the aircraft, to be able to detect and show us, say, wildlife or feral animals, as two examples, and some of you may have seen the news recently where we worked with Australia Zoo looking for koalas in trees. That probably is more than looking for white infrared dots in trees; it's trying to identify what is a possum, what is a koala, what could be a feral animal.

So indeed the real opportunity lies within the science that sits behind the images obtained through unmanned aircraft. I certainly would encourage you, as you are looking at the various applications that I am sure you are receiving advice around, is to have a very broad look at the opportunity posed to you, because we can certainly do some very, very clever stuff with the unmanned aircraft.

I think the other aspect that is worth considering is the business model. It is all part of understanding the problem space. I think there's the intuitive thought that we can go and buy a $200 machine, throw it in the sky and do some wonderful things. The irony at the moment is, unmanned aircraft aren’t that unmanned. Through the legislation, they actually do need a crew to fly, so they do need a pilot, they do need maintenance and so forth. That's again not meant to be a deterrent, but to understand the business model that might go around this.

One thing that a number of agencies are looking at—and I am sure the Council will be considering the same thing; is this a capability that you wish to embed within Council operations? So, have your own teams of people who can fly; they've got their licensing organisation certified and so forth, or is it something that you subcontract a certified operator to do? Once again I do implore you that it is not just a case of grabbing imageries up in the sky. Yes, they certainly do bring some extra situational awareness, but applying some very, very clever science to that can bring some wonderful gains with that.

Insurance is another thing to be conscious of. At the moment, insurance companies have a very poor handle on unmanned aircraft. There just isn’t enough experience out there, so it could be a costly function within all of that. QBE is one of the underwriters. I don't work for QBE, but they are just one of the people who do insure in this space. Really, they just don't have enough risk data at the moment to make that assessment. I mention that simply to bring that to your attention.

I am aware that there are other councils around Brisbane who have already looked at some demonstrations. You perhaps have done so yourselves. There certainly have been demonstrations around Dugong monitoring out in the bay, illegal fishing, whale monitoring; I think there was a case recently looking at a


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little helicopter to spray mosquitoes. I think that was Moreton Shire, but I can't be sure on that one.

The primary application would be based on aerial imagery with some clever science to work out the koalas, the dogs, the possums and so forth. What is starting to emerge is the ability to carry things. I am sure you have all seen the Amazon application. We think that is a little bit far-fetched at the moment. It is a great vision to have, but please be assured QUT is not planning to fly swarms of drones, shall I say, around the city. We will try not to do that. But things like targeted pest control, weedicide and so forth—that certainly is possible. I will pull up at that. I thank you for the opportunity and I will be very pleased to answer questions after the session if you like. So thank you.

Chairman: Thank you, Professor Campbell. Councillor SIMMONDS, do you wish to respond?

Response by Councillor Julian Simmonds, Chairman of the Finance, Economic Development and Administration Committee

Councillor SIMMONDS: Yes, thank you very much, Madam Chairman. Mr Campbell, my name is Julian SIMMONDS; I am the Chairman for Finance, Administration and Economic Development, and I wanted to thank you on behalf of the Council Chamber today for taking the time this afternoon to tell us a little bit more about the issue.

I note your considerable expertise in the fields of electrical and electronic engineering, aerospace engineering, artificial intelligence and image processing and robotics. It would be a very fascinating area to be in to see so many advances happening so quickly. It would be a fascinating field.

As you know, Brisbane prides itself on being a new world city and a digital city, so we are always looking for ways that we can make sure that Brisbane residents and Brisbane businesses can take a piece of the $20 trillion global digital economy. In that vein, I guess I want to commend your research. Not only before I get on to the aspects of how Council may use these vehicles, I know that your research is helping to inform that entire sector, that entire space, and I think there are some great opportunities there for Brisbane start-ups to be at the global forefront of that kind of research and technology. We commend you for that.

In relation to Council's use of the technology, this Administration holds two core principles as very dear to its heart, and that is our desire to enhance services for Brisbane residents and to deliver it in the most cost effective way possible. So it would be on the basis of those two criteria that we'd look at whether or not we deployed unmanned aerial vehicle style technology.

I know that some areas of Council are undertaking an assessment at the moment and looking at ways that this technology might be useful to some of the performances of their duties. I took the opportunity—you inspired me with your speech this afternoon—before you came in I went away and had a look at some of the other things that people are doing. You are very right; there are current jurisdictions—I note that Councillor McLACHLAN might in particular be interested that Moreton Bay has already announced that they are using this type of technology for mosquito spraying, particularly where power lines prevent the traditional helicopter from getting into those areas. They are using those.

The Queensland Police Service have also deployed this technology, and the Queensland Fire Service is currently looking at deploying this technology, and that particularly it's got some highly desirable uses in the field of disaster recovery in fire-fighting and environmental management areas as well. That is primarily the space that Council would be looking at the technology as well.

So thank you very much for telling us a little bit more about it. That has informed some of our considerations going forward, and if you don't mind, I might leave you with my card so that this issue, if it does progress, we can be in touch and ask any further questions we might have. Thank you very much.

Chairman: Thank you, Professor Campbell.


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QUESTION TIME:

Chairman: Are there any questions of the LORD MAYOR or a Chairman of any of the Standing Committees?

Chairman: Councillor MURPHY.

Question 1

Councillor MURPHY: Yes, thank you very much, Madam Chairman; my question is to the LORD MAYOR. This year is the 100-year anniversary of the landings in Gallipoli in 1915, and Anzac Day provides an opportunity to remember all Australians who served and died in all wars, conflicts and peacekeeping operations. Can you please update the Chamber on this Administration's efforts to ensure that memorial sites across the city honour the memory of our fallen on this very important centenary event?

LORD MAYOR: Thanks very much, Madam Chairman, and I thank Councillor MURPHY for the question. It will be one month tomorrow when Australians and, indeed, other allies will commemorate the 25 April 1915, when of course the landing of Gallipoli occurred, and where we saw what many people see as the real birth of this nation in terms of much that has characterised its history and its nation as a people.

Council has been playing its part in relation to this commemoration. We can expect to see some very, very significant crowds, not only here in the city for the Dawn Service and the parade, but also out around the suburbs of this city, the various RSL and war memorials that are located across this city.

To that extent, this Council in the budget last year allocated around $1 million towards refurbishment of several memorials in the city. There has been 31 in total—32 if you add in the joint restoration works that we have undertaken with the State Government on Anzac Square. But there have been six major refurbishments, and they have been located at Yeronga, Hemmant, Mt Ommaney, Mowbray Park at East Brisbane, Nundah and Kenmore. On top of that, there are a further 25 sites throughout the city where works have been done.

This morning I had the opportunity to visit the Centenary suburbs of War Memorial Gardens at Mt Ommaney with the President of the RSL sub-branch, Mr Alan Worthington, and also Councillor Matthew BOURKE. The works that have been completed there will certainly position that War Memorial Gardens very well in terms of the commemoration in a month's time. They are gearing up for a big crowd. I think they had something like 4000 people there last year, and I guess with most others, we can expect to see potentially a 50 per cent increase on that number, if not more.

At the Centenary suburbs memorial gardens, as an example, we have seen works there which have involved the parks parade ground—this is a parade corridor, essentially. They have the Courage Track which outlines the many theatres of engagement that Australian troops have been involved in over the years. As well as that, in more recent times—and I know in conjunction with work undertaken by Councillor Matthew BOURKE, they have established two walls of remembrance. Soon they will be the recipient of a statue which will be again another added bonus to the Anzac Day ceremony.

A number of other major memorials have seen improvements. These have been often improvements to the sandstone makeup; they could be a statue or it could be a monument of some sort. They have varied very much depending upon the nature of the particular memorial and reserve.

In the case of Hemmant, the works out there included repairing and restoring the Anning Monument and generally upgrading the park's facilities. Those works commenced recently, but as with other works, they will all be complete in time


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for 25 April. The Anning Boer War Memorial is one of the few memorials in Queensland out there at Hemmant, and that of course will be important as part of the commemoration and involvement and death of Queensland soldiers in the Boer War of 1899-1902. That monument was unveiled in March 1903, and again forms very much a part of the military history of this nation.

If you go to Mowbray Park, works there have included restoring the memorial. It has including improving the granite kerbing so that water can be drained around the memorial more successfully than it has historically. It has involved repairing the sandstone as well as cleaning and replacing lead lettering. So these are simply some examples—

Chairman: LORD MAYOR—

LORD MAYOR: —and we look forward to the commemoration.

Chairman: Thank you LORD MAYOR.

Chairman: Councillor DICK.

Question 2

Councillor DICK: Thank you, Madam Chair; my question is to the LORD MAYOR. According to your Key Corridors Performance Report, you have overseen worsening traffic congestion in our city. Your first decision as Chairperson of Traffic and Transport 11 years ago was to spend over $2 billion on toll tunnels that are seeing less and less patronage. Doesn’t your traffic report show that your 1950s approach has failed, and that you have no plan to fix Brisbane's traffic congestion?

LORD MAYOR: Well, thank you very much, Madam Chairman. I am quite happy to go back in terms of some of the history around this for Councillor DICK, and I thank him for his question. The truth of the matter was the first project that I undertook as Chairman of Major Projects and Transport was, in fact, the Eleanor Schonell Bridge—that is that public transport bridge which connects Dutton Park with the University of Queensland.

Councillors interjecting.

LORD MAYOR: There had been some work done on that by the—

Chairman: Order!

LORD MAYOR: —Australian Labor Party before there was a change of Administration, and that was a project that was progressed, and one which is working very, very well today.

Another project which the Labor Party had done some work on before we had arrived was the Clem7 tunnel. In fact—


Chairman: Order!

LORD MAYOR: —they wanted to call it the Jim Soorley Tunnel because of the fact that—

Chairman: Order!

LORD MAYOR: —he had brought Bernie Fraser in, you might recall, to undertake a feasibility study around the Clem7 tunnel.

But we make no apologies at all for the infrastructure that this Administration has built, because we know that it is infrastructure which has a 100-year asset life. It is infrastructure which has a capacity that will allow this city to grow and utilise that infrastructure for a long, long time to come.

It comes on the back of a Labor Council who really, apart from doing some of the study work around that, physically on the ground had done very, very little in 13 years—very, very little in 13 years of Administration.


Chairman: Order!


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LORD MAYOR: So, Madam Chairman, this city was screaming out for work to be undertaken in terms of improving the road capacity. I might remind Councillor DICK it was only last week when Airport Link closed down. Remember, it closed down because of an incident in the tunnel. What happened? This city was thrown into traffic chaos. I would love to just see another day to remind people, where all the tunnels closed down for a day—I reckon that would be a really impressive reminder for people of just what a difference the infrastructure that we have built is making in this city.

I know as a local resident out there at Eight Mile Plains that, since Clem7 has come into place, even the at-surface trips to the CBD have come from about 45 minutes that it used to take coming in during the morning peak down to about 25 to 30 minutes today. That has been the extent of difference. The people of the western suburbs are soon going to learn what benefits will derive from Legacy Way.


Chairman: Order!

LORD MAYOR: Coronation Drive and Milton Road will see the benefits, as reductions come off those particular pieces of network.

So, Madam Chairman, the Labor Party always want to interject on these matters because the fact of the matter is they have done precious little to improve the road network during their years. Not only did they do precious little in terms of the road network; they did precious little in terms of public transport. I always remind the Labor Party—


Chairman: Order!

LORD MAYOR: —that in that period of time, when they were in Administration—

Chairman: Order! Councillor NEWTON!

LORD MAYOR: —where population grew by 20 per cent, and they could only manage a 9 per cent increase in bus transportation patronage in that period of time.


Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON!

LORD MAYOR: They can squeak and squawk, but they're the facts of the matter, and squawking won't change the history or the facts of the matter, as much as they might think it will.

So, Madam Chairman, we have demonstrated that we are committed to improving the road network, and we have done that with a number of projects. We continue to roll out projects into the future. Not only that, we had the Road Action Program where we undertook—


Chairman: Order! Order!

LORD MAYOR: —44 road projects. It was 15 years of work bundled into four years.


LORD MAYOR: They laugh—they laugh, but—

Chairman: Councillor SUTTON!

LORD MAYOR: —you go back and have a look at your capital spend under Labor Administrations compared to the capital spend under this.

Chairman: Order!

LORD MAYOR: Madam Chairman, it is—

Chairman: Councillor SUTTON, if you continue to interject like that, I will warn you. LORD MAYOR.


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LORD MAYOR: They like to ask the questions, but they don't like to hear the answers, Madam Chairman. But that is the fact of the matter. We have undertaken an enormous roads program in the time since 2004, and I might say that, if you go to other states where it is worsening to a very significant degree, we are holding our position extremely well here in Brisbane, and long may it be.

Chairman: Further questions?

Chairman: Councillor WYNDHAM.

Question 3

Councillor WYNDHAM: Thank you, Madam Chairman; my question is to the Chairman of Infrastructure Committee, Councillor SCHRINNER. The release of Council's second biannual Key Corridor Performance Report clearly demonstrates that this Administration has its priorities right, in getting on with the job and delivering both new infrastructure and delivering projects—


Chairman: Order!

Councillor WYNDHAM: —that reduce traffic congestion. Can you please provide this Chamber with more information on some of those important projects?

DEPUTY MAYOR: Thank you, Councillor WYNDHAM. I was wondering if you had had any chats with Councillor DICK before Council, because your question is the same question that he asked. Look, I am more than happy to answer that. I have to say upfront Councillor DICK actually quoted a figure that I wanted to quote today, and that is that this Council has invested just over $2 billion into some of these important toll road projects.


Chairman: Councillor ABRAHAMS!

DEPUTY MAYOR: The going argument at the moment—and people like Councillor DICK like to peddle this, and there are also a few voices in the RACQ that might like to peddle this as well—is that these toll road projects have been an abject failure and have not done anything to deal with traffic congestion. That is what Councillor DICK would like you to believe. Here are the facts.

In recent years, there have been $8.5 billion worth of investment in toll roads in Brisbane. Let me list those projects. Go Between Bridge; Clem7; Airport Link; the second Gateway Bridge; and Legacy Way, which is now under construction. The combination of all of those projects I just listed is $8.5 billion approximately to construct. Guess how much Council has put in towards those toll road projects. Councillor DICK said it—$2.2 billion.

So it is actually not Council that has put in the majority of funding to these projects at all. Guess who put in the majority of funding. Well, the private sector put in a bit. The Labor State and Federal Governments put the money in. The Labor State and Federal Governments started the Airport Link project—toll road; they started the second Gateway Bridge project—toll road.


Chairman: Order!

DEPUTY MAYOR: Apparently toll roads are an abject failure.

Chairman: Order!

DEPUTY MAYOR: The reality is—and don't believe Councillor DICK—Labor loves toll roads. If there's any better proof, it is the fact that Labor Councillors in this Chamber—there are only a few of them—used the Go Between Bridge and Clem7 147 times last year, on the public purse too, mind you. They are quite happy to use these toll roads—


Chairman: Order!


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DEPUTY MAYOR: —themselves, yet they come out publicly and—

Chairman; Councillor NEWTON!

DEPUTY MAYOR: —bag the projects continually. I think the LORD MAYOR made a very good point. If you were to close down all of these toll roads at once, what would happen to the Brisbane road network? It would grind to an absolute halt. I would like to do that experiment one day. I don't think the LORD MAYOR would give me permission, but I would like to do that experiment. Anyone who says these toll roads aren’t working is absolutely living in some kind of fantasy land.

The reality is, there's a myth out there that Brisbane people won't pay tolls. The reality is, we don't want every Brisbane person or every Brisbane motorist to pay tolls, but we want those who see the value in it to do so. Guess what; 350,000 motorists each and every day use toll roads in this city—350,000 motorists each day. So the reality is they are an important part of the overall Brisbane road network.

As I said, we understand that not everyone will use them. That is the reality in every single city around the world. But every motorist who chooses to use one of these toll roads is taking a trip off an alternative route which frees up traffic for other people to use—it frees up road capacity for other people to use. So Council has, with $2.2 billion of investment, made a contribution towards the overall road network, but that is only a small part of the picture. It is a small part of the investment in toll roads, but also, as the LORD MAYOR mentioned, it's a small part of our investment in the wider road network.

We have spent far more money on free roads than we have on toll roads, and we continue to do so. Kingsford Smith Drive—that is not a toll road. Wynnum Road upgrade—that is not a toll road. We continue to invest in road upgrades on the free network right across this city. In the last 10 years, we have invested more than $8 billion in road and infrastructure upgrades right across the city. So the $2.2 billion on toll roads is a minor part of that overall picture.

We will continue to invest in the entire road network, and we will also continue to invest in public transport, in bikeways, in pedestrian improvements, in a whole range of modes of transport. So that myth that Labor is trying to perpetuate that the toll roads aren’t working—absolute rubbish, absolute rubbish. It is rubbish, and the figures prove it. They are taking pressure off the road network each and every day, and if anyone wants to dispute it, like I said, I am volunteering to close down all of those roads at once and see what happens.



Question 4

Councillor DICK: Thank you, Madam Chair; my question is to the LORD MAYOR. In relation to your traffic report, the RACQ's Michael Roth said, 'We don't think the current road pricing regime has delivered good outcomes' and goes on to say, 'Latest figures showed me that Clem7'—your Airport Link tunnel—'were having a significant impact on Brisbane's traffic.' LORD MAYOR, if the RACQ and the thousands and thousands of Brisbane motorists who are stuck in traffic agree with this, why are they wrong, but you are right? Doesn’t this just show the arrogance of your Administration by ignoring Queensland's most credible road authority and ignoring the views of Brisbane's residents?

LORD MAYOR: Well, Madam Chairman, I thank Councillor DICK for the question. Look, I am certainly aware of Mr Roth's views in relation to these matters, as the Policy Director of the RACQ. But Mr Roth and I have some different positions on things. I am quite happy to debate those positions any day of the week.

Probably the most fundamental difference that he has in terms of his views and my views on roads is that the RACQ believe that a congestion tax ought to be introduced. I have said religiously that I do not support a congestion tax. That has always been my position. I believe if people are travelling on a new piece of infrastructure, like a tunnel, they're gaining a benefit out of that infrastructure,


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then I believe that it is fair and reasonable that they pay a toll in relation to the use of that infrastructure.

The RACQ believe that the tolls ought to be free and you ought to impose the tax on those locations which are congested in the city. I will tell you why I have always been fundamentally opposed to it. Firstly, I see it as a tax on existing infrastructure. I see it as a tax on people who can sometimes get caught up in that congestion for no fault of their own. I refer here in relation to, in some cases, parents—mothers and fathers—picking kids up from school, where that area may be a congested spot. I have never supported a congestion tax, and I won't. It's as simple as that. So the RACQ and I are always going to be diametrically at odds.

It is up now to the Labor Party to say whether they will support a congestion tax. Do they support Mr Roth's position and the RACQ's policy position on a congestion tax for motorists? I have introduced the subject here today. It is now up to them to state their position. Madam Chairman, I have been very clear on my position. I do recall the referendums that have been conducted in some parts of the world. London has a congestion tax. But London is a grid-locked city. It is a city much, much bigger than Brisbane. It is a city with congestion issues far extreme in terms of the Brisbane situation.

I can tell you there are other locations where these matters have been put to the referendum of people, and where it's been thrown out, in spite of the fact of assurances of all of those congestion charges going into other roads or other public transport uses, and has got thrown out and thrown out very, very significantly. I am happy to provide further details of that later if anybody wants it. But my position is clear. It is now up to the Labor Party to say whether they are for or against a congestion charge.


Chairman: Councillor HOWARD.

Question 5

Councillor HOWARD: Thank you, Madam Chairman; my question is to the Chairman of the Brisbane Lifestyle Committee, Councillor ADAMS. Can you please outline to the Chamber how Brisbane residents are benefitting from this Administration's vision for the lifestyle portfolio through the investment into our vibrant, connected, accessible and informed library network, and the role libraries play in facilitating the growth of our new world city?

Councillor ADAMS: Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you, Councillor HOWARD, for the question. This Administration does certainly recognise the role our libraries play in providing a thriving platform to allow Brisbane residents the opportunity to learn, connect and socialise, and the library networks are a very, very important part of our vibrant, connected, accessible and informed city.

They are community hubs. We know that. I have spoken about it many times. I think you really need to get into the libraries and experience the libraries to realise they are definitely more than just book depositories. We deliver programs to over 200,000 children in literacy every year. Last year we saw that number grow again for our children and our parents particularly in the children's story time. Our children areas are really becoming so vibrant; our refurbishments encourage that literacy learning through play, so whether you want to go and lie in a bathtub in Sinnamon Farm in Mt Ommaney, or if you want to go and play in the carnival in the Mitchelton Library, or if you want to go and hang upside down in Cooper's Plains, it is all about getting the children engaged to make sure that they are learning and enjoying books and becoming lifelong learners and readers as well.

We are very proud; our network of libraries last year attracted over 360,000 people in general programs across the year, which can extend it, not just for children, but to our whole population, particularly our seniors. When we are talking about those who have not grown up in a work environment where they have access to iPads and emails and eBooks and downloads, it is a new world. It


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is very difficult if you are not using it all day, every day, so we provide that way for residents to continue to be informed into their later life as well.

We make sure that we're offering new skills and new hobbies for our residents, and libraries are a platform where you can start those new skills and hobbies if you come in and join. We offer programs where you can make new friends; you can learn about the internet; you can get into your family history. Genealogy is becoming very, very popular across our libraries. You can learn a new craft; you can learn entrepreneurial skills; you can learn how to hack.

I have to say, one of the things that we are definitely seeing is the connection we are making to those people that are between your children's story time and your seniors learning how to use eBooks. We have got that tweenies age group, the 10 to 17 that we are bringing back to the library. Our CoderDojo programs booked out within an hour of opening for this term session that they had. We have iBrary, which was actually invented by the 2010 Lamiak group, a research tool that they can use in the libraries for their homework and their study. We have phantoms, and if you don't know what a phantom is, you need to get into a library and get a bit hipper.

That was created by our Lamiak group last year, and of course we've got live performers, poets, musicians, comedians, that perform on a Friday night in BSQ Library to get the young people back into the libraries and realising what community hubs they are. We are offering libraries that fit in with our new world city here.

We continue to look at other services as well. We've got our learning opportunities that are inclusive. They are in other languages. We had 1.2 million wi-fi sessions enjoyed in libraries and our parks last year, and we continue to look at other technologies that we can use to make sure we can increase that accessibility of our information, our recreation materials and our learning opportunities as well.

From 2010 to 2014, we got a new Kenmore Library, Madam Chair, which I know you absolutely love. We refurbished the Fairfield Library again which was extensively damaged due to the floods. We did then do the deck extension and have a delayed refurbishment to the Grange Library; refurbishment and extension to Ashgrove Library; refurbishment to Indooroopilly Library; the relocation of the new Carindale Library that I know the DEPUTY MAYOR is very proud of; refurbishment and extension of the Mitchelton Library; and of course the refurbishment and extension of the Coopers Plains Library as well.

Now, just 10 days ago—we spoke about it last week—we had the Mt Ommaney Library where, as I said, you can go and lie in the bath and read your book at Sinnamon Cottage. But what really is making us a truly new world city is the technology we are introducing into our libraries. Ten days ago we launched at the Mt Ommaney Library the new automatic return shelf. This is the absolute latest on offer when it comes to RFID technology. It has a smart blade return, so when you book in the shelf, it is returned. No librarian out the back scanning it and trying to get it onto a trolley and get it back into the shelf so it can get into circulation. You put it on the shelf and it has been returned.

This is the type of technology we are seeing in a new world city. We are the first in Queensland to introduce this into our libraries; the third in Australia, which I don't think is a bad effort, but definitely shows you that Brisbane is well on the way to being a new world city in our libraries as well. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Chairman: Thank you.

Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON.

Question 6

Councillor JOHNSTON: Yes, thank you, Madam Chairman; my question is to the LORD MAYOR. In the City Plan 2014, your Administration removed gross floor area as one of the key means of regulating the bulk, size and scale of developments. In Sherwood, at 6 Quarry Road, there has been an application for a seven-storey apartment


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building, two storeys underground and five above. The developer is building outside of the building envelope, not complying with setbacks, not complying with building separation requirements, and is proposing a building that is massively in excess of the limits on the size of buildings.

This is a code assessable development because of your Administration. Will you now ensure that the building envelopes that are the only measure regulating the size, bulk and scale of developments are strictly enforced to ensure there is no inappropriate development in our suburbs?

Chairman: That's a very complicated question, Councillor JOHNSTON, and one that if the LORD MAYOR wants to take it on notice—


Chairman: You are happy to—okay, thank you, LORD MAYOR.

LORD MAYOR: Madam Chairman, it is not so much a matter of taking it on notice, but what Councillor JOHNSTON really is asking me to do within the context of the question is to step outside of the law. She is doing that by really seeking guarantees from me—

Councillor JOHNSTON: Point of order, Madam Chair.

Chairman: Yes, point of order against you, LORD MAYOR; yes, Councillor JOHNSTON.

Councillor JOHNSTON: Point of order, Madam Chairman; claim to be misrepresented.

Chairman: No, you can't claim to be misrepresented. You have asked—


Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON! You've asked a question; the LORD MAYOR was beginning to answer it. You are not misrepresented.

Councillor JOHNSTON: Point of order, Madam Chairman.

Chairman: Yes, Councillor JOHNSTON.

Councillor JOHNSTON: The LORD MAYOR just said what Councillor JOHNSTON is saying is that she wants me to step outside the law. Madam Chairman, that is not what I said. That is a misrepresentation under the Rules of Procedure, and I would appreciate the opportunity to correct the record at the appropriate time.

Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON, I do not uphold your point of order. You have not given the LORD MAYOR sufficient time to give his explanation. LORD MAYOR.


Chairman: Yes, Councillor JOHNSTON.

Councillor JOHNSTON: My question is not about relevance; my point of order was about misrepresentation, Madam Chairman.

Chairman: I do not uphold your point of order. You have not given the LORD MAYOR sufficient time to explain, and you are accusing him of misrepresenting you without giving him adequate time to even give an explanation. I do not uphold your point of order, and don’t raise it again.

Chairman: LORD MAYOR.

LORD MAYOR: Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. As I understood the question, Councillor JOHNSTON was asking me to give certain guarantees relevant to the building envelopes. The reason that I made the statement that I did is that I don't have authority within the structure of this organisation and within the structure of the Act under which this organisation must work to give Councillor JOHNSTON guarantees around that.


Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON!


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LORD MAYOR: Were I to do so today, I am saying to you I would be stepping outside of the law because the law is very clear under the State Government Act in terms of assessment of applications.

I am not going to get into the arguments today about whether this is a good application, a bad application, an application that will be rejected or an application that will be approved, because that is not my place to do so under the Act. Were it so, we would be going back to pre-Fitzgerald times.

The reality is that the officers—


Chairman: LORD MAYOR, just a moment. Councillor JOHNSTON, if you interject and disrupt this meeting once again, you will be warned. LORD MAYOR, thank you.

LORD MAYOR: So, Madam Chairman, I have heard what Councillor JOHNSTON has to say here today in respect of the application. I am assuming that she has lodged the appropriate advice to officers of her view in respect of the application. If she has done so, those matters will certainly be taken into account by officers, as they are required to do, as will other aspects of the application. I am not familiar with this Quarry Road application. I say that today.

So, I have learnt from the question what this particular application involves. As people in this place would be aware, this organisation gets over 4000 applications a year, so I don't pretend for a moment to be across every one of those applications. What I will say, though, is that the—and she is not here to hear the answer-


LORD MAYOR: Oh, she's talking, okay, that's all right. So, Madam Chairman, I would just say that the application is one that will have to be properly assessed by officers. It will have to be properly assessed in respect to height. It will have to be properly assessed in terms of the building envelope to which Councillor JOHNSTON refers in her question. If she hasn’t done so already, I would certainly encourage her to get her views into the officers with regards to those views that she has in regard to the application so that they can be taken into account as part of the assessment process.


Chairman: Councillor MARX.


Chairman: Point of order; yes, Councillor JOHNSTON.

MOTION FOR SUSPENSION OF STANDING RULES:515/2014-15

At that juncture, Councillor Nicole JOHNSTON moved, seconded by Councillor Milton DICK, that the Standing Rules be suspended to allow the moving of the following motion

Madam Chairman, I seek leave to suspend Standing Orders to allow me to move an urgency motion requiring the development application at 6 Quarry Road, Sherwood, to be brought to full Council for decision

Chairman: You have three minutes to establish urgency, Councillor JOHNSTON.

Councillor JOHNSTON: Yes, Madam Chairman; I am extremely concerned that the LORD MAYOR is attempting to avoid his responsibilities with respect to development applications based on the answer he has just given in the Chamber today. Full Council makes decisions week in and week out about development applications, and it could make a decision about 6 Quarry Road at Sherwood.

It is a concern to me that the LORD MAYOR has implied to the Chamber today that he has no responsibility for the decision making with respect to DAs in this


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city. Week after week we see DAs being brought to this Chamber for decision. I have written to the LORD MAYOR—

Chairman: Urgency please, Councillor JOHNSTON.

Councillor JOHNSTON: Yes, Madam Chairman. I have written to the LORD MAYOR asking him to call in this development and bring it to full Council for decision, just like I did at 66 Longman Terrace, and I have received no reply. Both of these developments are code assessable because of the changes made by this Administration, and I am concerned that they will make a decision that flies in the face of the City Plan and community expectations.

I believe the best place for these decisions to be made is here in the Chamber, and clearly the LORD MAYOR is unaware—

Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON, you are not explaining urgency.

Councillor JOHNSTON: I am, Madam Chair.

Chairman: Why does it have to be brought to this Chamber here today?

Councillor JOHNSTON: Madam Chairman, as I just outlined, the LORD MAYOR is unaware of his obligations and responsibilities to bring these sorts of matters to full Council for decision, or even apparently that he can. I have also made the point, Madam Chairman, that these are code assessable decisions, and they can be made at any time.

Third point for urgency; the LORD MAYOR has failed to respond to my requests to bring these matters to the Chamber for decision. It is critical that these large DAs that are changing the face of our local community are brought to full Council for a decision. It is in this place where we can take responsibility for the decision making, and it is critical that an adverse precedent is not set by allowing inappropriate development in our suburbs.

I believe it is urgent that the 6 Quarry Road, Sherwood development application is brought forward to this Council immediately. There have been two information requests issued to date. I have made a submission. It is clear that the developer does not want to change their development application. The only way this Council can stand up and make sure that the only regulator on gross floor area and building bulk and size is undertaken properly is if this Council makes a decision about strictly enforcing the building envelopes and setting a precedent so other developers know this is the way that their development will be treated.

It is urgent because I am concerned about the fact that this LORD MAYOR does not believe he is responsible for decision making.

Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON, your time has expired.

The Chairman submitted the motion for the suspension of the Standing Rules to the Chamber and it was declared lost on the voices.

Thereupon, Councillors Milton DICK and Nicole JOHNSTON immediately rose and called for a division, which resulted in the motion being declared lost.

The voting was as follows:

AYES: 8 - The Leader of the OPPOSITION, Councillor Milton DICK, and Councillors Helen ABRAHAMS, Peter CUMMING, Kim FLESSER, Steve GRIFFITHS, Victoria NEWTON, Shayne SUTTON and Nicole JOHNSTON.

NOES: 19 - The Right Honourable the LORD MAYOR, Councillor Graham QUIRK, DEPUTY MAYOR, Councillor Adrian SCHRINNER, and Councillors Krista ADAMS, Matthew BOURKE, Amanda COOPER, Margaret de WIT, Vicki HOWARD, Steven HUANG, Fiona KING, Geraldine KNAPP, Kim MARX, Peter MATIC, Ian McKENZIE, David McLACHLAN,


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Ryan MURPHY, Angela OWEN-TAYLOR, Julian SIMMONDS, Andrew WINES and Norm WYNDHAM.



Question 7

Councillor MARX: Thank you, Madam Chairman; my question is to the Chairman of the Field Services Committee, Councillor McLACHLAN, Brisbane was recently crowned as Australia's most sustainable city by Keep Australia Beautiful with the judges impressed by Council's commitment to keeping Brisbane clean and green. Can you please provide specific details of results from recycling initiatives introduced and undertaken by this Administration in recent years that contributed to this success?

Councillor McLACHLAN: Thank you, Madam Chairman, and thank you to Councillor MARX for the question. As you well know, we had a presentation in the Field Services Committee last week on the success of the Willawong Resource Recovery Centre since modifications there a couple of years ago, and the uplifts in materials now going from Willawong into reuse and into recycling streams.

During that Committee presentation, a question was asked about the statistics on recycling more broadly. That is a reasonable question. The answer points to the success of the Council's recycling initiatives over the past several years. This is the Environmental Benefit Certificate that Brisbane City Council is provided with each year from Visy, who are our recycling partners. All the materials that are collected in the yellow top bins across Brisbane go to Visy at Gibson Island for processing.

The big number in terms of tonnes is cardboard and paper. According to Visy, in the year to the end of June 2014, we collectively recycled 49,493.5 tonnes of paper and cardboard. That is nearly 50,000 tonnes. While people are reading fewer and fewer papers on actual newspaper, and the amount of cardboard packaging is reduced year on year, there is still plenty being collected, and that is rebirthed as new cardboard—nearly 50,000 tonnes last year. Glass, 29,300 tonnes goes back into new glass and increasingly broken down for use in concrete and asphalt production. Steel—not one of the larger items processed through Gibson Island—but more goes out into the kerbside collections, and gets collected by a variety of different ways, but still via the recycling service, a respectable 1400 tonnes.

But I was interested to see this stat in the volume of plastic bottles recycled—the PET plastic bottles. Of course, each bottle has a minimal weight, almost negligible, but there was enough of them to get to a respectable 2402 tonnes. I am told the number of bottles per tonne on average is a bit over 3300. So 1 tonne, one pallet, 3300 bottles per pallet, so that is nearly 8 million bottles that were last year processed and despatched to manufacturers to be returned as new drink bottles or as a variety of other products.

It is impossible to determine how many of those bottles originally contained water or maybe other soft drinks when they were sold, but the figures do make the point, they do prove the point, that it is simply wrong to suggest that the destiny for all empty water bottles is either landfill or roadside litter, and therefore bottled water should be banned from sale—as we have heard some people suggesting.

It ignores the reality of the success of our entrenched and well-regarded recycling scheme here in Brisbane. We know the Labor Party is flirting with the idea of a ban on the sale of bottled water here in Brisbane, and hopefully some wiser heads will prevail and they will scrap that idea and move on.

Banning the sale of bottled water won't improve recycling rates or reduce litter. What will is sticking to the path that this Administration has been on for the past several years, like making it easier to use infrastructure—bigger, larger bins, modifying and improving infrastructure where necessary to make sure people get and understand information about the program, like our Recycling Guide for


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Households that is provided in several languages, now with an app that a lot of people are now using. Thousands of people are now using the recycling app. These are always to get the story out, to get the information out.

Madam Chairman, the QUIRK Administration is absolutely determined to keep on increasing recycling rates, encouraging the reuse of materials, reducing the amount of materials that ends up in landfill. We have seen a 15 per cent per capita reduction in waste to landfill since 2008-09, from 361 kilograms per person in 2008-09 down to 307 kilograms in 2013-14, and that downward trend continues.

Recycling is the cornerstone of our city's Waste and Resource Recovery Services, and Brisbane continues to set the standards that others follow. We did away with that unworkable Labor folly of single truck pick-ups of both general waste and recycling, and when that happened, we saw an immediate leap in the recycling rates of our city. While we are getting on with the job, Labor's contribution is thought bubbles—


Chairman: Order!

Councillor McLACHLAN: —like nanny state, banning of bottled water, just like their previous doozey of fortnightly, not weekly, pick-ups of rubbish. That is not a good idea. We will continue on the path we are on to continue to provide Brisbane residents with recycling programs.

Chairman: Thank you, Councillor.


Question 8

Councillor DICK: Thank you, Madam Chair; my question is to the LORD MAYOR. New world cities are embracing active and public transport projects, but you are refusing to guarantee to construct dedicated bus and separated cycle lines as part of the Wynnum Road upgrade. Modern transport planners all agree that car-focussed roads only infrastructure projects are a throwback to the 1950s LA-style transport planning, which is doomed to fail. LORD MAYOR, why don't you get out of your 1950s mindset and guarantee today that there will be dedicated bus and separated cycle lines as part of the new Wynnum Road upgrade?

LORD MAYOR: Well, I thank Councillor DICK for the question. I would just be very interested to know from Councillor SUTTON whether she was interested in making sure that there was no opportunity for further motor vehicle movements on Wynnum Road for her constituents, because that is what Councillor DICK is essentially asking.


LORD MAYOR: Now, you can interject but you might just want to get up in General Business—

Chairman: Councillor SUTTON, if you continue to interject, you will be warned.

LORD MAYOR: Madam Chairman, that is the essence of the question. We have made it clear in relation to Kingsford Smith Drive that we will be providing an active transport opportunity. We have been providing separated bicycle ways; we are going to be providing pedestrian pathways, separated from bicycle ways. We are going to be providing indented bus bays.

So, Wynnum Road, we are proposing exactly the same thing at this stage. We have indicated that we want to do a road project which provides for active transport opportunities. We have indicated that we are prepared to undertake the difficult decisions of resumptions or acquisitions to ensure that we have that capability.

But if Councillor SUTTON wants to write to me to say that she doesn’t want to provide for any more motor vehicle access opportunity in relation to Wynnum Road, then I would certainly—as would any Lord Mayor—be happy to consider


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the local Councillor's position in relation to these matters. So that offer is a standing offer.


Chairman: Councillor ABRAHAMS!

LORD MAYUOR: It is always open. You, too, Councillor ABRAHAMS, because—


Chairman: Order!

LORD MAYOR: —part of this—we know your roads diet situation, but you have that same opportunity, because some of the acquisitions and resumptions we are doing obviously are initially within your ward.

Of course, Madam Chairman, we are all going through potential changes of boundaries, so who knows where it might end up. That said, I am only saying today that we will be ensuring that we have an active transport opportunity; that has always been the position. We will look forward to the development of that with time. We are in the early stages of Wynnum Road. It is about a year behind the Kingsford Smith Drive proposal, so stage 1 of Wynnum Road will be occurring at that time.

Councillor DICK makes these comments about providing—I remember Coronation Drive. They had the tidal flow system. Well, wasn’t that a cracker!


Chairman: Order!

LORD MAYOR: They created this situation where they had these lights, and it would be a big red light and a big green light, and I can tell you, every week, there would be a very significant period where that tidal flow system just collapsed. It kept on collapsing.


Chairman: Councillor NEWTON!

LORD MAYOR: It collapsed so many times that it just had to be taken out. It was causing more traffic congestion than it was worth. It was blocking road space that could have been properly utilised had that tidal flow system not been in.

When we took it out, we not only got a 19 per cent improvement—

Councillor NEWTON: Point of order, Madam Chair.

Chairman: Point of order against you, LORD MAYOR; yes, Councillor NEWTON.

Councillor NEWTON: My recollection was that Councillor DICK's question was specifically about public and active transport opportunities on the Wynnum Road upgrade, not Coronation Drive, not Kingsford Smith Drive—Wynnum Road.

Chairman: Thank you, Councillor NEWTON, but I believe the LORD MAYOR's comments are very relevant to the nature of the question that has been asked.

LORD MAYOR: Madam Chairman, Councillor DICK was instancing other situations, other cities apparently that have these provisions that he refers to. I am just instancing situations here where Labor had botched efforts in terms of this.

Again, I indicated earlier that our very first project that we did when Campbell Newman was elected as Lord Mayor of this city was to do the Eleanor Schonell Bridge. There was a referendum held of people immediately after that election, and that went ahead—


LORD MAYOR: Well, I think it's there, isn't it? I'm not sure why you're scoffing. It's there the last time I looked at it. I remember building it, Madam Chairman, as the Major Projects Chairman at that time. So, again, I can only indicate that if Councillor


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SUTTON wants to come and have a talk about this, maybe put her views in writing to me—


Chairman: Councillor SUTTON!


Chairman: The LORD MAYOR is giving an answer. Remain quiet. You asked a question. The constant interjections are out of control. If you want to comment to one of your other colleagues, you do it very quietly. I hear everything that you say because you're all so loud, and the constant interjections while the LORD MAYOR is giving an answer—be quiet. LORD MAYOR.

LORD MAYOR: So, Madam Chairman, if we are to see additional lanes for bus lanes, perhaps the State Government may be interested in making a contribution towards that. After all, they have the fundamental responsibility for public transport infrastructure, and they always have had. They've done the busway project out there along the freeway. That proved successful. I know people in the eastern suburbs are waiting for the eastern suburbs busway—

Chairman: LORD MAYOR, your time has expired. Councillor KNAPP.

Councillor KNAPP: Thank you, Madam Chair; my question—


Chairman: Order! Councillor KNAPP, just a minute. Thank you.

Question 9

Councillor KNAPP: Thank you, Madam Chair; my question is to the Chairman of Environment, Parks and Sustainability Committee, Councillor BOURKE. With the extreme rainfall that occurred over the weekend, could you please inform the Chamber on the actions Council has taken to deal with all forms of flooding across the city?

Councillor BOURKE: Thanks very much, Madam Chairman, and I thank Councillor KNAPP for the question. I know that Councillor KNAPP has a keen interest in all things raining and all things drainage in her time in Council. It is indeed true that we did have a significant rainfall event across the city both on Saturday and on Sunday. So parts of the city saw very heavy totals fall in a very short period of time.

I just want to list off some locations across the city, just to give the Chamber an idea about some of the depth of rain that actually fell. Down in East Brisbane, we saw 48 mm fall in a half-hour period—so all of these totals are in a half-hour period. So there was 48 mm fall in a half-hour period, which is equivalent to about a one in six-year rainfall event. At Toowong, Milton and Indooroopilly, Councillor SIMMONDS, we saw 51 mm fall in that same half-hour period, or a one in nine-year rainfall event. You were out running in that rain, Councillor SIMMONDS.

We then go down to Kangaroo Point in the Gabba area, 56 mm fell in that half-hour period, down to Sunnybank, Eight Mile Plains, there was 63 mm, and Councillor SCHRINNER, out in Rochedale, the highest total for that half-hour period actually fell down in your ward, 66 mm in a half-hour period, which given the catchment and the area it fell in, was equivalent to a one in 58-year rainfall event. I do have a map, Madam Chairman—a bit of show and tell. You can see the band of red that actually tracks across the city there, and the rainfall totals for that half-hour period.

A lot of these totals doubled in the next number of hours across the city, as we saw increased and continual rain. What that's meant is that we did see localised flooding, overland flow, as well as creek flooding and flash flooding across the city. Of course, this Administration has taken many actions over the last 10 years to make sure residents are safe, to make sure residents are aware and make sure residents are able to deal with the different types of flooding. So it is not just creek flooding. Of course, we have river flooding, storm tide, the creek


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flooding that I mentioned, and of course, overland flow, which was the main sort of flooding that we saw on the weekend.

Councillor KNAPP asked about what we have done. Well, we have invested not only in physical infrastructure but also in the online and the cutting edge infrastructure to help make residents safe. The early warning alert system, which I imagine we all got over the weekend as the BOM issued the thunderstorm warnings—97,000 Brisbane residents have signed up as part of the early warning alert system, staying informed about the conditions in their local catchment.

Last year we launched our flood awareness maps, so the residents can go online and understand their flood risk. Of course, we have had our ever-popular flood-wise property reports, those free flood information documents, free flood information documents, that all Brisbane residents can access to find out how flooding—be it one of the four different forms that I mentioned—affects their property. They can understand their risk.

On top of that, Madam Chairman, we have also been investing in the infrastructure that this city needs to help manage and deal with flooding. So we have our $4.8 million drainage budget for local drainage. We have our $10 million drainage budget for major drainage works, with the six projects that are being delivered as part of that. We have our $3.7 million waterway health enhancement budget which are those wonderful projects that we as local Councillors do with our communities, where we clean out creeks, we improve the drainage and we improve also the habitat.

Of course, this Administration's commitment to the voluntary home purchase scheme with the additional $7.5 million that sits in this year's budget, and the LORD MAYOR showing his commitment to that scheme. On top of all of this, let's not forget that we are the only Administration and the only ones to commit to a backflow protection device program of $10 million over this term, which has been completed. Those devices, the 30-odd locations across the city, protect 80 per cent of the residents who were inundated by the 2011 flood event.

We haven’t put all of our eggs in one basket when it comes to dealing with drainage in our city. We have delivered across the board a range of different measures to help protect and preserve residents' property and lives, so that they are safe and so they can plan not only their homes but also their businesses. We will continue to do that.

We saw at the end of last year the LORD MAYOR tabling the data that we had prepared from our Katherine flood studies. We tabled that in an open and transparent way. The reason we did that is because this side of the Chamber has always been open and transparent when it comes to dealing with floods, unlike those opposite who hid flood studies, who didn’t release the information. When you wanted to get flood information, they made you pay. They made you pay to get a flood report on your own property.

So this Administration has taken a completely different tack, and we will continue to invest the money that needs to be invested in infrastructure and invest the money that needs to be invested in the social work as well to help support our residents when there's all sorts of flooding in the city and help protect—

Chairman: Councillor BOURKE, your time has expired.

Chairman: That ends Question Time.

CONSIDERATION OF COMMITTEE REPORTS:

ESTABLISHMENT AND COORDINATION COMMITTEE


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The Right Honourable the LORD MAYOR (Councillor Graham QUIRK), Chairman of the Establishment and Coordination Committee, moved, seconded by the DEPUTY MAYOR (Councillor Adrian SCHRINNER), that the report of the meeting of that Committee held on 16 March 2015, be adopted.

Chairman: Is there any debate?

LORD MAYOR: Yes, thanks very much, Madam Chairman. Before coming to the formal report, I would just like to raise a number of issues if I may. Firstly, just to acknowledge that 21 March was Harmony Day, a day which is very, very important. It reflects cultural respect. It reflects the harmony of our society and indeed the respect that we have for one another, as people who have come from many parts of the globe to call Brisbane, Queensland, or indeed Australia, home.

But this Harmony Day is always a very, very important part of the calendar. It's an awareness day, obviously, and it reflects very much the things that make our nation great, and the ingredients that have gone to make a very, very successful nation, despite the very broad cultures and beliefs that the people of this city, state and nation hold.

Last Saturday I had the privilege of being at the Sherwood Arboretum for the celebration of their 90th birthday. Councillor BOURKE and Councillor JOHNSTON were at that event, and it was a great opportunity to congratulate and to celebrate with all of those people that have volunteered, families of some of the founding fathers of the arboretum as well as many of those in the community that celebrate that very, very fine asset to our city. The first Lord Mayor of Brisbane, William Jolly, planted tree no. 4 in a corridor of trees there. Other plantings I notice on this list were by Archbishop Duhig at the time and many others that have undertaken plantings at different times over the life of the arboretum. I just recommend it to Councillors if you haven’t had the opportunity to visit Sherwood Arboretum.

The other event that I attended on Saturday, I had to leave the arboretum fairly rapidly, because Operation Slipper was being commemorated in the city. This was an opportunity for the soldiers, sailors and airmen and women who served in operations in the Middle East, and it was our chance to officially welcome them home. It was a military parade which saw the parade go down Adelaide Street and through the city streets, past Anzac Square, past King George Square, where there was a dais and salute taken.

The parade moved to Southbank where a very respectful service took place. Many of the families of those who had fallen in Operation Slipper laid wreaths in memory of loved ones, and it was a very moving service indeed. It was a shame that the afternoon was a bit spoilt by that very sudden and severe storm, but at least the formalities of that event were able to be over with. Again it was something I think that would have been appreciated by all of those service men and women who were in attendance at that event.

I want to congratulate also, in respect of that, the number of Brisbane people that turned out. These operations and theatres of war have often been unpopularly received in terms of the return of servicemen. Particularly we remember some of the treatment that Vietnam Veterans received on return. So it was very pleasing to see that the Australian public have matured over the years in that respect. As we know, our servicemen are simply acting on behalf of the Government of Australia, and they do so in that regard. So I thank all of those Brisbane people that turned up and thanked our service personnel.

Madam Chairman, we are at that time of year again where we are going to be undertaking Homeless Connect. I want to commend to all Councillors and, indeed, the people of Brisbane the opportunity to contribute to make this Homeless Connect a success again this year. The calling for essential food and toiletries for the event that will be held in May is something that we do today. People can donate to either ward offices or Council libraries, and I thank all Councillors and Council staff in advance for their cooperation and assistance with this important event.


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Since Homeless Connect commenced in 2006, we have served some 13,000 people, and that has been everything from meals, haircuts, medical and dental assistance, vaccinations in some cases. It is an opportunity also to engage with the various agencies and making sure that we try to assist many of our fellow Brisbane residents who are down on their luck to get them back on the road to be housed or at least have assistance in other areas which makes their lives more fulfilling and, indeed, more complete in relation to the services that we can provide. So, Madam Chairman, I thank everyone for that.

The two items on the agenda today—firstly, item A, this is a decision that has come about because of an action taken by the Brisbane Gateway Resort owners. The Brisbane Gateway Resort owners advised Council that they would no longer be passing on the pensioner remission that Council provides to the owners for their tenants. Under the State legislation as it stands, Council cannot make them do it. So now that we are aware that the owners have decided not to pass on those remissions, we believe that the pensioners themselves that are at this particular resort ought not be out of pocket.

So, this provision today provides the opportunity for us to forward the quarterly ex-gratia payment directly to the 33 pensioner tenants that are at this location. This will commence from 1 April, and that is a date of effect which is commensurate with the owners' intention to stop passing on the subsidy. So, in most cases—in fact, in all other cases that we're aware of across the city—the owners of these facilities simply pass on through rental agreements or whatever the subsidy that we pay. So it is our way of saying to those 33 pensioners that we will continue to make that amount available.

It's an amount of $3048.65 for the April-June quarter, so that is a quarterly amount, and we will pay that each and every quarter. It is of no cost to Council because we just simply stop making that payment available to the owner. The cost to Council, I guess, is in the fact that we are sending out 33 letters individually to the tenants by way of that subsidy rather than the single one letter to the owner. But that is a small price to pay for ensuring that the tenants, the pensioner tenants, receive what is rightfully theirs under the arrangements that we have within this Council. As a Council, we have a very generous scheme. It is certainly one of the most generous schemes in Australia, but one that we are very proud to support.

Item B is the December quarterly financial report. Councillor SIMMONDS will give a more detailed account of this in response a little later, but I want to outline a number of factors if I may in terms of the report. Firstly, this report goes through to December, so it is the second quarterly report that goes to the end of December 2014. This report comes at a time, of course, when in November we had that storm event that cost nearly $25 million of resources of this organisation.

We as a Council continue to do I think a lot more than what other local authorities do in terms of our storm response. We do a lot of work around kerbside collections. We have been doing this for a few years now. I know it becomes an absolute expectation with people, and that's fine. The reality is that this Council does a lot more than other local authorities, not only around the state but indeed around the nation. That's a good thing. We want to help people where we possibly can.

The ratios within this quarterly report are provided and outlined on page 4. These are really the indicators of economic health. We have a number of target settings in relation to our budget. These target settings help to guide the financial strength of the organisation in terms of credit rating. So, in the area of interest coverage, we aim to have a figure of less than 10 per cent, and that figure currently is at 6.14 per cent as per the end of this second quarterly report.

The debt servicing as a proportion of total income, we like to see is less than 33 per cent; it is currently sitting at—

Chairman: LORD MAYOR, before you continue, your time has expired.


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516/2014-15At that point, the LORD MAYOR was granted an extension of time on the motion of DEPUTY MAYOR Councillor Adrian SCHRINNER, seconded by Councillor Ryan MURPHY.


LORD MAYOR: I thank you, Councillor. The debt servicing as a proportion of total income, as I said, we try to get that to be less than 33 per cent; it is currently 13.18 per cent. The net debt, as a proportion of total income, we seek to be at under 150 per cent; it is currently at 111 per cent. The working capital, which includes the repay and redraw amounts, we seek to be more than 1, and it currently sits at 1.41. The total assets as a proportion of total liabilities, we seek to be more than 3, and it currently sits at 7.24. Finally, the average debt maturity, we aim to have that as less than 15 years, and it is currently at 13.96 years.

So since December 2013, the Council's total equity—in other words, the wealth of the Council—has increased from $18.3 billion to $19.1 billion. This is mainly due to the increase in revaluations for land and infrastructure assets. Of course, as the Council gets more assets coming on line, we see an increase in terms of that total asset wealth. We continue to have projects coming on line.

We will see, of course, Legacy Way come on line over the coming months. We have seen open level crossings at Geebung and Bald Hills come on line over recent months, and so it goes. So, Madam Chairman, I commend the second budget review to the Council and look forward to the contribution of Councillors.

Chairman: Further debate?


Seriatim - Clause BCouncillor Milton DICK requested that Clause B, ANNUAL OPERATIONAL PLAN PROGRESS AND QUARTERLY FINANCIAL REPORT FOR THE PERIOD ENDED DECEMBER 2014, be taken seriatim for voting purposes.

Councillor DICK: Thanks, Madam Chair, and I rise to speak on both items this afternoon.

Chairman: Okay.

Councillor DICK: Thank you. Just on item A, Labor Councillors won't be opposing the ex-gratia payment to eligible pensioner residents of the Brisbane Gateway Resort. I understand that those residents have been quite concerned surrounding the decision to remove this remission. I know that there are approximately 35 residents, if this was to proceed, would not receive the pensioner discount for their rates or the Queensland Urban Utilities’ charges on their bill.

Just listening to the LORD MAYOR, this is probably an area where we may need to do some work on so that similar circumstances and similar concerns—obviously those residents are going about their business, and obviously were greatly concerned when they received the correspondence earlier this year from the place where they live for the withdrawal from the participation in the voluntary scheme. This might be a legislative requirement, but I am certainly happy to offer support to the LORD MAYOR to ensure that we don't see a similar situation for particularly older residents or those vulnerable and in need. We will be supporting that item on the agenda today.

As for item B, and the LORD MAYOR touched on, I guess, some of the top line figures in the report. It appears that he wants a pat on the back as a result of this annual operational plan progress and quarterly financial report for the period ended December 2014. Well, I think when we analyse and go through program by program, it's not a pat on the back; it's more a knife in the back to the residents of our city who are once again being short-changed by this LORD MAYOR and LNP Council.


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It is the same pattern that we see time and time again, year after year—big bells and whistles at budget time, big announcement, big media statements, and then over the course of the next 12 months, slowly and slowly the funding is withdrawn; slowly and slowly the projects are scaled back, and then the money is then rolled over. I know Councillor SIMMONDS will do his normal stumps speech and say, this is a snapshot in time.


Councillor DICK: Yes. You know what—there's a bit of a coincidence here. Every snapshot is the same, over and over again. So I really do need to go through in some detail. The LORD MAYOR chose, I guess, to focus on a couple of the top line figures, but you need to start from page 23, the Review of the Clean and Green WaterSmart City program, and the evidence is damning. The evidence is damning in terms of how this Council is simply winding back the expenditure and projects service delivery that they are offering the ratepayers of our city.

We know, by reading through this item, that we see millions and millions of dollars not being spent when we should be at this so-called snapshot in time. The one thing I do say, whether it be in program after program, the revenue is increasing—the revenue is increasing, but the services are decreasing, time and time again.

We know that there's a favourable variance on page 26 of $4.515 million Developer Contributions in the Parks Infrastructure Charges program. So you would think that this is a huge bonus to where we should be. From what we originally, under Councillor SIMMONDS, where he was originally budgeting for, so you would think, well, that's great; there'll be more money spent in some of the key parks and key upgrades. But it's not, Madam Chair, because the expenditure—and I quote from the report on page 26, 'Expenditure in core activities of the parks maintenance and enhancement service. The park infrastructure facility and landscape upgrades and the upgrade neighbourhood parks and the memorials'.

Memorials—we just had a lecture today about how the LORD MAYOR was out at one memorial wanting a pat on the back, but his own paperwork today shows that we aren’t spending the money where we should be. So, getting more money in, not spending it. That is an absolute insult to the mums and dads and the families spending more and more and more rates, that they are pocketing, but not actually delivering on these key items.

It is the same for $2.607 million expenditure on the upgrade neighbourhood parks, the parks assets maintenance and rehabilitation, and the park infrastructure facility and landscape upgrades projects. My question to the LORD MAYOR, through you, Madam Chair, is; why are you taking more money in and why are you spending less? What we are seeing is a pattern here. The Council pocketing this money and actually not delivering it out to the people who mostly need it.

You only need to continue to go on, and I'm always, always horrified when this Council likes to think it is doing a good job on drainage. It is Orwellian in its kind of approach, living in an alternative universe that we see expenditure up by $2.138 million where we're not spending it at all. We are actually doing that, and this is on page 27 under Major Drainage.

This LNP Council has a shocking record in delivering basic drainage. It has a shocking record in actually listening to the residents, but we know that expenditure for the drainage contributed assets projects is $6.664 million not spent. That is either we're not planning on spending—that is roughly about $9 million, a significant amount of money that would help the ratepayers of Brisbane.

There are two options here, Madam Chair; we're either planning the big cut or we are not on time delivering projects on where we should be. So cutting the service or incompetence—they're the two options, and that is right throughout this report today.


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Also on flood management, Maintain and Rehabilitate Open Drainage, we're about $1.36 expenditure in project activities. I am really concerned that, when you total up just on the drainage issue, we're about $10 million behind or the axe is coming down on these sorts of projects.

We move on, Madam Chair, and I certainly hope that the LORD MAYOR is taking some notes here, because he needs to explain exactly why he is taking more money in but actually not delivering on these services. There's a big question mark on page 31 which is Review of Moving Brisbane. We know that we are going to have a little debate today with those opposite thinking that congestion is getting better in our city. Hello! Anyway, we'll come to that—we'll come to that, Madam Chair, where those in the parallel universe sitting there want to believe that.

But on page 31, we have a variance of $4.807 million due to the expenditure in the Legacy Way project. That always spells alarm in my head with Legacy Way, because we saw the flip-flopping around a couple of weeks ago where the timeline now has been pushed out. There was sort of some movement that it was going to open March, April, and now it's been pushed out again. Why are we spending more money on that one? The LORD MAYOR can answer that.

But also on page 31, under Expenses, Maintain and Improve the Network Service has a variance of $7 million due to expenditure to maintain and improve the network core activity—wait for it—such as footpath reconstruction, safety fences and guardrails, and upgrade the road surface inventory system. So we know that this Council has a very, very and growing poor track record when it comes to actually delivering on these projects. Now it appears we are announcing one thing to the community and then, the last Council session, we are sneaking in this snapshot—I love that word snapshot—which clearly shows we are not spending the money on those services that we gave the commitment to the ratepayers that we would.

Also on Integrate the Various Modes, when it comes to public transport, there is a $1 million saving that we are looking at expending for Delivering an Accessible Public Transport Network in Brisbane Suburbs project. I would like an explanation about why we aren’t spending the money on that commitment that we had given. As I mentioned before, $4.87 million that we are spending more than we should be on the TransApex Legacy Way projects, and $10.236 million on page 34 regarding those basic infrastructure projects.

Chairman: Councillor DICK, before you continue, your time has expired.

517/2014-15At that point, the Councillor Milton DICK was granted an extension of time on the motion of Councillor Helen ABRAHAMS, seconded by Councillor Victoria NEWTON.

Councillor DICK: Thank you, Madam Chair, and I thank the LORD MAYOR and the Chamber. These are serious issues that I am raising today. When you are talking about $10.236 million, either in cuts or project delays, on the most of basic of services, whether it be footpaths, whether it be road construction or minor traffic density district projects, and also things like road resurfacing. So the LORD MAYOR needs to come clean.

It's little wonder why he didn't want to talk about this in his opening remarks, but Future Brisbane is where the rubber really hits the road. I know that Councillor ABRAHAMS may be touching on this today if we get time, but Future Brisbane—we're up by around $17.4 million—$17.4 million on where we thought we would be, but we are spending $2.17 million less in expenses. So the question then to be asked is; we're not using that money on any of the projects that we said we would. We are taking more money upwards, but not bringing it back down.

This goes completely opposite to the commitments that have been rolled out by the LORD MAYOR during the budget and month after month, in the glossy


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publication that cost ratepayers $1 million, Look What We're Doing. Well, here it is in black and white. We aren't doing, but we're taking more out of the pie. I say that is not on, Madam Chair.

You only need to look at service items like Review of Your Brisbane program. We know Councillor ADAMS struggles with the most basic of projects—we know that—and this is further evidence of her struggling in that portfolio. But in expenses, there's around $5.344 million less than where we said we should be spending, and capital, $4.701million, including almost $2 million on social inclusion. Now, what is going on in that portfolio?

The other kick-up is $3 million, or $2.986 million on page 40 for community sport and recreation facilities. The list, when you go through, is damning. Over and over again, we are seeing issues surrounding some of the more signature projects, particularly in your ward, Councillor CUMMING, where we have seen further blowouts regarding the old Wynnum State School site. Obviously we are still struggling on a number of key issues in this portfolio. But for goodness sake, Madam Chair, for goodness sake, to be in a situation where we aren’t delivering on some of those key deliverables and those key announcements, it's a damning indictment on just how incompetent and out of touch this Administration is becoming.

For those reasons, Madam Chair, the report is, I guess, a blight on what this Council is doing. The missed opportunities, the cutbacks that we all know about, that the ratepayers of our city are seeing time and time again, day after day; now we have the evidence and proof that, when it comes to delivering and it comes to honouring those commitments, you simply cannot trust the LNP Council.


Chairman: DEPUTY MAYOR.

DEPUTY MAYOR: Thank you, Madam Chairman; I rise to speak on item A, the ex-gratia payments. Just briefly, I am really pleased to hear that we will have bipartisan support on this one. It is an important issue for some pensioners in my local area. These are people who can least afford any kind of financial shocks or impacts that may arise if this submission is not approved.

We have a situation where there's approximately 30 to 35 residents living in essentially what is a relocatable home resort. So this is not a caravan park, this is a relocatable home situation. Previously the owner was receiving a pensioner discount for both rates and also water from Council, and that discount was passed on to the eligible pensioner residents on site.

Unfortunately the owner has decided—and I don't know why, and it is very disappointing—not to pass on that discount directly to the residents. So Council has taken action in this case to go around the property owner and directly to the residents to make sure that they get the discount that they're eligible for. So this is a good outcome; it's a fair outcome, and it will help some people who, as I mentioned, could least afford any changes in their financial circumstances.

I would say that Council does have an extremely generous pensioner rebate system, both for rates and for water, and we are the only local authority in South-East Queensland that actually helps pensioners pay their water bills. All of the other councils that we are of do not do that. So when it comes to water bills, pensioners in other council areas are on their own, but we have a very generous scheme in place that assists them in paying those water bills.

In terms of the rate remissions that pensioners are entitled to, if you are on a full pension, you can get a 40 per cent remission on rates of up to $225 a quarter; if you are on a partial pension, you can get a 20 per cent remission on rates of up to $105 per quarter. So it is a good scheme, and what we are doing today is making sure that everyone who is eligible can get access to it, including in a situation that is unfortunate such as this where a property owner has chosen not to pass that remission directly on to the residents.

So, once again, thank you to all Councillors for supporting this submission. It will be a good outcome and a fair outcome for some residents in my ward.


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Councillor JOHNSTON: Yes, Madam Chairman, I rise to speak on item B, the quarterly financial report and annual operation plan for Brisbane City Council. It is like Groundhog Day in this place every time the LNP Administration brings their quarterly financial credit card statement to this Chamber. It is extremely sad that we see the same problems happening over and over again.

I stand in this place week after week and talk about the importance of basic services to the community that I represent, and what this quarterly report shows us is the massive failure of the LORD MAYOR and his team in delivering those services to our community. I want to start with a few comments with respect to the general Council position and then raise a few items of specific concern.

I don't claim to be a maths genius, but I did win a subject prize for economics at school, so I know a little bit about reading a balance sheet. What I can say is I am extremely concerned about the graphs and charts on page 5 and page 6 of the quarterly financial report. I mention those pages so members of the public and the media can follow along. This is what it says in general terms: revenue is up. Operating expenses are up. Capital works are down. Liabilities are up. Rates are down. Other revenue is up. Grants—from other governments, presumably—is up.

On any general measure of running a sustainable financial position, those markers are the wrong way. Revenue is up, yet the main way in which this Council receives its revenue is down. As a result, it is clinging to and desperately trying to find other means of raising revenue, and we can see in this report before us today the addiction that this LNP Administration has to development in this city.

It is clear, Madam Chairman, that they cannot wean themselves off the funnel of cash that development is providing into this Council's revenue base. I refer to the additional $21 million in revenue, on page 9 of the quarterly financial report, that is coming from development applications and infrastructure charges. We sit here and we wonder—well, actually, I don't—but the community wonders why they see these huge developments happening in our suburbs, why they see them being approved at the drop of a hat by this Administration. Well, the value of these developments is clear in this budget. This Administration does not see a development that it doesn’t like, and it is happy to take the cash from those developers, whether it is in this budget or in their own Party fundraising. It is not on, and it is very clear that they are relying increasingly on the revenue that comes from development. I don't support that.

The developments being approved under this new City Plan are inappropriate; they are outside of community expectations, and it is shameful—

Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON. Councillor JOHNSTON, if you are referring to page 9, I think you are getting well off the track.

Councillor JOHNSTON: I am illustrating my point, but thank you; I don't want to waste too much time on just that one point. But what I will say is it is not right that this Administration is relying so heavily on revenue from development applications. It is not a part of our Council budget where there should be such a heavy reliance, and that is really problematic.

I am extremely concerned that our expenses are going up as well, yet capital works are going down. There is something inversely disproportionate about that, and it is absolutely the wrong way around. We should be spending more money investing in the needs of our city. We should be spending more money on drainage. We should be spending more money on roads. We should be spending more money on parks. By all measures in this quarterly budget review, those areas of expenditure are going down, and it is the same story quarter after quarter. It is shocking.

Then the drainage budgets particularly roll over to the next year, and they roll over again, and they roll over again. I don't think there is any genuine intention


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to spend the money that they announce in the budget. This is just like a video game to the LORD MAYOR. We'll pop it out of that screen; we'll pop it onto this screen, and we'll roll it over to the next quarter. It's not good enough.

If revenues are going up, and capital works are going down, there is something wrong. Investment in the basics of this city, whether it's services or whether it's infrastructure, are critical. The fact that this LORD MAYOR has got this the wrong way indicates that he is out of touch with the needs of our community.

I am particularly concerned about a few areas, and they are the same areas that I speak about week after week. I am extremely concerned by the fact that I worked it out to be about a parks underspend of $6.5 million. This is at a time when our LORD MAYOR has just stood up in his opening address and said, oh, we had the big storm and we had to do more. Well, no, LORD MAYOR, your figures show that you didn't. Your figures show that you did less. You did less. That is wrong.

If there is—and I see Councillor BOURKE shaking his head. Fair enough; you did less with the expenditure in this last quarter, and that is what the records are saying. If you are telling me these records are wrong, please stand up and say so, but it shows an under-expenditure of $6.5 million in parks expenditure for the last quarter.

Similarly, we see an under-expenditure in drainage of $8.2 million. That is both major drainage, that is the developer contributions, that is in closed drainage and open drainage. We are building less drains; we are maintaining less drainage, and yet the LORD MAYOR and the Parks Chairman have stood up here today and said what a great job we're doing. No we are not.

We know that 80 per cent of this drainage budget goes to the north side of the City, and 20 per cent to the south side, and that is if you can actually get this Administration to spend the money they say they will spend, because it is clear they are not doing it.

Residents out my way experience flooding now every time there is heavy rain, and it is not good enough. We can see the proof in these reports before us today of the financial ineptitude of this Administration. It is not good enough.

I am concerned as well that there is massive under-expenditure in the transport department. We can see that local road projects spending has gone down. There is about an $11 million underspend this quarter, and TransApex has gone up—a $4.8 million over-expenditure on the toll road project.

I don't quite take the Labor Party's position on this, but what I see as a problem is the fact that the LORD MAYOR wants to put all his eggs in one basket and fund one big project and is neglecting the small projects in our wards that need doing. They are desperately in need of doing. They are just as important to have road safety projects in local areas as the big tunnel projects.

What I would like the LORD MAYOR to do is stand up and say that the Legacy Way project is still under budget. I would like him to explain what these variations are for, and I would certainly like to know when that project is actually going to open, because it is now behind schedule. I would like the LORD MAYOR to explain what the extra $4.8 million is for, because he is happy to show journalists and investors through the tunnel, but he is not happy to account for the opening date and for the financial expenditure of the ratepayers of this city.

Madam Chairman, I know that I am repetitive in this place, because the same things keep happening. I will never stop speaking up about the lack of drainage that is happening in our city. I will never stop speaking about the need to improve our roads and our local parks infrastructure.

I am appalled that the best excuse that this Administration comes up with is this is some sort of snapshot in time; they're not real figures; we might be a bit behind, maybe, or we might not have quite got that right—there's a bit of a storm got in the way. If this was the first time, we may have some credibility. They may have some credibility. Let me be clear, Madam Chairman: they don't.


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If they think that they did a good job on storm recovery, come out my way where the parks are unmown, where the trees are down, and where you can see the neglect of this Administration from that event, as much today as four months ago. So let me be clear; if this Council cannot deal with a storm—

Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON, your time has expired.

Councillor JOHNSTON: —it's not doing a good job.


ADJOURNMENT:518/2014-15

At that time, 3.57pm, it was resolved on the motion of Councillor Ryan MURPHY, seconded by Councillor Kim MARX, that the meeting adjourn for a period of 15 minutes, to commence only when all councillors had vacated the Chamber and the doors locked.

Council stood adjourned at 4.02pm.

UPON RESUMPTION:

Chairman: Further debate on the E&C report.

Chairman: Councillor SIMMONDS.

Councillor SIMMONDS: Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. I rise to speak on Items A and B. Item A has bipartisan support within the Chamber. I won't speak too long about that other than to thank all the Councillors for their support. It's an issue that we haven't seen come up before but when it's occurred we have acted decisively to make sure that those pensioners living in this particular property are not out of pocket and that is the most important thing.

So if something changes going forward I'll certainly come back to the Chamber. But I appreciate the Chamber's support and approval of this resolution which will allow us on an ongoing basis to provide that remission directly to those eligible pensioner residents.

In terms of the Item B, the December quarterly report, well first of all I think a little bit of context is in order and I'd hate to disappoint anyone. So I will say that the quarterly report is indeed a snapshot in time. It is not a budget review and that's a very important difference. It is not a budget review. It is a snapshot in time of how we are tracking according to the budget phasing. It does not remove money. It does not add money for that matter. It simply tells us where we're up to in terms of the predicted timings.

On top of that we had, “a bit of a storm in November that we've had to deal with”. The next thing we'll be getting criticism for not properly dealing with that slightly high tide in 2011 that we had, Madam Chairman, if that was just a bit of storm. There were more than 60 truckloads of stuff taken out of Guyatt Park alone, 60 truckloads of dangerous debris that had to be removed from that one location alone. It took many, many Council resources in order to do that and that was at one location so there is an impact.

In fact if they were to read all the way through the document which they obviously haven't, if they get to program 8, they'll see that there was an extra $3.5 million in accelerated costs that had to be spent just to December as part of that particular operation. That's not including all the normal officers who were pulled off other jobs and went to do that storm recovery work, so an additional $3.5 million that was spent very quickly following-up after that storm event.

It's important to have a look at the overall position as the LORD MAYOR has pointed out. He read through some of those metrics and they are important metrics. Those on the other side of the Chamber like to rubbish it when the


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LORD MAYOR talks about how we are meeting those metrics, but it wasn't always so. That's why the LORD MAYOR likes to remind this Chamber because it wasn't always so that this Council was meeting those metrics at the start of the quarterly report. I only have to, Madam Chairman, refer to Councillor FLESSER's tenure as finance chairman in 2007, when those metrics weren't being met under a Labor Councillor still there on that side of the Chamber, still dictating their financial policies—

Councillor DICK: Point of Order, Madam Chair.

Chairman: Point of order against you Councillor SIMMONDS.

Councillor DICK: Just so that I can advise my colleagues, will you allow further advice on previous history of reports given that Councillor SIMMONDS is talking about 2007, not this actual report?

Chairman: Well, Councillor DICK I think I gave Councillor JOHNSTON a lot of freedom in her debate which was not specific in very many details at all. So I think Councillor SIMMONDS as the Finance Chair, what he is saying is quite relevant. Thank you.

Councillor SIMMONDS: Thank you, Madam Chairman. It's not just the ratios where this Council is in a strong financial position. Since this report shows that since December 2013, Council's total equity increased from $18.3 billion to $19.1 billion mainly due to the increase, Madam Chairman, in our land and in infrastructure assets. There has been early—in addition to that, Madam Chairman, in terms of the projects—there has been earlier than anticipated progress in certain projects. So earlier than anticipated spending in the Bushland Acquisition program, the Conservation Reserves Management Plan, Regional Water Quality Management Strategy, reconstruct gullies and network modernisation just to name a few.

So those opposite like to cherry pick individual projects and there are all reasons for those timing variances but we're happy to cherry pick and play that game as well if that's what they like, because there's plenty of areas where as I said, this is a snapshot in time in terms of there are plenty of areas which have accelerated their spending. There have also been savings across a number of projects where they are completing those projects but they are doing it at a lower cost to ratepayers. So this is where again—I'll say it again lest I be accused of anything else—the projects are being delivered for the ratepayers of Brisbane but they're being delivered in a more financially sustainable way.

Those include but are not limited to 100 per cent green power, the Green Heart Wisdom Project, the Bulimba Ferry Terminal, the Bus Build project, the Plan and Design Network, Robinson Road and Telegraph Road Railway Crossings, the Manage the Network program, the infrastructure charges reduction for eligible community organisations, the library projects, including the Mount Gravatt car-park and the installation of self-checkout machines in Mt Ommaney, and, Madam Chairman, the Riverstage venue which is being managed at a lower cost.

So you can see there are plenty of examples in this quarterly report where in fact Council officers through the administration of the Council Chairman are achieving what they want to, what they need to achieve for Brisbane ratepayers and they are doing it in a more financially sustainable way. So what is the total overall picture that this shows us, this December quarterly report shows us? Well it shows that Council's total capital works completion as of December is 43.48 per cent. So you'd expect at the very best that it would be 50 per cent halfway through the year, despite that “bit of a storm”, we have still delivered 43.48 per cent.

Now you would not get that picture listening to the hyperbole of Councillor DICK and those opposite would you, because again and again their rhetoric exceeds their grasp of the facts. In this case the facts are that 43 per cent of the capital that we intended to spend—50 per cent of that 43 per cent—has been spent despite the challenges we faced. So you think from those opposite who are asking for better, that while their record must be better, they must have achieved so much more to hold us to a higher standard. What did they do?


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Well under Councillor FLESSER again it was 37 per cent. In one year alone they had to carryover 16 per cent of their capital budget, not just as a timing issue; carry it over 16 per cent. So you can see that compared to previous Labor finance chairmen and compared to previous Labor Administrations that again despite the challenges of this Administration basis, we are far exceeding their record. We continue to have a strong focus on delivery for Brisbane ratepayers. But I've heard it all when I get a lecture from those on the other side of the Chamber that I'm not reliant enough on rates revenue and I should be more reliant on it.

Why aren't I charging more rates? What a ridiculous suggestion. This is how warped and twisted their rhetoric has become that their proposal is to say, “stuff a growing city, stuff the construction jobs, stuff a vibrant city and let's just rely on rates revenue. Let's just continually keep dipping into pockets of ratepayers—

Chairman: Order.

Councillor SIMMONDS: —because that's where the revenue should be coming from, for a Council”. If that's their policy then let them go and sell that to the ratepayers of Brisbane at the next election. I bet they don't. I bet they just use it in this Chamber and hide behind some different rhetoric when they're out there in front of voters, Madam Chairman. The fact of the matter is that if we get more applications—well first of all, we get the application fees regardless of whether the developments are approved or not approved. Second of all, then if more applications are received, it's then costing us more to assess and properly assess those applications as it currently is.

More importantly is this furphy that the infrastructure charges are the most important things because the reality of the matter is that you will never be able to fund the infrastructure that this growing city needs out of infrastructure charges. The capital infrastructure spend of this Council has for a number of years been close to or over $1 billion. $1 billion every year that we spend on infrastructure and catering for growth in this city.

The idea that we are desperately out there, Madam Chairman, trying to squeeze more people in because it will get us a few extra million in infrastructure charges is laughable, an absolute nonsense, absolute nonsense because our spend on infrastructure far exceeds by 100 per cent, 1000 per cent, $1 billion every year, than the revenue we get in, on infrastructure charges. So it's a total and utter furphy.

In terms of Legacy Way, well here's a good example of why this document is a timely document. Because Councillor DICK was happy to beat us up when he said we hadn't spent enough money on particular projects, but here is Legacy Way where we are saying in this document that they've accelerated spending, that they've accelerated the project, that we've spent an extra $4.8 million sooner than we anticipated and we get beaten up for that too. I'm not entirely sure what Councillor DICK wants.

This isn't new money, it's all within the budget, we don't add an extra $4.8 million in. The budget for Legacy Way is still the budget as outlined; we simply have spent it a little bit quicker. Thank you, Madam Chairman.

Chairman: Thank you, Councillor SIMMONDS.


Chairman: Councillor FLESSER.

Councillor FLESSER: Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I'd like to speak to Item B. Madam Chair, it's pretty clear that I live in a parallel universe compared to Councillor SIMMONDS. Because what this report shows, it's a quarterly financial report to Council, Madam Chair, but we need to think about how this report and how Council's finances are actually effecting people out there on the ground. Now according to Councillor SIMMONDS everything is fine, everything is much better now than it ever was under Labor, that's the mantra he pushes all the time.


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But, Madam Chair, you talk to people out there about grass cutting, talk to them about traffic congestion, Madam Chair. That's the issues that the people are concerned about. When you look at this quarterly financial report, Madam Chair, you can see where it's all going wrong. That's because this Council has spent $2.2 billion on toll tunnels, Madam Chair. I think that Brisbane ratepayers are questioning whether the amount of debt we've gone into has been wisely spent, whether more of that should have been spent on roads and public transport and active transport, Madam Chair?

These speakers in here just show exactly what the problem is. I want to take up a matter that the LORD MAYOR raised earlier today, Madam Chair, when he spoke about the Council's performance ratios. Madam Chair, I have a serious problem with these ratios because they're not exactly stretch targets, Madam Chair. I certainly do hope that the Council bureaucrats, their KPIs for their fat cat bonuses are not based on the figures in this report, Madam Chair, because they're not exactly stretch targets. When you look at the figures, it's not all good news.

I want to focus particularly on the net debt to total income ratio on page 4, Madam Chair. The LORD MAYOR said that's really good. Look, the target is 150 per cent and we're sitting on 111 per cent. Madam Chair, 111 per cent? Madam Chair, that's not what Peter Costello says that local governments or governments should have as far as that ratio is concerned. He says it should be 60 per cent. So we're almost twice what Peter Costello believes is the correct ratio.

We all remember when he came in after Campbell Newman was elected to State P0arliament and came in and castigated the State Government for having too much debt, Madam Chair, because he said it should be no more than 60 per cent. Here we are looking at 111 per cent. Madam Chair, it's not just Peter Costello. Madam Chair, it is your own organisation. I refer Councillors to the Local Government Association of Queensland quick reference guide for local government performance indicators.

Councillor OWEN-TAYLOR: Point of order, Madam Chairman.

Chairman: Yes, point of order against you, Councillor FLESSER. Yes, Councillor OWEN-TAYLOR?

Councillor OWEN-TAYLOR: Madam Chairman, this item is on the quarterly financial plan and not the Local Government guide.

Chairman: Yes, thanks Councillor OWEN-TAYLOR. Councillor FLESSER to the item thanks.

Councillor FLESSER: Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm referring to page 4 of the document, the item regarding net debt and total income, Madam Chair, and it says the target should be 150 per cent. Madam Chair, the Local Government Association what do they say it should be? They say it should—financial liability and total liability when it's a current—

Councillor OWEN-TAYLOR: Point of order, Madam Chairman, the Local Government Association does not dictate—

Chairman: Thank you Councillor OWEN-TAYLOR. I hadn't called you.

Councillor FLESSER: Madam Chair.

Chairman: I will allow Councillor FLESSER to give his interpretation of the figures.

Councillor FLESSER: Thank you, Madam Chair. Now, Madam Chair, they also say it should be not greater than 60 per cent but what we're looking at here in this Council, Madam Chair, is 111 per cent. But the LORD MAYOR says no, that's alright, that's not really affecting anything well, Madam Chair, it is affecting things. It's affecting the services that we're providing to Brisbane's ratepayers. Madam Chair, why is it so high? Why is it 111 per cent instead of less than 60 per cent? Well, Madam Chair, we know what it is. It's because of debt, Madam Chair. Currently this Council owes $894 million in general purpose borrowings.


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Madam Chair, if you look at again page 4 of the report that we're looking at today, the bottom of the page it says other non-current financial liabilities have increased by $260.5 million due to an increase in general borrowings in the last 18 months. So in the last 18 months this Council has voted not to—this is not even to tell us—this is general purpose borrowings. Mind you, what we're talking about here is borrowing to keep the lights on, Madam Chair.

So these obviously, some projects out in the wards that Councillor SIMMONDS has been unable to identify, those general purpose borrowings increased by $260.5 million in 18 months. But, Madam Chair, as they say on TV, but wait there's more. Let's look at what we owe on the Go Between Bridge, Madam Chair. We owe $245 million on that. On the Clem7 Tunnel we owe $423 million on that. Madam Chair, remember that this Councillor signed off the tolling rights to both those projects for somewhere between $450 million and $950 million.

Madam Chair, that's just the—sorry not the—that's not including the Clem7 Tunnel; the Legacy Way Tunnel where we owe $905 million. So between the Go Between Bridge $245 million and the Legacy Way Tunnel $905 million, we've sold the tolling rights for next to nothing. Madam Chair, we know why that is and that's because the LORD MAYOR is starting to worry about what the real traffic projections are going to be.

So, Madam Chair, we owe huge amounts of money in tunnels, Madam Chair. Our current net borrowings are running at $2.358 billion. Of course, Madam Chair, when you've got borrowings like that, you have to pay them back. You've got to pay them back, Madam Chair, and you've got to pay interest as well. From the report, Madam Chair, Council is currently paying around $30 million a quarter on finance costs.

So, Madam Chair, this Council is going backwards as far as its financial capability is concerned. We're in too much debt in my view and that's having a big impact on our residents especially in the areas of those basic services like grass cutting and tree trimming, Madam Chair. You've only got to work out in the ward office to find out the problems we've got with trying to get Council to undertake proper tree trimming. Of course, traffic congestion is getting worse and, Madam Chair, the RACQ are not wrong. They are correct. Traffic congestion is getting worse, Madam Chair. This Council is not providing the answers to fix it.

Chairman: Further debate on the E&C report?


LORD MAYOR: Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. Madam Chairman, I think we had the quote of the day when Councillor FLESSER indicated that he lived in a parallel universe to Councillor SIMMONDS. In fact I think Councillor FLESSER lives in a parallel universe to most of us when it comes to economics, indeed he lives in a world of his own. A number of issues that he's raised today, Madam Chairman, are easily addressed and he starts with the ratio of 111 per cent in relation to loan borrowings against other numbers within the Council budget.


LORD MAYOR: That's it. Madam Chairman, against that what Councillor FLESSER of course did not indicate is that most of our net debt is in relation to a loan that we have with Queensland Urban Utilities (QUU) where we simply act as the banker. We're the middle man. We get a loan off Queensland Treasury Corporation (QTC), we then loan that money to QUU, Madam Chairman, that's how most of our net debt works.

Councillor FLESSER: Point of order, Madam Chairman.

Chairman: Point of order against you LORD MAYOR.

Chairman: Yes, Councillor FLESSER?

Councillor FLESSER: I'm just wondering if the LORD MAYOR will take a question.


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Chairman: LORD MAYOR, will you take a question from Councillor FLESSER?

LORD MAYOR: Well, as I recall it, Question Time happens every week where Councillor FLESSER can have the opportunity to ask a question if Councillor DICK will allow him.

Chairman: Thank you, LORD MAYOR.

LORD MAYOR: Thank you. Madam Chairman.

Chairman: I think the answer is no Councillor FLESSER.

LORD MAYOR: I think so but he will get another opportunity next session Madam Chairman in relation to that and quite clearly that's our position. That is more than half of our net debt is tied up in relation to those QUU borrowings, Madam Chairman, of which this Council gets a dividend by way of an interest return and then of course the Labor Party call that profit don't they, they call that profit on a loan.

So, Madam Chairman, I also just want to indicate that in regards to these borrowings and Councillor FLESSER was talking about the issue of borrowing on infrastructure, Madam Chairman, the fact of the matter was the Story Bridge was built in 1940; I finished paying that off in 1987 as Finance chairman so there you go. I mean that's the nature of long-term assets, Madam Chairman, they are intergenerational assets. Again, if you want to talk about ratios, once you remove that indebtedness that we have to QUU, that loan that we give to QUU, Madam Chairman, we well and truly come within the range of which Councillor FLESSER was referring.

Madam Chairman, there was some discussion around Legacy Way about the financial health of that project. I just want to assure all Councillors that Legacy Way is well and truly within budget. I'll give a full financial report when that project is complete, Madam Chairman, but I just assure everybody that it will be certainly within the realms of the budgets that were set in regards to that project from the outset.

Madam Chairman, you might recall on that particular project we had originally estimated $1.8 billion and that project when we went out to tender and those tenders came back it came in at $1.5 billion. So that's how that $1 billion from Brisbane City Council and half a billion from the Federal Government and I again acknowledge and thank the Federal Government for its contribution to that.

Madam Chairman, on the other issues, Councillor SIMMONDS has handled most of those issues. But again I mean it's a reality that to be at 43 per cent halfway through a year in terms of capital spending is a very pleasing result. Because the reality is that in any budget cycle you announce projects at the start of that budget which is in the middle of June, Madam Chairman, when the budget comes down. It's then not approved until the final day of the budget debate. It is only once that budget is approved that Council officers can then start to commence the actions around that budget.

There is of course design lead-up in relation to many projects, Madam Chairman, which is why in every budget, whether you're talking Labor Administrations or LNP Administrations, Madam Chairman, you always see the largest capital spend in the second half of that financial year. That's the way our budgets have always worked. So to be at 43 per cent at the halfway mark, Madam Chairman, is a very credible result. I thank Councillor SIMMONDS for his stewardship on a day-to-day basis of the budget process.

Clause A put

Upon being submitted to the meeting the motion for the adoption of Clause A of the report of the Establishment and Coordination Committee was declared carried on the voices.


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Clause B put

Upon being submitted to the meeting the motion for the adoption of Clause B of the report of the Establishment and Coordination Committee was declared carried on the voices.

Thereupon, Councillors Peter CUMMING and Helen ABRAHAMS immediately rose and called for a division, which resulted in the motion being declared carried.

The voting was as follows:

AYES: 19 - The Right Honourable the LORD MAYOR, Councillor Graham QUIRK, DEPUTY MAYOR, Councillor Adrian SCHRINNER, and Councillors Krista ADAMS, Matthew BOURKE, Amanda COOPER, Margaret de WIT, Vicki HOWARD, Steven HUANG, Fiona KING, Geraldine KNAPP, Kim MARX, Peter MATIC, Ian McKENZIE, David McLACHLAN, Ryan MURPHY, Angela OWEN-TAYLOR, Julian SIMMONDS, Andrew WINES and Norm WYNDHAM.

NOES: 8 - The Leader of the OPPOSITION, Councillor Milton DICK, and Councillors Helen ABRAHAMS, Peter CUMMING, Kim FLESSER, Steve GRIFFITHS, Victoria NEWTON, Shayne SUTTON and Nicole JOHNSTON.

The report read as follows

ATTENDANCE:

The Right Honourable, the Lord Mayor (Councillor Graham Quirk) (Chairman); Deputy Mayor (Councillor Adrian Schrinner) (Deputy Chairman); and Councillors Krista Adams, Matthew Bourke, Amanda Cooper, Peter Matic, David McLachlan, and Julian Simmonds.

A EX GRATIA PAYMENTS TO ELIGIBLE PENSIONER RESIDENTS OF THE BRISBANE GATEWAY RESORT AT 200 SCHOOL ROAD, ROCHEDALE173/138/292/683

519/2014-151. The Divisional Manager, Organisational Services, provided the information below.

2. Council has specific powers to remit rates, in whole or part, to pensioners if:- they are owners of the property (section 112(1)(a) of the City of Brisbane Regulation 2012), or- they occupy land but do not own the land (section 115 of the City of Brisbane Regulation

2012).

3. Section 115(2)(b) of the City of Brisbane Regulation 2012 also provides that Council may only grant a rebate if the land owner agrees to pass the benefit of the rebate on to the pensioners.

4. Under section 3.1.3 of the Retirement Facilities, Caravan Parks or Mobile Home Villages of the Partial Remission of Rates and Charges for Pensioners Policy, Council offers a remission to pensioners who are tenants of caravan parks or retirement villages. These pensioners are not the property owners, but private tenants, and therefore Council has no direct relationship with them.

5. Council introduced this scheme to provide tangible economic assistance to pensioners who resided in caravan parks and retirement villages. The scheme operates at no additional cost to the owners of eligible facilities and provides a much needed benefit to the pensioner residents.

6. The Brisbane Gateway Resort, owned by Haraba Pty Ltd and located at 200 School Road, Rochedale, has recently withdrawn from this pensioner tenant scheme, which means that from 1 April 2015, no further pensioner remissions by Council will be provided to the owners for their distribution to the tenants. The Brisbane Gateway Resort owners have advised their tenants of their decision via letter.

7. Council has general powers under section 11 of the City of Brisbane Act 2010 to do anything that is


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necessary or convenient for the good rule and local government of Brisbane. This power includes the payment of ex gratia payments where the payments can be reasonably and sensibly considered to benefit the community.

8. Council has no other means of providing direct support via its rating powers and is therefore recommending the ex gratia payments to those residents adversely impacted by the owners’ decision.

9. As at 3 March 2015, there were 33 pensioner residents receiving this concession towards rates and Queensland Urban Utilities (QUU) charges on their bill. Based on the current bill, the estimated concession for the April to June 2015 quarter for all 33 pensioner residents is approximately $3,048.65. This figure is made up of $552.65 for rates and $2,496 for QUU. The ex gratia payments will be apportioned to the pensioner residents based on their eligibility, that is, if they are receiving a maximum pension or a part pension. Council’s Revenue Management will confirm the exact number of residents, along with eligibility status, prior to providing the payments.

10. As these pensioner residents are particularly vulnerable to any cost of living increases, it is proposed that Council provide this assistance.

11. The Divisional Manager provided the following recommendation and the Committee agreed.

12. RECOMMENDATION:

THAT COUNCIL RESOLVE AS PER THE DRAFT RESOLUTION AS SET OUT IN ATTACHMENT A, hereunder.

Attachment ADraft Resolution

DRAFT RESOLUTION TO MAKE EX GRATIA PAYMENTS UNDER THE CITY OF BRISBANE ACT 2010

As:

(i) Under the City of Brisbane Regulation 2012, Council may grant a rebate of rates or charges for land occupied only by pensioners only if the land owner agrees to pass the benefit of the rebate on to pensioners;

(ii) Pensioners at Brisbane Gateway Resort at 200 School Road, Rochedale, previously received the benefit of this rebate from Council;

(iii) The land owner has advised Council that the landowner does not agree to pass on the benefit of the rebate for the future, initially affecting the rating period 1 April 2015 to 30 June 2015;

(iv) The total benefit that would be received by all eligible pensioners currently occupying the Brisbane Gateway Resort for the rating period 1 April 2015 to 30 June 2015 is no greater than $4,500;

(v) Council wishes to make ex gratia payments to benefit pensioner occupiers at the Brisbane Gateway Resort who will be unable to benefit from the rebate,

Then Council:

(i) Resolves to make ex gratia payments in the amount of no greater than $4,500 per rating period, commencing with the rating period 1 April 2015 to 30 June 2015 for the purpose of benefitting pensioner occupiers at Brisbane Gateway Resort at 200 School Road, Rochedale, who will be unable to receive the benefit of Council’s rebate of rates or charges under the City of Brisbane Regulation 2012.

ADOPTED

B ANNUAL OPERATIONAL PLAN PROGRESS AND QUARTERLY FINANCIAL REPORT FOR THE PERIOD ENDED DECEMBER 2014134/695/317/459

520/2014-15[4464 (Ordinary) meeting – 24 March 2015]

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13. The Divisional Manager, Organisational Services, provided the information below.

14. The City of Brisbane Regulation 2012, sections 196(2) and (3), state that the Chief Executive Officer must present financial reports to Council at least quarterly. The reports are to state the progress that has been made in relation to Council’s budget.

15. The Annual Operational Plan Progress and Quarterly Financial Report December 2014 (see Attachment B, submitted on file) separately identifies and reports the financial results of Brisbane City Council, Brisbane City Council Core Services (i.e. Council excluding business units) and Brisbane City Council Business Units. The written commentaries provide an explanation of the figures.

16. Section 166(3), City of Brisbane Regulation 2012, states that the Chief Executive Officer must present a written assessment of Council’s progress towards implementing the annual operational plan to Council at least quarterly.

17. The previous financial report for the period ended 26 September 2014 was presented to Council on 2 December 2014. The current report relates to the period ended 26 December 2014.

18. The Divisional Manager provided the following recommendation and the Committee agreed.

19. RECOMMENDATION:

THAT COUNCIL RESOLVE AS PER THE DRAFT RESOLUTION AS SET OUT IN ATTACHMENT A, hereunder.

Attachment ADraft Resolution

DRAFT RESOLUTION TO ADOPT THE ANNUAL OPERATIONAL PLAN PROGRESS AND QUARTERLY FINANCIAL REPORT FOR THE PERIOD ENDING DECEMBER 2014

As:

(i) Section 196(2) and (3) of the City of Brisbane Regulation 2012 requires that the Chief Executive Officer present financial reports to Council at least quarterly;

(ii) Section 166(3) of the City of Brisbane Regulation 2012 states that the Chief Executive Officer must present a written assessment of Council’s progress towards implementing the annual operational plan to Council at least quarterly,

Then:

(i) Council directs that the Annual Operational Plan progress and Quarterly Financial Report for the period ending December 2014, as set out in Attachment B, submitted on file, be noted.

ADOPTED

INFRASTRUCTURE COMMITTEE

DEPUTY MAYOR, Councillor Adrian SCHRINNER, Chairman of the Infrastructure Committee, moved, seconded by Councillor Ian MCKENZIE, that the report of the meeting of that Committee held on 17 March 2015, be adopted.


DEPUTY MAYOR: Thank you, Madam Chairman. It's now been quite some time since Question Time. Councillor DICK and his Labor Councillors have still not ruled out the congestion charge for Brisbane. So I can only assume that their former policy position, which was in their own transport plan—

Councillor JOHNSTON: Point of order, Madam Deputy Chairman.


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DEPUTY MAYOR: —is still their policy.

At that time, 4.42pm, the Deputy Chairman, Councillor Angela OWEN-TAYLOR, assumed the Chair.

Deputy Chairman: Point of order against you DEPUTY MAYOR. Councillor JOHNSTON?

Councillor JOHNSTON: At the DEPUTY MAYOR's request I'm happy to say that I don't support a congestion tax for Brisbane.

Deputy Chairman: DEPUTY MAYOR.


DEPUTY MAYOR: Yes.

Deputy Chairman: Order.

DEPUTY MAYOR: When Councillor JOHNSTON helps Labor form a minority government then that view will be important but until then—

Deputy Chairman: Councillor DICK, please—

DEPUTY MAYOR: —the reality is Labor likes to portray themselves as the alternative Administration but they don't have any alternative plan or alternative policies.

Deputy Chairman: Just a moment please DEPUTY MAYOR. Councillor JOHNSTON and Councillor DICK you are calling out across the Chamber and disrupting this meeting. If you continue to do so, you will receive the appropriate warnings.


DEPUTY MAYOR: Thank you, Madam Deputy Chairman. As I said, Labor is very good at criticising, very good at trying to cut other people down, very good at making politically charged comments but when it comes to—

Deputy Chairman: Councillor CUMMING.

DEPUTY MAYOR: —providing an alternative plan and vision, they are found sorely lacking. Importantly they like to cover up their previous policies. This is not something that I've made up. This was in the transport plan for Brisbane that was put forward and approved by Labor Councillors the last time they were in Administration. These people, many of whom are still here today proposed a cordon toll for Brisbane. A cordon toll is just another name for a congestion charge.

They also proposed in the same document a car park tax on all inner city car parks. So it's very interesting when you hear them today, they're all against toll roads. They're all against paid parking. But when they were in Administration, they wanted to impose a toll on free roads and they wanted to impose a tax on all CBD car parks. So don't ever fall into the trap of believing what these people say. Just have a look at what they did when they were in Administration. They like to—it wasn't introduced because people tossed you out, that's why. It wasn't introduced for a very good reason.

Look, I'm certainly happy to have the debate on congestion charging. If Labor wants to come forward and express their opinion, we will very forcibly express our opinion. Other organisations like the RACQ I encourage them to express their opinions as well because in the end, it's one thing to criticise the Administration in terms of our efforts on traffic congestion. That's easy to do. Anyone can do that. But it's another thing altogether to provide an alternative view and an alternative vision. We know that people are using our toll road network and I mentioned before, 350,000 trips per day on Brisbane's toll roads—350,000 trips a day.

Even if you look at some of those more recent inner city projects; so take for example the Go Between Bridge, Clem7 and Airport Link; 88,000 vehicles a day using just those projects taking cars off inner city roads. Now 88,000 vehicles a day, what does that mean? Our most congested Council road, our busiest Council road is Coronation Drive. Coronation Drive carries 75,000 vehicles a day. So these toll roads which Labor derides are carrying more traffic per day than Coronation Drive. If you suddenly closed down the toll


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roads it's the equivalent of putting another Coronation Drive onto the road network.

So let's not have any suggestion that the projects that this Council and the Labor State Government initiated are not having a positive impact. They certainly are having a positive impact and the evidence is there for anyone to see. We have a committee presentation report on the Corridor Performance Report. I have to say this is the second of such reports that Council has released. It's based on the Bluetooth monitoring data that we've got right across the city. We're collecting at the moment around a million bits of Bluetooth data each day and that data is feeding into this report.

Today I'd like to call on the State Government to release their Bluetooth data that they're collecting on the State road network, because the reality is we as a Council have proactively released this information and whenever we do, it gives Labor a good free kick to make all types of claims. Well if there is a very good reason why the State Government is not releasing their Bluetooth data, I'd like to know because we hear a lot from the Labor Party about secrecy yet the State Government is not releasing their Bluetooth data.


DEPUTY MAYOR: I call on the State Government today—


Deputy Chairman: Order. Councillor CUMMING if you continue to interject I will warn you.


DEPUTY MAYOR: I call on the State Government today to do one or two things. Either provide a report in a similar manner to what we're doing here on the State roads, or give the data to us and give us permission to release it and incorporate into our report because there are some very important roads missing out of this report. Things like the South East Freeway for example, things like the Riverside Expressway for example. These roads are critical in our road network and are not included in our report here because they are not Council roads.

So to get a full picture of congestion in our city and what's happening with traffic flow changes we need those state roads to be part of that picture. We need the information. I will be writing to the State Government as a matter of priority to request that we can incorporate that information into our next report. So I'll certainly keep Councillors updated on that request. Hopefully Councillor DICK, because he doesn't like secrecy, will come on board and convince his colleagues in the State Government to release that information proactively. That would be a good thing and it would really help us get a full picture of traffic flows right around the city.

We have in this report at Item B a petition requesting privacy screening for properties in Ferny Grove. I think we'll achieve a good outcome as a result of this petition response. I trust all Councillors will certainly support this submission.

Deputy Chairman: Further debate?

Deputy Chairman: Councillor DICK.

Councillor DICK: Thanks, Madam Deputy Chair, and I rise to speak on the Infrastructure Committee report. Isn't it fascinating that we had the Chairman of Infrastructure give a seven minute speech today but without actually talking about the report? We heard about Labor in power; we heard about the State Government. Well, Madam Deputy Chair, I want to talk about the actual report. The Key Corridors Performance Report July to December 2014—another snapshot.

It is right for the DEPUTY MAYOR to say that the LNP are going to lose wards at the next election because they are and to suggest there will a minority hung Council. Because he knows the issue of the potency of what congestion and the rising amount of congestion under this LNP Council—knows how toxic it is for those opposite. Because we are debating this today because Councillor


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SCHRINNER thought he was too half by smart. He'd bring in—too smart by half. He'd bring in this report—


Councillor DICK: It's a bit of both sometimes Councillor FLESSER. He thought he'd bring in a report. If I was in the backbench I would be horrified that your leadership is leading you down this path because yes, Councillor SCHRINNER released the report. Don't take my word for it; the headlines started screaming straightaway things like—let me read it out—Brisbane toll tunnels fail to cut rising cross travel time—

Deputy Chairman: Councillor DICK what's in the media is not in this report. Please confine your comments to the report. That is what you're here to speak about.

Councillor DICK: Madam Deputy Chair, are you ruling that I should not refer to media reports about this actual report?

Deputy Chairman: Councillor DICK, you are asked to speak on what is contained in this report before this Council Chamber today please.

Councillor DICK: So I'm seeking your guidance, Madam Deputy Chair. So media coverage surrounding this item that we are debating today, you don't want me to reference?

Deputy Chairman: Councillor DICK, I have asked you to confine your comments to the items that are in the report today please.

Councillor DICK: Okay, that's not answering my question so I'll continue on.

Deputy Chairman: I have been explicit in my direction. Confine your remarks to the items in the report please.

Councillor DICK: Yes, Madam Deputy Chair, and I'm asking for your direction. Do you wish for me to refer to media articles highlighting this report?

Deputy Chairman: Media articles are not contained in this report. Does that clarify it for you?

Councillor DICK: No, it doesn't but needless to say once this report was released, once it was addressed, the wider community, the peak body groups including the RACQ, including motoring experts, have all said as a result of this report, congestion is getting worse in our city. That's exactly what this report is demonstrating. This is not something that the Labor Party has created. This is not something that Labor Councillors have written. This is by Councillor SCHRINNER's own hands, which says traffic under this LNP Council is getting worse.

Madam Deputy Chair, in the report it says that traffic on Brisbane's major roads has increased by 3.5 per cent. This means motorists are spending more time stuck in traffic during peak hour according to this Brisbane City Council data. After almost 12 long years of the LNP running this agenda, the evidence that we are debating today, the report that Councillor SCHRINNER brought forward has clearly stated once and for all what everyone knows; that under the LNP, congestion is getting worse. More and more people are being stuck in traffic.

Go back 10 years ago when you had the then Lord Mayor candidate Campbell Newman sitting on the side of the road saying, “I won't stand for this”. Well do you know what's happened? As a result of this report, traffic has got worse. Because we've looked at the investment that this Council has done and the LORD MAYOR confirmed it today. The report indicates the major projects that this Council has introduced overseen including Clem7 and Legacy Way. I'm going to reference those projects, Madam Chair, because they're referenced in the report.

We know when the Clem7 Tunnel which is referenced here today right throughout the report, we were promised that vehicles would travel through that project of around 100,000 vehicles per day, 100,000 vehicles. The report clearly shows that we are down to 26,325 trips in the December quarter. Now, Madam Deputy Chair, you know that is nowhere near the 100,000 vehicles that were promised. We know by looking at the data from a snapshot on this time to six months before, there's been a drop of point one per cent. So we're not even


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projecting upwards with this infrastructure. We're going backwards. We're dropping—so less and less people.

So forget all the LNP spin about how they are fixing congestion, nobody believes it, Madam Deputy Chair, nobody believes it. The peak motoring groups, the experts in the field, the analysis, the verdict is in, the commuters, the mums and dads sitting in their traffic, they know with this report and Council's response on page 3, Madam Deputy Chair, is to address the Legacy Way Tunnel. Well Council's own data shows that eight out of 10 Brisbane residents won't use this project, eight out of 10, 80 per cent of residents won't use it. But we know there are 100 per cent of ratepayers that are paying for this project.

But it gets worse. Right underneath that on page 2 is the Kingsford Smith Drive upgrade. Now we know because of the shonky economics of those opposite, Madam Deputy Chair, that as a result of them selling off the tolling rights for the Legacy Way Tunnel, we are going to pay for these other projects. But when you look at the data of Clem7, of Airport Link and the fact that the consortium that bought our tolling rights who don't believe that Council's projections are accurate, we know that that project is close to not meeting its targets.

Because the RACQ, Madam Deputy Chair, the consortium that bought those tolling rights, they projected figures completely different to what this LNP has claimed. They think in the first year of July 2015 we're hitting around 16,700 compared to the Council's figures of 24,000. July 2016 the Council's figures which are referenced are around 34,400 vehicles. We're looking at around 21,000 by Queensland Motorways. So there is a huge discrepancy.

I know who I trust when it comes to looking at traffic analysis and it is not the LNP Council because as this report clearly demonstrates we are seeing major roads across this city covered in traffic gridlock. We are seeing the projects which were promised to deliver reductions in times actually now are not being used. The answer to all of our woes if you listen to the LNP to their 1950s thinking is another tunnel. Well when are they going to wake up opposite, Madam Deputy Chair, and realise when the DEPUTY MAYOR challenged me and said when—and I know this is in the report so I expect to be challenged—but, Madam Chair, I'll say it.

When the DEPUTY MAYOR challenged me to say where is Labor's position, he directly asked me that on the congestion tax. Well I'll answer like this DEPUTY MAYOR. I have never supported a congestion tax; I never will support a congestion tax. Labor Councillors sitting in this Chamber do not support a congestion tax. There it is, black and white. You know that. That is all you've got to hide on as a result of today. You're not defending any of these projects. You're not defending any of the work that you've done. All you're doing is simply looking back in time.

So we know that the Clem7 as referenced in this report has dropped in numbers. We know Airport Link hasn't worked as well. My fear is that we are going down the same path with Legacy Way; doomed for failure time and time again. Because when you look at, whether it be the Go Between Bridge, whether you look at Airport Link, whether you look at Clem7, you hear one thing from the LNP, trust us. Well three strikes and you're out as far as I'm concerned.


Councillor Dick: Don't get me started on CityCycle Councillor FLESSER. That's not referenced in this report but I'm glad it's not because I'd need a full 10 minutes on that dud project alone. So we know, Madam Chair, just as the motorists know that more people are being stuck in traffic particularly during the peak hour times. I hear it day in day out. My colleagues on this side of the Chamber hear it day in day out. The only people who aren't listening are the LNP Council. They think things are good. They think things are good enough and we don't need to do anything else. Just put your feet up after 12 long years. A LORD MAYOR who's been in this place 30 years, 11 seconds is good enough. That's it. It's all been worth it so we can all go home.


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Madam Deputy Chair, the people of Brisbane are getting so frustrated with this, the people of Brisbane are getting so sick and tired of sitting in their vehicles and it's not as if on the same side the LNP is investing in public transport. They've cut public transport and we're one million passengers behind on where we should be.

Deputy Chairman: Councillor DICK your time has expired.


Deputy Chairman: Councillor McKENZIE.

Councillor McKENZIE: Thanks, Madam Deputy Chairman. Madam Deputy Chairman, I'd like to address the Council today on the Key Corridors Report. Also I'd like to say this is one of the most practical and important achievements of this Administration. Keeping traffic moving in a safe and timely manner is one of the greatest challenges Council faces in a prosperous and expanding city like Brisbane. Now it's a fact that traffic has increased by 3.5 per cent. Nobody can do anything about that. It's not our fault that traffic has increased.

In the 18 key corridors a significant increase in the savings of seconds at each intersection, every journey, is extremely important to commuters in businesses and that is what this Council has achieved. Although our public transport system provides transport for those who choose it, this Council does not deny its responsibility to assist residents who choose to or must use vehicles for business or pleasure. That's why we've provided $8.5 million in the 2014-15 year to provide improvements to our key corridors and to free up chokepoints and provide extra lanes.

Now unlike the Labor Opposition who deal in hearsay and cherry pick the statistics, we have solid proof that reduction in times has occurred in the city—

Deputy Chairman: Councillor SUTTON.

Councillor McKENZIE: —for example a good cost effective example of that is the O'Keefe Street roundabout, bounding Greenslopes and Holland Park ward where the majority of traffic travels along Logan Road into the city is held up by relatively few vehicles entering the roundabout from the city on Logan Road. This was assessed and lights installed on the southbound approach resulting in a morning peak time improvement, improvement of 8.1 per cent for northbound traffic and 10.7 per cent for westbound traffic which are the areas of the majority where the vehicles travel.

I understand Councillor SCHRINNER personally benefits from this but I'm sure that wasn't the reason why it was done. It was done because it was a terrible chokepoint getting into the city from Old Cleveland Road. There are numerous other actions being taken by this Council to undertake improvements in this critical area and we all know them but I'll just note them here. The Sydney Coordinated Adaptive Traffic System (SCATS), the Traffic Response Unit, variable message signs, closed circuit TV and Bluetooth timing monitoring. These are all designed to streamline traffic movements and reduce consumer time.

In conclusion I would just like to thank the Congestion Reduction Unit for their consultation with particularly my ward office and I'm sure other ward offices, in getting local knowledge as to how to fix these traffic problems on an item by item basis across our wards. Thank you.


Deputy Chairman: Councillor Sutton.

Councillor SUTTON: Thank you, Madam Deputy Chair. I wasn't going to enter this debate but I've just been doing some sums here. I know that one of the key achievements that Councillor SCHRINNER spoke about in the Infrastructure Committee very, very briefly last week was the time travel savings that have been achieved by this Administration. I think that one of the highest time travel savings that has been achieved is 11 seconds. So traffic is now moving 11 seconds faster than it


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was when this Administration came into power in 2004. So by my calculation, that works out to be around about $272.7 million per second.

So I just wanted to get up and congratulate the LNP Administration for their wise expenditure of ratepayers' money. Because I think that if you walked out into the street and said to the average Brisbane resident that this Council Administration over the last 11 years has spent $3 billion improving this city's traffic congestion problems, and our traffic is now travelling 11 seconds faster and that is the equivalent of $272.7 million per second, I'm sure all of them will agree that that's a wise expenditure of money. I'm sure they will all agree.

Councillor MURPHY is nodding his head over there in agreement. He doesn't think that's a bad expenditure. So I mean if you're happy with that over there, if you're happy with that track record, I am happy to go out and tell Brisbane residents that. If you are honestly saying that that $272.7 million per second couldn't have been better spent by investing in public transport infrastructure to really radicalise the way that this city moves, then I've got nothing for you. So I just wanted to say congratulations, well done team QUIRK. I look forward to you selling your achievements in a Transport and Traffic perspective to the electorate come the 2016 election.


Deputy Chairman: Councillor WINES.

Councillor WINES: Thank you, Madam Deputy Chairman. I rise to enter the debate principally for item B but I also cannot let item A go without a small amount of discussion. This Council is committed to battling traffic congestion like no other city Council in this city. While our city grows in population and size, our traffic congestion reduces. Every other city in this country, every other capital city in this country, is failing the challenge of battling traffic congestion.

Councillor NEWTON: Point of order, Madam Deputy Chair.

Deputy Chairman: Point of order against you Councillor WINES.

Councillor NEWTON: I'm concerned—

Deputy Chairman: Order. There is too much noise in this Chamber.

Deputy Chairman: Councillor NEWTON.

Councillor NEWTON: I'm concerned that Councillor WINES is misleading the Chamber. The report clearly said that there was a 3.5 per cent increase in the traffic volume across 18 key corridors, not a decrease as Councillor WINES has just claimed. I just wanted to make sure that he was aware that the information that he was providing the Chamber was incorrect.

Deputy Chairman: Councillor—just a moment please, Councillor WINES. Councillor NEWTON, I am sure that Councillor WINES has read the report, in particular Item number 13 which you were referring to. He was putting this is context.

Deputy Chairman: Councillor WINES?

Councillor WINES: Thank you Madam Deputy Chairman, as I say I'd like to thank my learned colleague Councillor NEWTON. I'd like to refer her to her friend sitting next to her who said the travel has reduced by 11 seconds again and again and again in a speech immediately before mine. So—


Warning – Councillor Shayne SUTTONThe Chairman then formally warned Councillor Shayne SUTTON that unless she desisted from interjecting/obstructing and interrupting the proper conduct of the meeting she would be suspended from the service of the Council for a period of up to eight days. Furthermore, Councillor SUTTON was warned that, if she were suspended from the service of the Council, she would be excluded from the Council Chamber, ante-Chamber, public gallery and other meeting places for the period of suspension.


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Deputy Chairman: Councillor FLESSER if you interject while I am speaking again you too will be warned. You are now on a caution.

Deputy Chairman: Councillor WINES.

Councillor WINES: Thank you, Madam Deputy Chairman. As I was saying, Councillor SUTTON repeated many times in her speech that traffic time had been reduced by 11 seconds. So can Councillor NEWTON either correct her or Councillor SUTTON correct Councillor NEWTON to work out which is their preferred position?


Councillor WINES: They sit right next to each other Councillor SIMMONDS. No, in all seriousness though, this Council has built a huge amount of road infrastructure, both tollways but also surface level roads for the sole purpose of improving the lives of Brisbane people to make sure that they spend less time in traffic and more time in the places that they're travelling to. Other cities are failing this, most notably Melbourne which had an opportunity to—

Councillor JOHNSTON: Point of order, Madam Deputy Chairman.

Deputy Chairman: Point of order against you Councillor WINES.

Deputy Chairman: Yes, Councillor JOHNSTON?

Councillor JOHNSTON: Yes, Madam Deputy Chairman, in line with your previous rulings, other cities are not referenced in this matter before us today. As you drew Councillor DICK back from mentioning a media article about the reports, I would ask you to do the same for Councillor WINES who's speaking about other cities.

Deputy Chairman: Councillor WINES, please contain your comments to what is in the report in relation to Brisbane please.

Councillor WINES: Thank you, Madam Deputy Chairman. As I say surface level roads, subterranean roads but also Councillor DICK in his speech challenges to talk about, he kept referring to our vision of the past and all this history. Well, his questions in Question Time were about our plan for Wynnum Road and our plan for Kingsford Smith Drive.

Deputy Chairman: Yes, Councillor WINES, this is not about Question Time. To the report please.

Councillor WINES: So clearly this Administration has a plan for the future and the Labor Party knows all about it. They simply choose to ignore it for the purposes of this debate. On item B, I'd just like to begin by recognising the genuine concerns of my constituents in Ferny Grove. I want to thank them for working with the Council and also the Asset Services officers to being so accommodating to address the concerns of these constituents. We're hoping to have their concerns addressed in the very near period and I am looking forward to being able to deliver this for them. Thank you.



DEPUTY MAYOR: Thank you, Madam Deputy Chairman and thank you to all Councillors who participated in this debate. Now Councillor DICK made some interesting comments about 1950s thinking. He likes to use that to try and disparage the LORD MAYOR and this side of the Chamber. I don't know about 1950s thinking but I am a little bit familiar with 1960s and 1970s traffic planning when the Labor Party decided to shut down the tramway network in this city. They were pro car and pro freeway. So I know all about that. We know that today we are dealing with the impacts of Labor's decisions in our city when it comes to transport planning.

So he can talk about the 1950s all he likes; let's talk about the 1960s and the 1970s—

Deputy Chairman: Councillor ABRAHAMS.


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DEPUTY MAYOR: —and Labor's legacy in our city, Labor's legacy in our city which was to shut down—

Deputy Chairman: Councillor CUMMING.

DEPUTY MAYOR: —a great public transport network because the car was the future according to Clem Jones and Labor. So look, Councillor DICK can throw those barbs all he likes. Let's talk about recent history because that's what's important right now in this Chamber. We know that whatever they might say about this Council's investment in various projects, here are some facts. Labor in Council voted for Clem7. They voted to build Clem7. If it hadn't have been for Labor's support, that project would never have happened because we didn't have a majority in Council at the time.

When they criticise the traffic projections, they actually saw all of the same figures that we saw and then they voted in favour of it. So apparently Labor now says they've made a very big mistake. I disagree. In the end there are two different issues here; whether Clem7 was a financial success is one issue and whether Clem7 was an infrastructure success is a different issue altogether. Now Clem7 may not be able to make the profits that the private sector envisaged but what Clem7 has done is taken thousands of vehicles each day off the Story Bridge and off the Riverside Expressway, the Captain Cook Bridge and other alternative routes.

So regardless of the financials of that deal for the private sector, it has been a raging success in terms of the infrastructure of our city for the next 100 years. Now it's very easy to criticise any kind of new toll road project. I am aware that when the Gateway Bridge was initially built, it was criticised for being a white elephant. I think Councillor WYNDHAM was mentioning that there was something like 12,000 vehicles a day, from memory, using that piece of infrastructure.

Today there's something like 150,000 vehicles a day using that bit of infrastructure and in fact in a relatively short period of time, that bridge had to be duplicated.

So I have no doubt the Clem7 and Airport Link and Go Between Bridge will be, in the future, the raging successes that the Gateway Bridge was and they will continue to deliver benefits for generations of Brisbane residents to come. But we know that Labor voted for Clem7 and we also know that the Labor State Government established, planned and funded Airport Link Tunnel in partnership with the private sector.

So Labor at a Council level voted for Clem7, Labor at a State level got Airport Link going, another toll road, and Labor at a Federal level put in $500 million into Legacy Way. The project which Labor at Council continues to bag. A project which the guy Councillor DICK seeks to roll thinks is a great project. I'm referring to Labor MP Bernie Ripoll. He thinks it's a great project that will benefit both Brisbane and the very residents that Councillor DICK seeks to represent.


DEPUTY MAYOR: The very residents that Councillor DICK seeks to represent. So we know that nothing Labor says in this place can be taken seriously because their actions say a very different thing. Publicly, they're against toll roads, but the reality is their record shows that at all three levels of government, they support toll roads. In this place, when they had the opportunity to vote for Clem7, they voted in favour of it.

Now I mentioned before about the need for an alternative vision on Labor's part, and we saw a little snippet of it today. Their vision was to turn the Wynnum Road upgrade into a bus-only lane facility. So—


DEPUTY MAYOR: —it's not true. So hang on a minute, let me do the maths here. There's a four-lane road that we're going to add two extra lanes on to become six lanes. If you


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put bus lanes in both directions then it's a four-lane road again. This is one of the silliest things I've ever heard. The reality is, our capacity upgrade of Wynnum Road will benefit all road users, including bus users, because there will be extra capacity for all of those users. The buses will travel faster, the motorists will travel faster.

What Councillor DICK and Labor are saying is that if you're a motorist, particularly those people out in Councillor SUTTON's area, you don't deserve this upgrade and that it should only be reserved for bus users. So all of those Lexus and BMW and Peugeot drivers that Councillor SUTTON represents will have to leave their car at home and get on a bus, that—


DEPUTY MAYOR: —Maserati drivers as well. Right, okay, I stand corrected, Councillor SUTTON. All of those people in Councillor SUTTON's area that drive their cars at the moment will be punished by Labor and will be forced to get on a bus. Because their idea of a Wynnum Road upgrade is an upgrade only for buses and for no one else. So it's been interesting. We've heard Councillor ABRAHAMS talk about the roads diet. Now Councillor DICK is on the same diet. He's essentially saying that we shouldn't upgrade that corridor for motorists; we should only put bus lanes on that road.

I wonder if Councillor SUTTON's residents would be interested to hear that, because I think it would change their view on how effective she is as a local representative if they heard that this is now Labor's approach to the Wynnum Road upgrade. So I hope that Councillor SUTTON will put Councillor DICK back in his box and say, no, no, no, no, this is not what we signed up for. Because I recall very clearly in this Chamber that Councillor SUTTON gave her full and unequivocal support for the Wynnum Road upgrade. We now have questions being asked about that upgrade by Labor.

It's indicative of their constantly changing approach to these issues. We don't know where they stand when it comes to public transport, road upgrades and a whole range of issues. They're constantly moving. The people of Brisbane deserve a solid and consistent position from them as the opposition. Our position as an Administration is solid and consistent. We believe that all modes of transport should be invested in. Not favouring one over another but investing in all of them.

So that means investing in public transport, in active transport and also in the road network. That way, it provides choice and this Administration is always about choice. Just because you drive a car, doesn't make you a bad person. We understand that people need to find their own way of getting around the city. It's great when people catch a bus or a ferry, or walk and cycle, that is great. But it is their choice and they shouldn't have to be forced to do it, they should do it because it's a choice they want to make.



DEPUTY MAYOR: Taxing people out of their cars with the cordon toll is not a choice. That's why we absolutely reject that approach that Labor has put forward in the past. But this key corridors report, as I said, proactively released by Council, shows that even small projects can make an important difference. The simple project of putting roundabout metering in place at Stones Corner has improved travel times significantly.

Labor can scoff at travel time savings; we will take any savings we can get. Whether it is a five-second saving or an 11-second saving or a 22-second saving, it is a saving. It is a saving. What Labor is offering is no investment in major infrastructure, no investment in infrastructure—


DEPUTY MAYOR: Well, I'd like to know what you are offering, because no one else knows. No one else knows. We are very clear with our approach.


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Deputy Chairman: DEPUTY MAYOR, unfortunately your time has expired.

Upon being submitted to the Chamber, the motion for the adoption of the report of the Infrastructure Committee was declared carried on the voices.


ATTENDANCE:

Deputy Mayor, Councillor Adrian Schrinner (Chairman), Councillor Ian McKenzie (Deputy Chairman), and Councillors Margaret de Wit, Milton Dick, Victoria Newton and Norm Wyndham.

A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – KEY CORRIDORS PERFORMANCE REPORT – JULY TO DECEMBER 201 4

521/2014-151. Stephen McGrath, Planned Incident Management Manager, Congestion Reduction Unit, Brisbane

Infrastructure, attended the meeting to provide an update on the Key Corridors Performance Report – July to December 2014. He provided the information below.

2. There was a 3.5 per cent increase in traffic volume across the 18 key corridors between July and December 2014, compared to 2013. Kingsford Smith Drive experienced the largest daily volume increase at 13.6 per cent.

3. The key corridors morning peak average network travel time per kilometre increased by six seconds. The key corridors afternoon peak average network travel time per kilometre increased by three seconds.

4. Council’s major projects including Legacy Way, the Kingsford Smith Drive Upgrade and the Wynnum Road Corridor Upgrade Stage 1 will address congestion and provide a benefit to future peak travel times.

5. The Kingsford Smith Drive Upgrade will widen Kingsford Smith Drive from four to six lanes between Harvey Street and Breakfast Creek Road. This will improve traffic flow and increase capacity at intersections.

6. The Wynnum Road Corridor Upgrade – Stage 1, will widen Wynnum Road from four to six lanes between Latrobe Street and Canning Bridge. This will help to cater for existing and future traffic demands.

7. The Arterial Roads Improvement Program is a $5.8 million investment in 2014-15 for congestion reduction projects at traffic ‘choke-points’ across the city including turning-lane extensions, intersection improvements and lane reconfigurations.

8. Council manages the traffic network through a variety of different systems or mechanisms. These being:- Sydney Coordinated Adaptive Traffic System (SCATS)- Traffic Response Units (TRUs) - Variable Message Signs (VMS)- Closed-Circuit Television (CCTV)- Bluetooth Travel Time Monitoring.

9. A map showing the 18 key corridors, colour coded into five groups, was displayed.

10. New initiatives from Council’s Congestion Reduction Unit include Left Turn on Red (LTOR) and the Roundabout Metering Scheme.

11. The key features of the LTOR initiative provides motorists with the ability to turn left at a red light after coming to a complete stop and giving way to other traffic. This is only permitted at intersections where a ‘Left Turn on Red Permitted after Stopping’ sign is installed.


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12. The Roundabout Metering Scheme helps to create gaps caused by unbalanced flows in roundabouts. This is generally operated during heavy unbalanced conditions such as peak periods.

13. The average daily traffic volumes along the 18 key corridors have increased by 3.5 per cent for the same six months from 2013 to 2014.

14. Of the 18 corridors, Kingsford Smith Drive experienced the largest increase in daily volume from 54,365 to 61,773 vehicles per day, a 13.6 per cent increase. The increase is a combination of increased activity around the airport area, runway and terminal expansions and other developments, and on the Australia Trade Coast.

15. A table was shown detailing the traffic volumes by day of the week. Friday is the most heavily travelled day while Sunday is the least travelled day. The average daily traffic volumes all increased over the same six month period from 2013 to 2014, except Wednesdays, which remained the same.

16. A table was displayed showing the travel times by day of the week. Thursday has the slowest travel times for both morning and afternoon peaks due to higher traffic volumes followed by Friday. Sunday is the fastest.

17. With the introduction of Airportlink (APL), the left lane on Bowen Bridge Road became a ‘trap lane’ for entry to APL, CLEM7 and the ICB. This resulted in a reduction of through traffic capacity. It also resulted in unnecessary weaving and queuing on Bowen Bridge Road. The trap lane was removed and marked as a through-lane, reducing travel time. As a result morning peak travel time improved by 26.6 per cent from 2.04 minutes to 1.31 minutes travelling in the northbound direction from O’Connell Terrace to Northey Street. A reduction of 14.5 per cent was observed in the afternoon peak for the same segment from 1.16 minutes to 1.05 minutes.

18. The Inner City Bypass (ICB) had two westbound lanes approaching the Royal National Agricultural and Industrial Association of Queensland (RNA) tunnel. The APL provides a dedicated on-ramp onto the ICB. The ICB westbound was reduced to a single lane. This resulted in congestion in the morning peak, increasing travel time. The two westbound ICB lanes were reinstated for through traffic and the APL onramp now merges into the left through-lane. The morning peak travel time improved by 22 seconds from 4.13 minutes to 3.51 minutes measured in the westbound direction from Cooksley Street to ICB Herston Road off-ramp which is a distance of three kilometres. A minimal reduction in the afternoon peak was observed.

19. There was an inadequate right-turn lane facility from Ipswich Road into Venner Road in the southbound direction. Queues spilling from the right-turn lane were causing blockage of the through movement. An extension of the right-turn lane pocket to accommodate existing demand was installed. Eight second and seven second reductions in travel times were observed for the morning and afternoon peaks, respectively for the southbound direction from Annerley Road to Cracknell Road which is a distance of one kilometre.

20. The O’Keefe Street roundabout experiences unbalanced flows during the morning peak period with high volumes from the westbound approach and low volume from the southbound approach. This results in excessive queuing and delays on the Logan Road westbound approach. Roundabout metering was employed to provide priority to the high volume approach. Logan Road westbound was metered using traffic signals on the southbound approach. The morning peak travel time improvements are 8.1 per cent and 10.7 per cent for the northbound and westbound directions respectively. As the metering operates only during the morning peak period, minimal or no changes were observed for the afternoon peak.

21. A video was shown of normal roundabout operation with unbalanced flow between the southern high-volume and eastern low-volume approach. Vehicles in the southern approach give way to vehicles from the eastern approach resulting in excessive queuing and delays. Another video was shown of roundabout metering. In roundabout metering, priority is given to the high-volume (controlling) approach by signalising the low-volume approach. This results in less overall queues and delays.

22. A table was displayed showing the congestion reduction initiatives that were completed in this reporting period. Their initial impact on travel times will be presented in the next reporting period.


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23. Other factors affecting the network performance include:- The Brisbane Metropolitan Transport Management Centre (BMTMC) data included in the

report indicated 250 to 400 significant incidents per month with a duration ranging from 55 to 95 minutes.

- The report lists major road works and temporary road closures along the 18 corridors.- The ongoing role of BMTMC in managing recurring and non-recurring congestion.

24. Following a number of questions from the Committee, the Chairman thanked Mr McGrath for his informative presentation.

25. RECOMMENDATION:

THAT COUNCIL NOTE THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THE ABOVE REPORT.ADOPTED

B PETITION – REQUEST FOR PRIVACY SCREENING FOR PROPERTIES ON MCALROY ROAD, FERNY GROVECA15/95350

522/2014-1526. A petition requesting that Council install a privacy screen along their frontages to McAlroy Road,

Ferny Grove, privacy screen along their frontages to McAlroy Road, Ferny Grove, was presented to the meeting of Council held on 10 February 2015 by Councillor Andrew Wines.

27. The Branch Manager, Transport Planning and Strategy Branch, Brisbane Infrastructure Division, supplied the following information.

28. The petition contains eight signatures from five households on Don and Cassimaty Streets, Ferny Grove. The petitioners believe the privacy screen will reduce vehicle noise and scrutiny of their living areas by passing traffic and pedestrians.

29. Don and Cassimaty Streets were recently formed in a recent subdivision. The major frontages of the residential premises are on Don or and Cassimaty Streets, with side or rear aspects along McAlroy Road.

30. The residential blocks are substantially lower than the level of McAlroy Road, allowing passing traffic to overlook yards and living areas. The degree of intrusion is demonstrated in the photographs provided by the signatories accompanying the petition.

31. Typically Council only installs noise fencing with the construction of new roads or where major upgrades significantly increase the volume of traffic along a corridor. As McAlroy Road is classified as a District Access Route in Council’s Brisbane City Plan 2014, noise fencing and privacy screening was not required in the development approval. It is noted that many of the existing residential properties along McAlroy Road are also unfenced.

32. However, the continuation of the kerb and construction of a concrete footpath on the eastern side of McAlroy Road is proposed before the end of the 2014-15 financial year. This work is expected to make walking a more attractive option for the local community.

33. To ensure that increased pedestrian activity does not impact on the residents of Don and Cassimaty Streets, Councillor Andrew Wines has arranged for vegetation to be planted along the neighbouring embankment. The shrubs will have a mature growth height and dense foliage that disrupts sight lines into the properties and reduces noise and light pollution from McAlroy Road.

Consultation

34. Councillor Andrew Wines, Councillor for Enoggera Ward, has been consulted and supports the recommendation.

Preferred option


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35. It is the preferred option to advise the head petitioner that Council proposes the planting of dense shrubs along the McAlroy Road frontages to the effected properties. This vegetation will screen the rear of the properties from the roadway and footpath, providing more privacy for residents and reducing the impact of traffic using McAlroy Road.

36. The Branch Manager recommends as follows and the Committee agrees.

37. RECOMMENDATION:

THAT THE PETITIONERS BE ADVISED IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE PREFERRED OPTION ABOVE AND OF THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THE ABOVE REPORT.

ADOPTED

PUBLIC AND ACTIVE TRANSPORT COMMITTEE

Councillor Peter MATIC, Chairman of the Public and Active Transport Committee, moved, seconded by Councillor Steven HUANG that the report of that Committee held on 17 March 2015, be adopted.

Deputy Chairman: Is there any debate?

Deputy Chairman: Councillor MATIC.

Councillor MATIC: Just briefly, Madam Chairman. I just want to acknowledge the presentation by the officers on the driver console unit and their consideration of basically the evolution of the unit itself and also the introduction of the go card. But importantly also the upgrades that have been provided to it recently as part of its Display Control Unit (DCU) 3 upgrade, providing even better wireless communication and improvements in the settings and use by the drivers.

It's interesting that there have been in the past, depending on the black spots around the city, dropouts within the wireless communication of the DCU. Even reported to me within my own ward of residents passing through a particular area and then having to—having their go card drop out. This kind of improvement will provide a better overall service to Brisbane residents.

At that time, 5.20pm, the Chairman, Councillor Margaret de WIT, resumed the Chair.


Upon being submitted to the Chamber, the motion for the adoption of the report of the Public and Active Transport Committee was declared carried on the voices.


ATTENDANCE:

Councillor Peter Matic (Chairman), Councillor Steven Huang (Deputy Chairman), and Councillors Steve Griffiths, Nicole Johnston, Kim Marx and Ryan Murphy.

A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – DRIVER CONSOLE UNIT

523/2014-151. Alan Geyer, Chief Operating Officer, Bus Operations, Brisbane Transport division, attended the

meeting to provide information on the driver console unit (DCU) that is used on Council buses. He provided the information below.

2. A DCU is a device that is fixed to the dash of all Council buses for the purpose of controlling GoCard readers and selling paper tickets. DCUs collect ticketing data and transmit the information to a


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TransLink server. DCUs are supplied and maintained by TransLink through a contract with the technology provider, CUBIC.

3. On-bus ticketing methods have changed over the years as follows.- From 1925 to 1994 paper tickets were used.- In September 1994 ticket equipment supplied by ERG Group was installed in Council buses.- In January 1995 magnetic stripe tickets were introduced.- In July 2006 TransLink DCU version one (DCU1) was rolled out for paper tickets, and ticket

reader-validators for magnetic stripe tickets were installed (but were withdrawn in early 2008).- In 2007 TransLink GoCard readers were installed.- In January 2008 the use of GoCards commenced.- In December 2014 TransLink DCU version three (DCU3) was rolled out.

4. In 1994, when Council made the move to electronic ticketing, technology was limited to magnetic stripe cards and smartcards with microchips that required contact with a device to read them. Customers used paper cards with magnetic stripe tape to record their trips and fares. Drivers used smartcards to sign on at the ticket console when starting their shift. Photographs were shown of a paper ticket with a magnetic stripe, and a smartcard.

5. In 2008 TransLink introduced CUBIC ticketing equipment and its contactless GoCard ticket product. Since then, customers use a plastic card with an embedded microchip which does not require contact to record trips and fares. Wireless technology is used at bus depots to transfer data to and from the ticket console.

6. A diagram was shown to compare DCU1 technology to that of DCU3. Constant communication between the DCU3 and TransLink server allows for timely customer top-ups on GoCards and up-to-date operational data. Better wireless communication has led to considerably less equipment faults that previously caused travel delays of up to 15 minutes.

7. DCU3 benefits drivers because of:- similar functionality and screen layout to DCU1- a colour touch screen which makes it easier to use- adjustable volume and brightness settings- automatic start-up and system communication which saves driver time in depots- less dropouts due to better wireless communication.

8. The DCU3 benefits customers due to:- constant third generation mobile data transfer technology which ensures customer top-ups will

be available to download onto their Go Cards within two hours (compared to the previous time of 48 hours)

- less chance of signal dropouts which previously prevented customers from successfully touching off their Go Cards when alighting from a bus.

9. Following a number of questions from the Committee, the Chairman thanked Mr Geyer for his informative presentation.

10. RECOMMENDATION:


NEIGHBOURHOOD PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT ASSESSMENT COMMITTEE

Councillor Amanda COOPER, Chairman of the Neighbourhood Planning and Development Assessment Committee, moved, seconded by Councillor Vicki HOWARD, that the report of the meeting of that Committee held on 17 March 2015, be adopted.



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Councillor COOPER: Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, at Committee last week, we had a presentation about the Inclusive Brisbane Professional Advice Alliance. This is a project that I think all Councillors should be aware if, it's certainly a great initiative that you can promote to your local community and particularly—obviously not-for-profit groups who may be interested in taking up this service.

So this is an outcome that resulted from the Urban Futures Brisbane Board. So that, of course, being the advisory board for planning and development in our city. It is a great opportunity for it to bring together discussion over a whole range of different areas in our organisation and particularly the Inclusive Brisbane Board (IBB) which both Councillor ADAMS and I participate in their discussions.

So Inclusive Brisbane Board offers guidance to Council on how to deal with a number of social inclusion issues across Brisbane, from homelessness to arts and creativity and particularly its expertise—its extremely high level of expertise on the not-for-profit sector. In particular, under its very able chairman, Greg Goebel, we see IBB providing advice on community issues such as development and planning issues affecting that particular sector, particularly relating to land use, affordability, community facilities, economic viability, safety, the arts and community cohesiveness of our beautiful city.

At an Inclusive Brisbane workshop in 2012, for not-for-profit organisations—there were a range of these workshops—and the strong feedback we got from participants was concerns that they had about cost and access to advice, professional advice, relating to the availability of their organisations to operate sustainably.

Based on that feedback that was received, IBB consulted with a range of not-for-profit groups and formed the Professional Advice Alliance to provide free advice to community organisations. So this is a pro-bono operation that was set up as a pilot project and operated from February to November of 2014. It was very successful and there has been now a two-year official appointment that has been established.

So we are now going to be able to offer it on a wider scale. So it's a very exciting project and it will be something certainly that we will be seeking to promote and encourage people to be aware of, so they can take up this opportunity to get some assistance at no cost. So the range of organisations that we think this would be most beneficial for; bowls clubs, sporting groups, community groups, cultural groups, service providers.

In particular, the actual charter of what the Professional Advice Alliance is all about is seeking to provide preliminary development infrastructure and organisational sustainability advice to community and not-for-profit organisations across Brisbane. They will then report back to the Inclusive Brisbane Board on the progress of the Alliance at the bimonthly board meetings.

So the advice isn't only limited to planning and development issues but also relates to all aspects of the work of our community groups. In particular, it's really to try and make sure that they can continue to thrive and function in our city, because there are obviously a lot of challenges going ahead. Some of them have limited memberships, some of them are really concerned about the ongoing viability of their organisations, and we think that there are some opportunities for certainly members of the private sector who want to get involved and help support these sorts of important organisations.

In particular, we have had a lot of feedback about the issues that they are keen to get further advice on, such as membership sustainability and volunteer management. They want collaboration and merger opportunities, they want some advice on business case feasibility advice. They want particularly marketing advice, social media strategies, attracting sponsorship and grant applications and they want to understand audit and business operation procedures.

So since the group's initial inception in December 2013, 24 groups have met with the Alliance and 88 hours of pro-bono advice has been provided. In


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particular, we have recently written to all ward offices, and I would hope all of the Councillors in the Chamber have noted that, to ask them to pass on this information to any local not-for-profit groups who may be interested in taking up this initiative.

So there have been a number of different success stories that have been able to be achieved through this. I particularly want to thank Inclusive Brisbane Board for supporting these sorts of new initiatives for our city and for the private sector who have given up their time and energy to make these sorts of projects happen. It is, I think, a growing city and a city that needs to make sure that we continue to support those community networks, those not-for-profit organisations that deliver such great outcomes for our city. Thank you.


Upon being submitted to the Chamber by the Chairman, the motion for the adoption of the report of the Neighbourhood Planning and Development Assessment Committee was declared carried on the voices.


ATTENDANCE:

Councillor Amanda Cooper (Chairman), Councillor Vicki Howard (Deputy Chairman), and Councillors Helen Abrahams, Geraldine Knapp, Shayne Sutton and Andrew Wines.

A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – INCLUSIVE BRISBANE PROFESSIONAL ADVICE ALLIANCE

524/2014-151. Marcus Mulholland, Principal Strategic Planning, City Planning and Economic Development, City

Planning and Sustainability Division, attended the meeting to provide an update on Inclusive Brisbane Professional Advice Alliance. He provided the information below.

2. The Inclusive Brisbane Board is a portfolio board of the Urban Futures Brisbane Board and provides advice on community issues to help build social capital. The Inclusive Brisbane Board provides advice on community issues associated with development and planning, including:- land use- affordability- community facilities- economic viability- safety- the arts- community cohesiveness of Brisbane.

3. The role of the Inclusive Brisbane Board is to:- advise on community issues related to the future development of Brisbane- identify emerging social inclusion issues- advise on issues affecting the not-for-profit sector in Brisbane- share information, generate ideas, and identify research needs and partnership opportunities to

address issues.

4. After extensive consultations with the not-for-profit and community sector the Inclusive Brisbane Board established the Inclusive Brisbane Board Professional Advice Alliance to provide free advice to community organisations.

5. The Inclusive Brisbane Professional Advice Alliance (the Alliance) will operate as a sub-committee of the Inclusive Brisbane Board.

6. The Urban Futures Brisbane Board provides strategic advice to Brisbane City Council on planning and implementing Brisbane’s development future.


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7. The Alliance will seek to:- provide preliminary development, infrastructure and organisational sustainability advice to

community and/or not-for-profit organisations across Brisbane; and- report to the Inclusive Brisbane Board on the progress of the Alliance at the bi-monthly board

meetings.

8. The current members of the Alliance are: Matthew Miller, Development Manager, Leasing – Grocon and the Convenor of the Inclusive Brisbane Professional Advice Alliance; Michael Banney, Director, m3architecture; Richard Coulson, Director, Cox Rayner Architects; Evan Matthews, Crowe Horwath Accounting; Jonathan East, Partner, HWL Ebsworth Legal; Josh Neil, Cardno Engineering ; Ben Lyons, Cardno Town Planning ; Ashley Lane, Urbis Town Planning; Matthew Cox, Group Manager Community Services, Red Cross; Sonya Keep, Common Ground Housing and Karen Dare, General Manager, Communify Queensland.

9. Greg Goebel, Chairman, Inclusive Brisbane Board describes the Alliance as “The Alliance taps the voluntary commitment of professionals in areas of legal, property development, governance, finance, marketing and strategic planning to assist organisations to survive, grow and prosper in the fast changing community sector.”

10. A flowchart of the application process was displayed. - the applicant makes contact with the Inclusive Brisbane Secretariat in Council’s City Planning

and Economic Development Division. - an application form is sent to the group seeking further details- the convenor of the Alliance (Inclusive Brisbane Board Member Matthew Miller, Grocon) is

contacted and Alliance members are booked for the meeting- meeting takes place between the applicant and the Alliance- a statement of advice (minutes of meeting) is provided to the applicant- a champion from the Alliance is provided to assist the applicant to implement the advice and

an evaluation survey is sent.

11. The types of applicants include bowls clubs, sporting groups, community groups, cultural groups and service providers.

12. Types of assistance provided include:- development, planning and certification- membership sustainability and volunteer management- collaboration and merger opportunities- business case feasibility advice- marketing, social media strategies, attracting sponsorship and grant applications- auditing and business operations.

13. Since December 2013, 24 groups have met with the Alliance. Eighty hours of pro-bono advice has been provided by the corporate sector. The Alliance continues to receive applications. There is ongoing evaluation, promotion and expansion of professional advice offered by the Alliance.

14. Following a number of questions from the Committee, the Chairman thanked Mr Mulholland for his informative presentation.

15. RECOMMENDATION:


ENVIRONMENT, PARKS AND SUSTAINABILITY COMMITTEE

Councillor Matthew BOURKE, Chairman of the Environment, Parks and Sustainability Committee, moved, seconded by Councillor Fiona KING, that the report of the meeting of that Committee held on 17 March 2015, be adopted.



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Councillor BOURKE: Look, thanks very much, Madam Chairman, I'll just be brief. A few comments before I get to the Committee presentation that we had last week in Committee. Madam Chairman, I joined with the LORD MAYOR and Councillor JOHNSTON at the Sherwood Arboretum on the weekend to mark the 90th birthday or anniversary for the Sherwood Arboretum and planted a tree along with the LORD MAYOR. It was a bit big, probably, to plant ourselves. We ceremonially put mulch around a tree, Madam Chairman. That was one of the Kauri Pines.

The original Kauri Pine Avenue that was planted, as the LORD MAYOR talked about, by notable people in the City of Brisbane 90 years ago, Madam Chairman, some of those trees had passed away for various reasons, lost due to weather events, lost due to moisture in the soil. Council has been working quite well with the Friends of the Sherwood Arboretum over recent years to try and replace some of those trees that were lost, Madam Chairman.

So the LORD MAYOR planted a Kauri Pine on the weekend, as well as—there was an additional group of plantings that we did with representatives from the scouts and other representatives from the community, Madam Chairman, to mark the occasion as well. The Sherwood Arboretum has the largest collection of native Australian subtropical trees and plants in Australia, there's over 1000-odd specimens across the site. Madam Chairman, we were blessed to have the former curator of the Brisbane Mount Coot-tha Botanic Gardens, Ross McKinnon, with us on the day as well as the new curator of the Mount Coot-tha Botanic Gardens, Dale Arvidsson, who has just joined us from Mackay Regional Council.

So it was a great day and I just want to say congratulations to all those involved and particularly to the Friends of the Sherwood Arboretum for the work that they've done and for the work that I know that they're going to continue to do into the future.

Madam Chairman, we had a Committee presentation on the Preston Road Park Meadowlands outdoor gym. This is the first of its kind park installation, I think is the best way of putting it, because it is not an outdoor gym and not a basketball court or a multi-use court, Madam Chairman, but it is a combination of both. This particular project was funded by the DEPUTY MAYOR and the Councillor for Doboy Ward, jointly out of their Wards, Footpaths and Parks Trust Funds, Madam Chairman, and while it is in the Doboy Ward, as I said, they both jointly funded it.

It is not your traditional outdoor space, it is a combination of a number of different elements that come together to make a great multi-use area. So, Madam Chairman, it features a Multi-use Games Area (MUGA), which is a sixteen by nine metre line marked for various uses. So it's marked for basketball, it's marked for netball, it's marked for handball, it's marked for a range of different sports and games, Madam Chairman. It has a cross-trainer, a mini-cross trainer for children, a treadmill and a smaller treadmill for children. A hand-bike as well as lateral pulldown and shoulder press facilities, leg pressers and oblique exercisers, dips and leg raisers, pull-up and assisted pull-ups, as well as a bench, Madam Chairman, forming part of what is really a full outdoor exercise gym with those multi-purpose courts built in.

It is a great installation and Councillor MURPHY tells us that it's getting exceptionally high usage, Madam Chairman, and it is great to be able to provide those sorts of facilities. I guess it is an example of how this Administration is continuing to involve what we offer in parks and the range of interactions and opportunities that we provide residents when it comes to parks. We did though, through the Committee presentation, just make sure that people were aware of some of the constraints or some of the issues that we do have with these particular facilities.

So you really do need a very large area, so a district park, Madam Chairman, is probably the best or the suited location for it. It takes up a site of about 40 by 30 metres, so it is quite a large installation in your park. Obviously you have to take in car parking, toilets, other facilities, drinking fountains and the like,


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Madam Chairman, to make sure that you have all of the facilities in that space when residents obviously come to use it.

So it was a great presentation, great piece of equipment that this Administration is proud to support and be able to provide for the residents of Brisbane.



Councillor MURPHY: Yes, thanks, Madam Chairman. I rise to speak on item A, the Committee presentation, as well. The Minnippi outdoor gym. Of course, this gym was a joint initiative between Councillor SCHRINNER and me. We each allocated $125,000 from our Wards Footpaths and Parks Trust Funds to see this project built. It's important to acknowledge that this gym is the only kind—the only facility of its kind in the city. It's unashamedly a piece of Council infrastructure that takes a new approach to gyms.

Always previously, we've taken the approach to gyms where we've had stations, almost like the Stations of the Cross. If you're a Catholic student, you'd understand what that meant. But you would go and you would do the bike or the pull ups or whatever and then you'd run to the next one. Ultimately, I think, that strategy is starting to see the end of its useful lifetime.

People want to come and they want to use a gym that clusters all that equipment together, that provides a range of different exercises, a range of different muscle groups that get worked in a very small space. That's what that gym—this new gym, this new MUGA, I call it, Councillor BOURKE, not MUGA. I call it a MUGA to avoid the unnecessary connotations with muggers. But that's what this MUGA does.

It allows us to do cross training to have a treadmill, a hand bike; we've got a recumbent bike in there, a lateral pulldown and a shoulder press. We've got a leg press, a dips and leg raise machine, a pull up and assisted pull up machine and a bench. As Councillor BOURKE mentioned, Madam Chairman, more than that we've also got the mixed-use ball court area. You may well say, well we've got a lot of ball courts in the city, what's special about this one? The constant feedback that I get from local residents and particularly the local school children is that this one has a fence.

This one has a fence that actually stops the ball running away. As you know, when a ball runs away off the court, it just breaks up play, everything grinds to a halt and someone's got to run off and collect that. Particularly in Minnippi Parklands, especially after you've had a storm or a downpour, that grass can get pretty soggy. So the fence actually prevents that, keeps the flow of the game going and it's really good.

Madam Chairman, during the school holidays, I go down there and I'll have a look and there's often a line snaking outside of the gym as people line up ready to have matches against each other. So it's that kind of level of demand that it's generated, Madam Chairman. But I don't want you and I don't expect you to take my word for it. I've put together just a few bits of feedback that local residents have had about the Minnippi outdoor gym.

Ron says, “congratulations to you and Councillor SCHRINNER for such a wonderful idea. We can now enjoy this amazing outdoor facility”. Tracy says, “this is an amazing gym and we should have more of these across the city”. Ricky says, “I use this gym so much now and it's helped me and my cousin to get shredded, true story”. But I don't even want you to take the word of local residents for it, I want you to take the word from the Labor candidate for Chatsworth, Paul Keene who came up to me on polling day at the Tingalpa State School booth and he said, “mate, credit where it's due. I live across the road from this gym and I use it all the time. You in Council have done a really great job with this”, Madam Chairman.



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Councillor MURPHY: I encourage my colleagues opposite to confirm that with Paul Keene. He did in fact say that. So, Madam Chairman, bipartisan support, you can't get much better than that for a gym project. So I'd also like to thank Paul Hemmings from The Great Outdoor Gym Company (TGO), the company that provided the gym, as well as John Buchannan and Councillor BOURKE's office for making this gym a reality. I look forward to celebrating this gym's first birthday in June this year. Thank you, Madam Chairman.


Upon being submitted to the Chamber by the Chairman, the motion for the adoption of the report of the Environment, Parks and Sustainability Committee was declared carried on the voices.


ATTENDANCE:

Councillor Matthew Bourke (Chairman), Councillor Fiona King (Deputy Chairman), and Councillors Peter Cumming, Kim Flesser, Geraldine Knapp and Ryan Murphy.

A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – PRESTON ROAD PARK, MEADOWLANDS ROAD OUTDOOR GYM

525/2014-151. Danny van der Walle, Senior Coordinator Parks, Business Delivery (Arboriculture, Natural

Environment, Civil Engineering, Mosquito Management), Asset Services Branch, Field Services Group, Brisbane Infrastructure, attended the meeting to provide an update on the Preston Road Park, Meadowlands Road Outdoor Gym. He provided the information below.

2. Preston Road Park, Meadowlands Road Outdoor Gym was built by the Great Outdoor Gym Company and opened on 28 June 2014.

3. The cost of the gym was $230,000 and was jointly funded from Doboy and Chandler Ward Footpath and Parks Trust Funds.

4. The gym features several pieces of equipment and a small hard-court which is lined for social games of basketball, cricket and futsal.

5. The equipment supplied with this package included one each of:- multi-use games area (MUGA 16 metres by 9 metres)- cross-trainer- mini cross-trainer (children)- treadmill- mini treadmill (children)- hand bike- recumbent bike- lateral pull-down and shoulder press- leg press and oblique- dips and leg raise- pull up and assisted pull- bench.

6. A slide was shown displaying the site layout.

7. The recumbent bike is an interesting piece of equipment, which generates electricity when in use. Users can power a mobile device, such as a phone, whilst conducting a work out.

8. Asset Services East report usage rates as high and there are no reported incidents of vandalism.

9. The design and location considerations included:- large district park with available space of 40 metres by 30 metres and existing infrastructure


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- car-parking with disabled car parks and paths of travel- public toilet- picnic facilities- drinking fountain- children's playground (preferable)- de-branding of equipment to remove advertising- not suitable for sites which are subject to flooding.

10. Images of the gym equipment were displayed.

11. Following a number of questions from the Committee, the Chairman thanked Mr van der Walle for his informative presentation.

12. RECOMMENDATION:


FIELD SERVICES COMMITTEE

Councillor David McLACHLAN, Chairman of the Field Services Committee, moved, seconded by Councillor Norm WYNDHAM, that the report of that Committee held on 17 March 2015, be adopted.


Councillor McLACHLAN: Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Before I move onto the item before us at item A, I'd just like to continue with a few comments from earlier and also to applaud the DEPUTY MAYOR, Councillor SCHRINNER, for his passionate support for the idea of choice. It's what we stand for on this side of the Chamber, I think it's what differentiates us from the other side and I certainly do hope that the Labor Party pulls back from the precipice of its Soviet-style diktats on what people can and can't buy when it comes to their tacit support for the ludicrous campaign to ban the sale of water bottles in Brisbane.

As I said earlier in the Chamber, we have a very good story on recycling; it's a pity that that doesn't have bipartisan support from the other side. But the outcomes stand for themselves; I repeated earlier the statistics provided by Visy about what passes through Gibson Island on an annual basis. That's a very good story when it comes to recycling; nearly 50,000 tonnes of paper, 2400 tonnes of plastic—of water bottles the Labor Party believes don't get recycled, that they say ends up only in landfill or as roadside litter.

That goes to producing water bottles. So, look, it is a matter of choice, certainly we would encourage everybody to buy bottles that can be refilled and to use tap water. Of course that's to be encouraged. But as I said, this is a matter of choice and the idea of banning the sale of water bottles in Brisbane is ludicrous and the Labor Party should rule it out absolutely.


Councillor McLACHLAN: Madam Chairman, to continue the theme of recycling that was the matter before us at item A, the Committee presentation last week on our resource recovery centre. This is a further contribution to the recycling and resource reuse story of Brisbane. The Willawong facility was upgraded in 2013, the other transfer stations are currently in the process of being upgraded. Construction of those new facilities will be completed this year and open for business shortly thereafter, once the construction has completed, weather and ground conditions permitting, with building in difficult circumstances always on former landfill sites. Construction can be sometimes difficult but that is the current program for completion this year.

But what that has done at Willawong, what it will do at Ferny Grove, at Nudgee and Chandler, is to increase the freedom of choice for our residents. When they


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go to the transfer stations, they can drop off the things that can be recycled and put into the pit for landfill—only the minimum amount of things that can't be recycled. This is an excellent delivery of the Council's program as we continue our journey towards zero waste. This Administration is always looking for ways to improve on the way our residents have the capacity to improve their knowledge and understanding and capacity to join us on that journey towards zero waste. Thank you, Madam Chair.



Chairman: Councillor OWEN-TAYLOR.

Councillor OWEN-TAYLOR: Thank you, Madam Chairman, I just rise to speak briefly in respect of the Willawong Transfer Station and the resource recovery centre. Madam Chairman, it was great to actually be there the day that we opened the resource recovery centre because it is very much a jewel in the crown and it is a great way that we can assist our local residents with providing an opportunity for them to actually recycle a lot of their materials. Can I say, Councillor McLACHLAN, I had a very old trailer that has seen its way to being part of the steel that has been recycled from that resource recovery centre?

But there are so many things that people do have in their properties that sometimes they think, “oh what am I going to do with this”? The resource recovery centre does give them a viable option and it does give them that capacity to really not just add it to landfill. That is something that we have to be very cognisant of, as a Council, that there is limited space across our city and across particularly our state for landfill resources. So we really have to focus on the ways that we can reduce the amount of waste going to landfill. This is a very important step in the right direction.

The very fact that we've had over 57,000 vehicles through the resource recovery centre at Willawong is very significant. Because having that number of vehicles go through shows that there are extremely high levels of public support for this very purpose. We even go down to the extent of teaching recycling to our young people in our schools. Those young people are gradually growing up; they've grown up with an era as a generation of recyclers.

So they will be looking continuously for these opportunities. That's why I think it's absolutely fantastic that there will be new resource recovery centres at Chandler, Ferny Grove and Nudgee. They are great additions to our ward and certainly having them on each extremity of the city is going to assist a wider spread of resource recovery opportunities. Just the sheer fact that the tip shop items for resale has increased by 100 per cent, which in itself is significant as well. Because it shows that people are not just taking the items there to recycle them, but they're actually going there to pick up recycled items.

So it is a completely different concept for a lot of people. But it is certainly one that is growing in our local communities. Can I say, it is extremely commendable that we have diverted 4582 tonnes of recyclable items from landfill? That is a lot of space in a landfill and when we do have limited availability, it really does enhance our long-term sustainability of our landfill sites, but it also is a better environmental outcome not only for our city but also our state and our nation and for future generations. Thank you, Madam Chairman.


Upon being submitted to the Chamber, the motion for the adoption of the report of the Field Services Committee was declared carried on the voices.


ATTENDANCE:

Councillor David McLachlan (Chairman), Councillor Norm Wyndham (Deputy Chairman), and Councillors


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Peter Cumming, Nicole Johnston, Kim Marx and Ian McKenzie.

A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – COUNCIL’S NEW RESOURCE RECOVERY CENTRES

526/2014-151. Arron Lee, Manager, Waste and Resource Recovery Services, Field Services Group, Brisbane

Infrastructure division, attended the meeting to provide information on Council’s new resource recovery centres (RRC). He provided the information below.

2. Council’s RRCs:- contribute to the delivery of Program 1.9 – Managing and Reducing Brisbane’s Waste and

Litter- reduce waste to landfill and subsequently support:

- Towards Zero Waste strategy- Council’s vision for a clean, green city- 2012-13 Lord Mayor deliverables

- improve peak period processing times.

3. Many councils, both locally and internationally, large and small, have implemented RRCs. They are seen as the most cost effective way to divert self-haul waste from landfill. Waste recovery is further supported and promoted by Council’s Recycling Art Competition and the Endeavour Foundation. Endeavour Foundation workers run tips shops and assist Council to identifying reusable items at the Willawong RRC.

4. Most RRCs are linked to tip shops or recycling markets. Photographs were shown of RRCs and recycling markets in locations such as Bundaberg, North Queensland and the United Kingdom.

5. The first RRC, built at Willawong, was opened by Councillor Graham Quirk, Lord Mayor, on 14 November 2013. Since opening, Willawong RRC has:- processed 57,302 vehicles- diverted 4,582 tonnes of recyclable items from landfill- increased recycling at the transfer station by 21 per cent- increased tip shop items for resale by almost 100 per cent.Twenty-two per cent of all self-haul waste received at Willawong is now diverted from landfill (53 per cent if green waste is included).

6. Photographs were shown of slip lanes and an exit gatehouse which were part of the upgrade to the existing Willawong transfer station. Both changes have improved efficiency at the site.

7. The materials that are separated at RRCs include:- paper/cardboard- ferrous steel (washing machines, fridges etc.)- nonferrous steel (copper and aluminium pipe etc.)- car batteries and personal batteries (AA etc.)- paint (water and oil based)- e-waste- glass bottles- gas bottles- florescent tubes- reuse items for tip shops - mobile phones- polystyrene.

8. New RRCs are being constructed at:- Chandler, to be opened in April 2015- Ferny Grove, to be opened in August 2015- Nudgee, to be opened in November 2015.The layout of new RRCs will differ due to site constraints but the systems used will be the same.


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9. Following a number of questions from the Committee, the Chairman thanked Mr Lee for his presentation.

10. RECOMMENDATION:


BRISBANE LIFESTYLE COMMITTEE

Councillor Krista ADAMS, Chairman of the Brisbane Lifestyle Committee, moved, seconded by Councillor Andrew WINES, that the report of that Committee held on 17 March 2015, be adopted.


Councillor ADAMS: Thank you, Madam Chair. To our presentation last week. We saw the update on the Cost of Crime campaign, which is going into its second year with our partnership with Crime Stoppers Queensland. Last year, we saw a great turnout at our pop-up events that were held through many suburbs in Brisbane; New Farm, Mitchelton, West End, Indooroopilly, Forest Lake, Moorooka, Seventeen Mile Rocks, Wynnum, Sandgate and, of course, the CBD as well.

This is a fantastic contract that we have with Crime Stoppers. They are a community volunteer organisation that believes that they can really make a difference by just getting the general public to get involved and to give them the information that may help them solve and prevent crime. So they receive anonymous information obviously and allocate it then to the most appropriate group to respond to.

Last year, December last year, was actually the 25th anniversary of Crime Stoppers. It was great to attend their Christmas function and the celebration of this event. It was a big day and we are one of their major sponsors now with this program, at $250,000 a year via our Taskforce Against Graffiti budget. So last year, we had the focus on graffiti, as was mentioned in Council last week. This year, we are focusing on vandalism and the cost to Council of repairing the incidents of vandalism we have across the city.

The pop-up campaign did very, very well last year and everybody seems to really love those big price tags that are around showing us how much the cost actually is. I think the big thing to note is that we really did see some qualitative research as well that showed us that people were actually responding to this with increased calls to their—to Council's contact centre and to the Crime Stoppers as well around these incidents.

They had specifically 13 intelligence calls that led to two further arrests, which is fantastic to see, 14,500 visits to the Crime Stoppers web page, which is great off the back of these pop-up events, so more than they usually get as well. We also had an increase in our visits to our graffiti page as well, from Council, which is a great outcome as well.

Channels 7, 9 and 10 promote them throughout the year. I have to say very interestingly they've now transferred—or I should say translated some of their collateral this year into languages other than English: Vietnamese, Traditional Chinese, Arabic and Hindi. So as we go around the suburbs, we'll be able to use those as well. So it's fantastic to see this three-year campaign moving into its second year. Best of luck to Crime Stoppers as they roll them out.

It will be coming to a suburb near you, you just won't find out till about a week before it actually comes to that suburb. So you'll have to all wait with baited breath to see if you are the lucky ward that will be getting one of the events this year.

We also had two petitions before us last week. The first one was with regards to Roy Harvey Park. The guest speaker came and joined us last week, on Roy


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Harvey Park, and as everyone heard me explain, we are working with the local residents and talking about what they do see as appropriate in Roy Harvey Park at this point in time, the extent of the intensity that the AFL was suggesting is not what we think is appropriate in Roy Harvey Park. We're still working with the AFL to see what we could do to support them, because we do realise that there is also that balance of not enough sporting fields for some of our community sporting clubs around Brisbane as well.

The other petition was a wider Brisbane Citywide petition which was similar to a petition that was through a couple of months ago about the keeping of chickens on multi-unit dwellings and around body corporates; which I did go through in much depth the last time that petition came to the Chamber. Thank you, Madam Chair.



Seriatim - Clause BCouncillor Milton DICK requested that Clause B, PETITIONS – REQUESTING COUNCIL BAN CHICKENS FROM TOWNHOUSE DEVELOPMENTS AND MULTI-UNIT DWELLING PRECINCTS, be taken seriatim for voting purposes.

Councillor Dick: As much as Councillor ADAMS outlined that she's given her views, I too had outlined the views of the petitioners at that time and would ask that item be taken so that we could vote on that separately.

Chairman: Sure. Further debate?

Chairman: Councillor HOWARD.

Councillor HOWARD: Thank you, Madam Chairman. Madam Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to speak to item A of the Lifestyle report. As Councillor ADAMS is saying, the Cost of Crime program and the Crime Stoppers organisation as a whole are very important to me and I'm glad that the report talks about Crime Stoppers' 25th anniversary on 13 December 2014. That's because, with the indulgence of the Chamber, I'd also like to recognise their 25th anniversary.

As the minutes say, they've been in our community now for 25 years, the community volunteer organisation that believes the general public can help make a difference in solving and preventing crime. In recognising this work of the organisation, it's important to remember the valuable contribution of people like Graham Jones as the inaugural chairman and Jim Planincic and David Muir and of course Superintendent David Tucker who were tireless in assisting to establish and guide the organisation in its early days, along with Paul Hodge and Trevor Markwell of the Queensland Police Service.

I'm delighted to be reminded through the minutes that we at Council have now been a major sponsor of Crime Stoppers since 2010. Because I know that these funds directly go to the coal face to ensure that the organisation fulfils one of its priorities, and ours, which is to increase the awareness of city residents about the impact of criminal activity and it encourages people to report it.

Almost 20 years ago, I started my career in the community as the company secretary of Crime Stoppers Queensland. Back then, I argued that what was needed to reduce crime was a focus from everyone, including government, on firm, practical solutions that addressed the root causes of crime and that were proven to work. It's a view I've retained and an approach that we have pursued in this place. Because ensuring people are free from crime and free from the fear of crime is essential to the foundation of any liberal society.

The Cost of Crime campaign is indeed a firm, practical approach, Madam Chairman. The three-year project as outlined by Councillor ADAMS, the costs of graffiti in year one, to the costs of vandalism in year two and finally the cost of all crime in year three, is based on the principle of raising the community's


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awareness to take notice of their surroundings, the neighbourhood and to reject vandalism.

I know from firsthand experience of their pop-up events where price tags indicating the real cash costs of graffiti and other vandalism gets cut through in the community and in the media. That cut through is important and is encouraging, as Councillor ADAMS said, that the research conducted has indicated more than 1100 calls were made to the Council's contact centre, including 13 intelligence calls providing information on the perpetrators of graffiti vandalism.

14,400 people viewing the Crime Stoppers webpage directly associated with this campaign. The page views to Council's graffiti information went up and the Crime Stoppers Facebook page had more than 10,500 views during the campaign, compared to 2500 outside of that campaign period. Pleasingly, it is good to read of the planning of the future stages as well. A presence at the EKKA, the Green Heart Fairs and to continue this fantastic momentum.

Madam Chairman, we all know that a one-size-fits-all policy does not work when we are talking about crime. So I thank the various officers here at Council and in the State and Federal spaces for the work that they do to continue to really engage with local communities to act upon this issue that really matters to them, thank you.



Chairman: Councillor WYNDHAM.

Councillor WYNDHAM: Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I rise to speak briefly on Roy Harvey Park. Roy Harvey Park, as we know with the speaker in last week, is an area in my electorate where both cricket and soccer training takes place, and cricket games. But, Madam Chair, recently Wilston Grange Football Club also applied for a lease over Roy Harvey Park for four to five nights a week and Saturdays for seven months of each year for AFL.

Madam Chair, as you would probably recognise, I think, most residents would be a little upset that when they live probably 10 to 15 metres from that field that their evenings and their weekends would be greatly disrupted. Madam Chair, first we have to look, I guess, at the history of what's happened with this. That would be that funding for lighting et cetera was awarded to the club by the then State member, Stirling Hinchliffe. So they have the money for lighting and provisions for nets, et cetera, for a prevention of balls going onto the roads.

That was issued with the situation that they were looking at using Stafford School where this proposal was rejected. They've since been given opportunities at about five or six other fields, of which they're using some, at Somerset Hills. But according to the club, they find Somerset Hills ovals a little small for their training. I don't know too much about AFL but figure two ovals is fairly decent size for nine to 11 year olds to train for AFL, even if they have to adapt their training methods. It's not as if it's being used for game days. On the Saturday, perhaps, they could look at another venue.

But, Madam Chair, I've had many a conversation with local residents, I've surveyed the local residents on several occasions. The locals themselves have put together petitions. As it stands at the moment, Madam Chair, the AFL have been refused that lease but we are looking at perhaps another form of the lease on a seasonal basis. But I will stand by my locals that every night of the week and Saturdays is certainly too much. But I also call upon the State member to, I guess; assist with trying to support the club in finding a more suitable venue closer to their own fields.

As this was originally an issue that was brought up, or I guess put upon us by the State Government, the previous Bligh State Government who've initially given the club funding and now the club has nowhere to spend that funding in relation to developing a field. But, Madam Chair, I'd also like to thank the Brisbane Lifestyle Committee members and of course the Council officers


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who've worked tirelessly on this since November last year. I would like to thank them for their input and I'm sure we haven't heard the end of this. But I will certainly be working towards helping the local community resolve the issues around this park and trying to come up with a solution for the football club as well.

Thank you, Madam Chair.


Clause A and C put

Upon being submitted to the meeting the motion for the adoption of Clauses A and C of the report of the Brisbane Lifestyle Committee was declared carried on the voices.

Clause B put

Upon being submitted to the meeting the motion for the adoption of Clause B of the report of the Brisbane Lifestyle Committee was declared carried on the voices.


ATTENDANCE:

Councillor Krista Adams (Chairman), Councillor Andrew Wines (Deputy Chairman), and Councillors Steve Griffiths, Vicki Howard, Steven Huang and Victoria Newton.

A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – BRISBANE CITY COUNCIL AND CRIME STOPPERS PARTNERSHIP ‘THE COST OF CRIME’

527/2014-151. Linda Gillam, Business Improvement and Strategy Manager, Compliance and Regulatory Services

Branch, Brisbane Lifestyle Division, attended the meeting to provide an update on Brisbane City Council and Crime Stoppers Partnership ‘The Cost of Crime’. She provided the information below.

2. Crime Stoppers Queensland Limited (CSQL) is a community volunteer organisation that believes the general public can help make a difference in solving and preventing crime. They receive anonymous information about crime and allocate it to the most appropriate police group to respond to it. 13 December 2014 was the 25 year anniversary of Crime Stoppers.

3. Council is one of the major sponsors of Crime Stoppers via the Taskforce Against Graffiti (TAG) budget, providing a $250,000 per annum sponsorship grant to the organisation that contributes to some administrative support, and funds campaigns that seek to raise awareness of city residents about the impact of criminal activity and encourages people to report it. The first-three year agreement was implemented in 2010, and was renewed in 2013 through to 2016.

4. Prior to 2013, the Tag them Back campaign was advertising based, including multiple channels, such as news media, posters, Queensland Rail monitors in rail stations and Council officer desk tops. Advertising campaigns have been graffiti related, for example, Tag them Back identified what communities were not able to implement as a result of the investment required to remove graffiti; things such as additional park equipment.

5. In 2013, Council renewed the three year partnership and suggested a refresh of the campaign be carried out. ‘The Cost of Crime’ campaign was a new proposal, agreed by Council and launched in March 2014. This proposal features a broader and escalating scope; from the cost of graffiti in year one, to the cost of all vandalism in year two and finally to the cost of all crime in year three. The Cost of Crime is a pop-up events based campaign, supported by media coverage wherein the program places price tags indicating the real cash cost of graffiti and other vandalism to the community. This program bases itself on the principle of raising the community’s awareness to take notice of their surroundings, the neighbourhood and to reject vandalism.


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6. The ‘Cost of Crime’ pop-up campaign uses innovative community engagement techniques and provides Councillors an opportunity to be involved at local events. These are pop-up, community based events, designed to attract attention. Crime Stoppers staff and volunteers, Council’s Taskforce Against Graffiti, and where possible, graffiti removal officers have attended to answer questions and provide information to the public. Local Councillors are invited one week prior to events via a detailed email containing campaign background, date and time. It highlights the costs of crime and what could be done to make Brisbane a better place to live. Highly visible tags attract the community’s attention. The Committee was shown one example of the price tags used in this campaign, depicting the over-all cost of graffiti. Individual tags like the one shown were attached to light poles or other park equipment to illustrate the actual cost of graffiti removal and management. The punch line, “See it, Report it, Stop it” is prominently used.

7. Written information is handed out to the passing public. Surveys are completed to understand both public perception of graffiti as a crime, the likelihood they would report graffiti, and other feedback to help build more effective events and information. Local businesses are engaged before and after the events to also gain feedback on benefits and effectiveness of events.

8. CSQL has translated the Cost of Crime-Graffiti brochures and information to Vietnamese, Traditional Chinese, Arabic and Hindi. These will roll out across future events and be uploaded to the Crime Stoppers - Cost of Crime-Graffiti website for reference.

9. The outcomes and evaluation of the first year of the ‘Cost of Graffiti’ campaign were shared. In 2014, the events were:- New Farm- Mitchelton- West End- Indooroopilly- Forest Lake- Moorooka- Seventeen Mile Rocks- Wynnum- Sandgate- Brisbane CBD (Post Office Square).

10. The launch featured on all major television networks including channels Seven, Nine and Ten to achieve a reach in excess of 1.65 million viewers, and the subsequent events have achieved cover in excess of 5.1 million across all media. The pop-up events have been included in a range of advertising media including:- Facebook advertising placement every month- Brisbane Times- 4BC Radio campaign and live reads- Nova - outdoor placement on billboard, scooters and bus shelters in pop-up event locations.

11. Qualitative research conducted by Crime Stoppers to assess market perception of campaign indicated that:- more than 1100 calls were made to Council’s Contact Centre, including 13 intelligence calls

providing information on the perpetrators of graffiti vandalism.- 14,400 people viewed the Crime Stoppers webpage directly associated with this campaign

(more than any other page on their website). - page views to Council’s graffiti information, went up from 8000 to 8300- Crime Stoppers Facebook page had more than 10,500 views during the campaign, compared to

2,500 outside of the campaign period.

12. Building on momentum gained from Cost of Crime Graffiti campaign in year one (2014), a similar strategy of pop-up and static events for 2015 will be adopted over the next nine months with a focus on the cost of vandalism, including graffiti vandalism. Vandalism on City Assets ranges from scratching bus windows and slashing seats, to burning park benches, to ‘tagging’ traffic signal boxes. The total figure of more than $4 million affects multiple areas across Council.

13. The key learnings and feedback from year one of the campaign will be incorporated. This includes improvements to the event messaging to include greater emphasis on:


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- the ability to remain anonymous- choices for and ease of reporting, for example, Crime Stoppers for crime in action, Council

Contact Centre for removal and repair, Graffitistop to report Graffiti or graffiti related activity- consequence of crime, such as reduced perception of safety, lower property values, for

example, ‘the what’s in it for me’ component.

14. In addition, improvements for year two of the campaign include: - events will be longer in duration allowing more engagement with the community - families will be catered for by including activities for children. Free children’s activity hubs

will be created next to every pop-up event to draw in target audience- the events will be held on Saturdays for eight hours to maximize exposure- the key messages will be focusing on reporting social and financial costs- there will be increased social media advertising- promotion with businesses will be continued- new price tag signage related to vandalism, including a colour change and hand out

information has been developed to suit wider messaging for this escalated year two cost of vandalism campaign activity and new brochures will be circulated

- radio and local newspaper placements will be continued- locations for events have been determined using high community use locations

15. The campaign will feature at the CSQL site at the Ekka and at Green Heart Fairs. Additionally, there are five community events planned for the next nine months. These started with the launch by the Lord Mayor and the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Crime Stoppers at Southbank on 10 March 2015. The launch was well covered by various media.

16. The Lord Mayor spoke at the event about the cost of vandalism in our community and encouraging people to report graffiti and other acts of crime. He explained that the money spent repairing vandalism and removing graffiti could be better spent on other things for the community. The Lord Mayor also spoke about how Council continues to fight graffiti across the city and prosecute graffiti offenders.

17. Trevor O’Hara, CEO of Crime Stoppers QLD, spoke at the event about how year one highlighted the cost of graffiti and how this year the campaign also includes the cost of vandalism. Mr O’Hara encouraged people to report any information to Crime Stoppers that might be helpful to identify the culprits and reminded them that reporting is anonymous. He also spoke of how this campaign aligns with the vision Council has for the city, making it a safer place to live.

18. Year three of the campaign focuses on the cost of crime. How much does Council spend on repairs, maintenance and replacement of public assets as a result of criminal activity? Planning has not yet begun, however while vandalism may have the greatest immediate impact; crimes of theft, drug use in public places and safety audits will be considered during input to year three strategies for the campaign.

19. The Chairman thanked Ms Gillam for the informative presentation.

20. RECOMMENDATION:


B PETITIONS – REQUESTING COUNCIL BAN CHICKENS FROM TOWNHOUSE DEVELOPMENTS AND MULTI-UNIT DWELLING PRECINCTSCA15/95465 and CA15/113254

528/2014-1521. Council received two petitions to ban chickens from townhouse developments and multi-unit dwelling

precincts. Both petitions were presented by Councillor Milton Dick. The petition CA15/95465 was presented and received at the meeting of Council on 10 February 2015 and the petition CA15/113254 was presented and received at the meeting of Council on 17 February 2014.

22. The Divisional Manager, Brisbane Lifestyle provided the information below.


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23. The two petitions contain a total of 82 signatures.

24. Council administers and enforces the regulations around the keeping of animals in accordance with the Animals Local Law 2003 and the Animals Subordinate Local Law 2003.

25. Compliance and Regulatory Services branch and Brisbane City Legal Practice examined the local laws and found no restrictions relating to the keeping of chickens in townhouse developments or multi-unit dwelling precincts, as long as all minimum standards are observed. As such, the decision on whether chickens are permitted lies solely with the Body Corporate and the tenants of such precincts, in accordance with the Body Corporate and Community Management Act 1997.

26. Council has no jurisdiction over private agreements made by Body Corporates, unless those agreements operate outside the boundaries of Queensland Government legislation and local laws administered by Council.

27. As such, there are no current grounds for Council to intervene in this matter. Council has no plans to review the local law in relation to the keeping of chickens in residential areas, at this time. However, the petitioners’ request to change the legislation regulating the keeping of chickens at townhouse developments and multi-unit dwelling precincts will be considered during any future review of the local law.

28. The Divisional Manager therefore recommends as follows and the Committee agrees, with Councillors Victoria Newton and Steve Griffiths dissenting.

29. RECOMMENDATION:

THAT THE INFORMATION IN THIS SUBMISSION BE NOTED AND THE DRAFT RESPONSE, AS SET OUT IN ATTACHMENT A submitted hereunder, BE SENT TO THE HEAD PETITIONER.

Attachment A Draft Response

Thank you for your petitions requesting Council ban chickens from townhouse developments and multi-unit dwelling precincts.

As you are aware, the keeping of animals in Brisbane is regulated by Council’s Animals Local Law 2003, and the Animals Subordinate Local Law 2003. Currently, there are no restrictions relating to the keeping of chickens in multi-unit dwelling precincts, as long as all minimum standards are observed. The decision on whether chickens are permitted lies solely with the Body Corporate and the tenants of such precincts, in accordance with the Body Corporate and Community Management Act 1997.

Council has no jurisdiction over private agreements made by Body Corporates, unless those agreements operate outside the boundaries of Queensland Government legislation and local laws administered by Council.

Council has no plans to review the local law in relation to the keeping of chickens in residential areas, at this time. However, your request to change the legislation regulating the keeping of chickens at townhouse developments and multi-unit dwelling precincts will certainly be considered during any future review of the local law.

If you have any further questions, please contact Mr Peter Jasper, Senior Project Officer, from Compliance and Regulatory Services branch, on 3403 8888.

Thank you for raising this matter.ADOPTED


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C PETITION – OBJECTING TO ROY HARVEY PARK BEING USED AS AN AUSTRALIAN FOOTBALL LEAGUE TRAINING FACILITYCA14/1010286

529/2014-1530. A petition from residents, requesting Council consider the residents’ objections to Roy Harvey Park

being used as an Australian Football League training facility was received during the Summer Recess 2014-15.

31. The Divisional Manager, Brisbane Lifestyle provided the information below.

32. The petition contains 57 signatures.

33. The petition relates to a proposal from the Wilston Grange Australian Football Club Inc. (the club) to upgrade, and be granted a lease over, Roy Harvey Park for use as a junior AFL training facility. The proposal included the installation of field lighting, development of a storage shed and improvements to the field surface. The club proposed to use Roy Harvey Park for junior AFL training during the winter season, from March to September, Monday to Thursday, from 4pm to 6.30pm and Saturday mornings from 8am to 1pm.

35. On 16 October 2014, Council provided conditional in-principle support for the club’s proposal. As part of the conditional support, Council set a number of conditions on the club, including the requirement to undertake local community consultation and prepare a maintenance and development plan.

36. On 29 November 2014, the club held an information session at Roy Harvey Park, which was attended by Councillor Norm Wyndham, Councillor for McDowall Ward, Councillor Fiona King, Councillor for Marchant Ward, and Mr Jim Brabon, Community Facilities Operations Team Leader, Connected Communities. All written feedback received at the information session and additional written feedback received from local residents following the information session was reviewed by Council. The major concerns included traffic volumes, parking, noise, lighting impacts, and park access restrictions for local residents.

37. On 4 March 2015, Council completed its review of the club’s proposal, taking into account the issues raised by local residents during community consultation. Based on the traffic and parking issues in the streets surrounding Roy Harvey Park, and the expected amenity impacts on local residents, Council withdrew its in-principle support for the club’s proposal.

38. Council will continue to work with the club to find a suitable site for a junior AFL training facility in their catchment.

Consultation

39. Councillor Norm Wyndham, Councillor for McDowall Ward is in agreement with the recommendation.

40. The Divisional Manager therefore recommends as follows and the Committee agrees, with Councillors Victoria Newton and Steve Griffiths abstaining from the vote.

41. RECOMMENDATION:

THAT THE INFORMATION IN THIS SUBMISSION BE NOTED AND THE DRAFT RESPONSE, AS SET OUT IN ATTACHMENT A submitted hereunder, BE SENT TO THE HEAD PETITIONER.

Attachment A Draft Response

Thank you for your petition objecting to Roy Harvey Park, 34 Byth Street, Stafford, being used as an Australian Football League (AFL) training facility.

As you may be aware, on 16 October 2014, Council provided conditional in-principle support for the proposal from Wilston Grange Australian Football Club Inc (the club) to upgrade and use Roy Harvey Park. As part of the conditional support, Council set a number of conditions on the club, including the


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requirement to undertake local community consultation and prepare a maintenance and development plan.

As part of the local community consultation, the club held an information session on 29 November 2014 at Roy Harvey Park, which was attended by Council representatives, including Councillor Norm Wyndham, Councillor for McDowall Ward. All written feedback received at the information session and additional written feedback received from local residents following the information session was reviewed by Council.

On 4 March 2015, Council completed its review of the club’s proposal, taking into account the issues raised by local residents during community consultation. Based on the traffic and parking issues in the streets surrounding Roy Harvey Park, and the expected amenity impacts on local residents, Council has withdrawn its support for the club’s proposal.

Council will continue to work with the club to find a suitable site for a junior AFL training facility in their catchment. Should you wish to discuss this matter further, please contact Mr Jim Brabon, Community Facilities Operations Team Leader, Connected Communities, on 3403 8888.

Thank you for raising this matter.ADOPTED

FINANCE, ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT AND ADMINISTRATION COMMITTEE

Councillor Julian SIMMONDS, Chairman of the Finance, Economic Development and Administration Committee, moved, seconded by Councillor Angela OWEN-TAYLOR that the report of that Committee held on 17 March 2015, be adopted.


Councillor SIMMONDS: Thank you, Madam Chairman. Just briefly, to thank the Disaster Management operations team members who presented to the Committee last week about their system for dealing with disasters. This is the back-of-house system they use to log and task jobs. It's an incredibly sophisticated bit of kit that they use also to connect with other agencies such as the State Government and Queensland Fire and Rescue and others.

I think it was quite enlightening for the Councillors who were present there amongst us to get a feel for the process they go through when an event occurs and a job is logged either by a Councillor or by a member of the public, and to see the way that that flows through to our Local Assets team members who then get out there and action the job—the seamless way that that can be tasked and prioritised depending on the city's needs.

So if people haven't had the opportunity to be there as part of that presentation and if you want to have a look at it, the offer is there to be briefed on it. Because it is a really interesting bit of kit. Thank you.



Councillor JOHNSTON: Yes, just briefly on item A, Madam Chairman. Because I understand there are some residents waiting patiently in the gallery for a discussion in general business which is the next item, so I'll be quick. I'm interested to hear what the issue is. I just want to put on the record, Madam Chairman, a few comments about the disaster management issues that were raised in this Committee.

Firstly, I'll say that I'm not a member of this Committee; therefore I'm not entitled to a copy of the agenda. So I have no idea about what's actually coming to the Committee until I'm given the Council papers on the following Thursday. So I did not know that this matter was coming to the Committee and I would have been interested in attending and understanding more about this issue.


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I have some concerns about the way in which we go about disaster management, particularly the recovery side of disaster management. Having been through, in my ward, some of the most horrific events that this Council's experienced over the last few years, unfortunately we are somewhat disaster weary in Tennyson Ward.

There is a good level of awareness in my ward about how to prepare for storms and flooding. But what I can say is; there is a gap between the expectations of the community with respect to recovery and the delivery of services by this Council. What I will say is; we are getting our initial response better. That is the immediate response to the aftermath of a disaster is improving. I can see that after the super storm last year.

However, the big issue, as I see it, is with the recovery and rehabilitation phase. It's now some four or five months after the super storm and—

Councillor SIMMONDS: Point of order, Madam Chairman.

Chairman: Yes, point of order against you, Councillor JOHNSTON.

Councillor SIMMONDS: You've given a lot of leeway, this is about the tasking the system the disaster management system uses, not months after a—

Chairman: Yes, thank you Councillor SIMMONDS. I was about to bring Councillor JOHNSTON back to this particular report and the content of this report. Not whatever she wants to talk about in relation to disasters. So, Councillor JOHNSTON, to the actual issues in this report or please resume your seat.

Councillor JOHNSTON: Well, Madam Chairman, thank you. I've read this report and as I said, this is the only thing I can speak on. I refer you to paragraph three which talks about the impact of the November 27 supercell storm. I also refer you to paragraph 10 which talks about the recovery and resilience functions that are exercised by this Committee. Now again, these are matters that are in the report before us today which I have read and I am attempting to respond to and to address the matters that affect the constituents in my ward.

I note the juvenile behaviour of the Finance Chairman over there—

Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON. Councillor JOHNSTON, when I speak, you stop. I would ask you to withdraw that comment.

Councillor JOHNSTON: His head on the desk is not juvenile behaviour, Madam Chairman?

Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON, don't argue with me. If I ask you to withdraw, you withdraw the comment.

Councillor JOHNSTON: Madam Chairman, I withdraw.

Chairman: Thank you.

Councillor JOHNSTON: Let me say, Madam Chairman, I don't think Councillor SIMMONDS putting his head on the desk and attempting some sort of response after he's made a spurious point of order is appropriate. Now I represent residents, Madam Chairman, who have gone through so many natural disasters and I want to make a contribution on their behalf to the way in which this city recovers from natural disasters.

Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON, you've got plenty of opportunity in general business to speak about whatever you wish. This is a specific report.

Councillor JOHNSTON: Yes, Madam Chairman, and I want to raise as part of this, things like paragraph seven, strategy is a key component of Council's Disaster Management arrangements. Madam Chairman, paragraph 10, recovery and resilience functions are undertaken to enhance outreach and promote awareness including blah blah blah. Now, Madam Chairman, I can go back to reading out word for word these reports, which I know you don't like. But I would prefer to have a proper debate in this area where I can put on the record, while Councillor SIMMONDS is sitting here, Madam Chairman, my concerns about how this Administration and this Council respond to disasters.


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Now that is the purpose of the report before us today. That is the point that I wanted to make in about three minutes and sit down. But there seems to be this idea that I'm not allowed to speak on disaster recovery in this place. Well, Madam Chairman, let me be clear. This Council needs to change the way it undertakes recovery and rehabilitation works. There is a lack of communication with Councillors and there is a lack of communication with residents about expectations around recovery and rehabilitation after an incident has occurred.

Now I've spoken with the manager of Local Assets South specifically about this and he agrees Madam Chairman that this is something this Council could do better. I wanted to put that on the record today because I think there is always an opportunity to reflect on disasters. As clearly Councillor SIMMONDS thinks because this report's come to us for debate. That there are clearly lessons that can be learnt from disasters and there are clearly lessons, Madam Chairman that we can incorporate into the way Council recovers from disasters.

Now that is the simple point that I wanted to make. This Council's a $3 billion entity and a $25 million clean-up has derailed the ordinary business of this Council following the November super storm. I can tell you it has not been fully fixed in my ward, Madam Chairman. The impacts of that storm will be felt for years. Madam Chairman, I can see—I can see that all the jobs we logged as a result of the storm are still waiting, in some cases, for action.

Now it's great we can track them. One of the things the Local Asset Services (LAS) manager said to me, Madam Chairman, was when he got some push back from in town about the impact of the storm in Tennyson Ward, he could point to the electronic mapping that showed where all the damage was occurring across the city. He said it was very hard for them to say there wasn't a problem when he could point to their own maps that showed where it was.

Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON. Councillor JOHNSTON, I am concerned about the way in which you are conducting this debate and the way you are implicating Council staff. I think you are very badly—think about what you're saying. Think about it.

Councillor JOHNSTON: Madam Chairman, all I was—

Chairman: Please keep it to—it's not about Asset Services, it's about the actual—it's the area that Councillor SIMMONDS is responsible for, it is the system, it is the overarching system.

Councillor JOHNSTON: Madam Chairman, the people who carry out the work are our LAS officers. Now, Madam Chairman, I think it's—

Councillor SIMMONDS: Point of order, Madam Chairman.

Chairman: Point of order against you, Councillor JOHNSTON.

Chairman: Just a minute Councillor SIMMONDS. Yes, point of order.

Councillor SIMMONDS: By her own admission, she's talking about Local Asset officers who are not covered by this Committee. I do not have any responsibility over the LAS crews of this city.

Chairman: Thank you, Councillor SIMMONDS. Councillor JOHNSON, please stick to what's in the report and just be mindful of what you are putting on the record.

Councillor JOHNSTON: Madam Chairman, I will refer to the Local Disaster Coordination Committee (LDCC) people in the Local Disaster Management Group then. I won't say where they're from but what I will say, Madam Chairman, is the people that I deal with, with respect to the disaster recovery issues, are our local Council officers who are on the ground. They're the people that respond to disasters and they're the people who are tasked into the roles to manage the disaster.

Now it's quite reasonable that I would discuss with them the outcomes and the impacts of these storms, Madam Chairman, and any other natural disaster. I'm quite surprised that you're trying to imply I've said something wrong here today when all I'm saying is that I have had discussions with them and I am, Madam Chairman, wanting to put the learnings from the natural disasters we've


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had and my discussions with the officers on the record so we can continue to improve as a Council.

That is my point here, there is no nefarious purpose. I simply have a forum here where you're all a captive audience and I can put these concerns on the record. I think we can do better in dealing with the rehabilitation and recovery aspects of natural disasters. I would like to make a contribution to that, Madam Chairman, and I will continue to do so, on behalf of my residents.


Chairman: Councillor SIMMONDS.

Councillor SIMMONDS: Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. What contribution? What contribution? I just heard five minutes on how she's—the Councillor for Tennyson's desperate to make a contribution, I heard no suggestion, not a single one, other than the fact that she'd like to be talked to a bit more. Then she turns around and spends the next minute about how her officers are talking to her in the ward.

What suggestion? What meaningful contribution have you possibly made?


Chairman: Order. Councillor JOHNSTON! Councillor JOHNSTON! Councillor JOHNSTON.

Councillor SIMMONDS: What contribution does Councillor JOHNSTON make to this city, to the disaster recovery operations of this city? Absolutely none. All we hear is a five minute speech about her. About her. Woe is her. Woe is her, nobody talks to me, everybody talks to me. It's not a—it was just a little bit of a storm then it's a supercell storm. There's no reason why we should have to put back other work because of a storm to there's still recovery work to be done, won't you please do it right now.

It is hypocritical in the extreme. Until Councillor JOHNSTON has a constructive suggestion to make in this area, she should—the best thing she can do for her residents is to stay seated, so that the people who do the hard work in this city, the Council officers, who do an incredibly diligent job, can get on with the work of helping her residents because she just seems to want to stand in the way. That's what she does, that's her contribution and she should think long and hard about it. Because honestly, submitting this Council to these kinds of diatribes, submitting Council officers to these kinds of diatribes is getting a little bit beyond the pale.

There is a bit of good advice that I can offer to her and to anybody else in this Chamber. When it feels like it's everybody around you, it's probably you. Nobody else in this Chamber has a problem with disaster recovery; everybody thinks the officers are doing a good job. They have shown time and time again, and guess what? Brisbane residents think they're doing a fantastic job.

So when it seems like it's everybody else around you, it's probably you. Nobody else has a problem, Councillor JOHNSTON, so I suspect you should look inside yourself for the problem.

Upon being submitted to the Chamber, the motion for the adoption of the Finance, Economic Development and Administration Committee was declared carried on the voices.


ATTENDANCE:

Councillor Julian Simmonds (Chairman), Councillor Angela Owen-Taylor (Deputy Chairman); and Councillors Kim Flesser, Fiona King, Ryan Murphy and Shayne Sutton.


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A COMMITTEE PRESENTATION – DISASTER MANAGEMENT OFFICE UPDATE

530/2014-151. Shaun Allen, Coordinator, Disaster Management Office, Office of the Lord Mayor and Chief Executive

Officer attended the meeting to provide an update on the Disaster Management Office. He provided the information below.

2. The Disaster Management Office (DMO) is comprised of the following key functions:- Operations- Capability and Development- Strategy- Recovery and Resilience

3. Since September 2014, the DMO has responded to 36 events. Of these 36 events the Local Disaster Coordination Centre (LDCC) was stood up twice for severe weather events on 27 November 2014 and Tropical Cyclone Marcia on 19 February 2015. DMO supported State Emergency Service (SES) operations during both events, specifically policy and command and control. Further events supported in the period included 11 severe weather events, eight severe thunderstorms, eight public disruptions, three fires, three planned burns, one planned major event, one fire weather event and one major event outside of Queensland.

4. The presenter provided statistics for the operations activities since September 2014 which included:- Local Disaster Management Group (LDMG) meetings included one scheduled meeting

(24 September 2014), two event meetings (28 November 2014 and 20 February 2015) with involvement of the LDMG in Exercise Tempest on 23 October 2014.

- DMO Report Statistics included 40 warning orders, 10 preliminary impact assessments, nine DMO Fire SitReps, four additional DMO SitReps and three High Tide Action Plans issued.

- Preparation of storm season activities included LDCC equipment audits including alternate sites, Local Disaster Management Plan (LDMP) review which is on schedule for completion, and continual situational awareness and monitoring.

5. Capability and Development have undertaken the following training and exercise initiatives:- January 2015 had 50 staff trained over four training sessions for Brisbane Incident

Management System Online (BIMS Online), Queensland Disaster Management Arrangements (QDMA) and LDCC Functional Group Specialisation for Rapid Response Group.

- February 2015 had 153 staff trained over 10 training sessions for BIMS Online, QDMA, LDCC Functional Group Specialisations for Planning, Intelligence and Support Groups.

- March 2015 will see 196 staff trained over eight training sessions on the BIMS Online, QDMA, and LDCC Functional Group Specialisations for Operations and Planning Groups.

6. Capability and Development are currently developing two initiatives that will enhance Disaster Management response including:- Proposed exercise – evacuation centre set up exercise for Council staff to sponsor in

partnership with other stakeholders- Proposed training – high level leadership training course for Incident Controllers from the

disaster management workforce.

7. Strategy is a key component of Council’s disaster management arrangements. Council has delivered the 2014 edition of the LDMP and All hazards sub-plans, and standard operating procedures to enhance Council’s coordinated, measured and timely response in times of emergency and disaster events. DMO has reviewed protocols and officer training for the Flood Information Centre to ensure delivery and coordination of strategic flood projects.

8. The presenter discussed the Emergency Management Assurance Framework which is delivered by the Office of the Inspector-General of Emergency Management and how Council is currently considering an implementation approach.

9. Details were provided on the media campaign ‘All Hazards Brisbane Ready for Summer’ Program of Work (incorporating Get Ready Queensland) which is undertaken to educate residents on risks associated with living in a subtropical climate and how to be prepared. The full media campaign is undertaken from July to June with media opportunities on the commencement of the bushfire season and flooding season. Council’s enhanced partnerships for 2014/15 included Red Cross, Queensland


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Ambulance Service, Bureau of Meteorology, SES, Queensland Fire and Emergency Service (QFES), 97.3 Radio and Quest News.

10. Recovery and Resilience functions are undertaken to enhance outreach and promote awareness including recent preparation of a new Council mini Preparedness booklet, QFES Safer Neighbourhood brochures, promotional items, online preparedness risk rating tool, educational online fact sheet for school students.

11. Community engagement activities include educational workshops with TAFE, shopping centre engagement, approximately 33 various events and festivals to date, competitions ‘Selfie up a storm’, Red Cross and Council emergency kit competitions, mail outs and letterbox drops to vulnerable and isolated communities, Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Audience (CALD) workshops, Bunnings promotional days with SES and 512ABC Get Ready Queensland Day and Week.

12. A demonstration of the BIMS Online software was displayed. The BIMS Online system enhances ability to manage DMO business as usual operations, and LDCC and BIMS operations. The benefit of the new system includes Council’s enhanced ability to:- activate a disaster response more quickly- obtain and share information with other agencies more easily- provide quicker and more accurate information to stakeholders and residents- operate with a smaller team due to improved efficiencies- conduct more realistic disaster management exercises to improve response processes- capture greater intelligence and enhanced analysis post-disaster events.

13. Following a number of questions from the Committee, the Chairman thanked Mr Allen for his informative presentation.

14. RECOMMENDATION:


B COMMITTEE REPORT – FINANCIAL REPORTS (ACCOUNTS RECEIVABLE, RATES, INVENTORY, ACCOUNTS PAYABLE, PROVISIONS AND MALLS) FOR THE PERIOD ENDED DECEMBER 2014134/695/317/460

531/2014-1515. The Divisional Manager, Organisational Services, provided a detailed report (submitted on file) on

Council’s position relating to accounts receivable, rates, inventory, accounts payable, provisions and malls for the period ended December 2014.

16. The Chairman and the Committee noted the report. The financial report on Council’s position relating to accounts receivable, rates, inventory, accounts payable, provisions and malls for the period ended December 2014 is now presented to Council for noting.

17. RECOMMENDATION:

THAT THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THE REPORT BE NOTED.ADOPTED

PRESENTATION OF PETITIONS:

Chairman: Councillors, are there any petitions?

Chairman: Councillor WINES.

Councillor WINES: Madam Chairman, I have a petition from the people of Ferny Grove regarding an on-street parking issue.


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Councillor DICK: Thank you, Madam Chairman. I have a petition on behalf of residents regarding a development at Toowong.

Chairman: Further petitions?


532/2014-15It was resolved on the motion of Councillor Ryan MURPHY, seconded by Councillor Victoria NEWTON, that the petitions as presented be received and referred to the Committee concerned for consideration and report.

The petitions were summarised as follows:

File No. Councillor TopicCA15/191655 Andrew Wines Objecting to ‘no parking’ zones on Lanita Road, Ferny

Grove.CA15/213117 Milton Dick Objecting to the proposed development at 65 Sylvan

Road, Toowong.

GENERAL BUSINESS:

Chairman: Councillors, are there any statements required as a result of a Councillor Conduct Review Panel order? Are there any matters of general business?


Councillor MARX: Yes, thank you, Madam Chair. I rise to speak on three separate items. The Lindsay Evans Memorial Park naming ceremony, Kuraby Special School Sensory Garden and the Ed Sheeran Concert on Friday night at Riverstage.

So it was my honour and privilege to finally have my very first park naming ceremony which took place on Saturday. It was originally, as most Councillors will know in this place here, all parks are generically named after the street they are either located in or nearby. I have been trying for a couple of years to try and get somebody in the area to give me some history about any particular park, and I finally succeeded when I had a resident contact me about a local gentleman who passed away a few years ago by the name of Lindsay Evans.

We went through the process of getting the park naming and then the sign put up and we had the official ceremony on Saturday. I have to say, it was very moving. The family were so thrilled to have that happen, they didn't even know that parks could be named after family members, let alone after a much-loved dad. There would have been close to 100 people there. I was surprised, we actually got a coffee van in, thank goodness, because I don't think we would have managed to cope with the coffee otherwise.

One of my staff did the catering, as she always does, she does an awesome job. Then Mrs Evans and her family contributed as well. It was actually almost like a memorial service. I don't know if people are aware in this place but in New Zealand, funerals as a tradition were a year after the person passes away. You have the headstone ceremony or unveiling as it's called, that becomes a year anniversary memorial. This was very similar to that. So although I didn't know the gentleman at all, his family are just beautiful people and I was very moved by the ceremony myself.

So it was just fabulous to be able to offer that. As a local Councillor I was just absolutely thrilled and I thank Councillor BOURKE and his officers for getting that happening for us.


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The other thing was the Kuraby Special School. We, as a result of the LORD MAYOR's Suburban Initiative Fund, we were able to install a sensory garden. Which is basically, as you can imagine at a special school, these children don't have a great deal of opportunity to work with gardens. They can get in there and dig and they can learn about all sorts of plants. Not only the flowering ones but the edibles as well. They've planted corn and all sorts of carrots and tomatoes and everything like that.

So it was absolutely lovely to be able to go there yesterday and have a ceremony there to officially open that.

The third and final thing was the Ed Sheeran concert which happened on Friday, Saturday and Sunday night. Thank goodness I took my children—my daughter—on the Friday night which was dry because the Saturday night when I know Councillor ADAMS went, was rather wet and Sunday was even worse.

I just want to say what a great job all the workers on that site do. They get thousands of people in there and then they get thousands of people out and there's no dramas, and I know that the Council officers under the stewardship of Councillor McLACHLAN would have been extremely busy cleaning up after the Friday night and the Saturday in preparation for Sunday night. So I want to pass on my thanks to all those officers for their hard work. Thank you.

Chairman: Further general business?

Chairman: Councillor DICK?

Councillor DICK: Oh thank you, Madam Chair. I rise tonight to speak on a new development at Newmarket and start by acknowledging the very patient local residents that have joined us in the gallery tonight who wanted to show their support for my speech tonight.

Madam Chair, I was fortunate enough to attend a public meeting last Thursday night surrounding the redevelopment site of the Aveo Retirement Village at Newmarket.

Around 250 residents attended that public meeting and I was able to hear firsthand, the deep, deep concerns that residents have particularly regarding the bulk and size of this proposed development.

Madam Chair, the residents at that meeting asked me to speak on their behalf tonight and raise a number of issues to place fairly and squarely on the public record so that these concerns can be aired, not only here on the public record but in the wider community as well.

I acknowledge the organisers of the Save Our Space organisation, the effort, the dedication that they have done in opposing and setting up an organisation. I'm holding up a presentation which was a detailed PowerPoint presentation. You can see many in the gallery this evening have taken the time to provide the resources to provide not only t-shirts, but messages of support surrounding their campaign.

At that meeting, Madam Chair, I was very concerned, deeply concerned, about the issues that were raised, particularly the following issues: community safety, traffic congestion, parking and accessibility issues, the school and daycare centre impacts which the centre currently co-exists next to.

Just to put it into perspective, at the public meeting at the local Catholic school, traffic was at an all-time high at around 7:30 at night. I could see firsthand just the traffic impacts from one public meeting, and this was before we even talk about the huge amounts of traffic volumes that travel down Newmarket Road.

There are also concerns regarding the phased development and the impacts that will have on existing and future residents, the construction impacts particularly the access of construction vehicles, the environmental impacts, the creek corridor that runs nearby is of deep concern and the impacts that this size of development will have onto those residents who exist around the village at the moment.


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Just to put it into context for you, Madam Chair, and for all Councillors, we are looking at around the size of 70 villas at the moment turning into units of around 300. Now I took a drive around there and saw firsthand just how constrained the site is.

What I want to say that the residents have very clearly indicated through correspondence to me is they are not anti-development. They are not anti-retirement village. They want a fair go from this Council to make sure these issues are addressed. They want to make sure any development there is, is appropriate and fits in character with the existing residents.

They've had a wonderful relationship being terrific neighbours and I know some of the local residents have had their family members live nearby. So we see that wonderful ageing in place process where people have grown up, lived in that suburb, and then transitioned into a retirement village or move their family nearby.

I heard countless stories about how those aged and frail residents are really, really worried. They're worried about the process that's been presented to them, and they're also concerned about the sort of development that's going to happen on their future home.

The other concerns are the visual impact and also the precedent for other potential development. So going through the issues one at a time, you only can look at the traffic as the top issue and also associated parking issues. Now the school is an older school that has been built in and around that community and the residents there tell me that the school has already significant traffic impacts.

This sort of development will add further pressure, not only to this school but existing schools around the district as well. Parents I heard firsthand are worried about getting their kids safely to and from schools. Now what they're also concerned about Madam Chair, is the parking impacts. Obviously with the increasing staff numbers on that we need to ensure as a Council we are delivering adequate car parking ratios and adequate car parking plans.

This LNP Council has a very, very poor record in delivering on adequate car parking. The fact is this Council, under the stewardship of this Administration, has watered down the provisions and watered down the requirements of developments to provide adequate car parking.

So we need to make sure when that development application is lodged, and I want to stress the residents are building a campaign. They're preparing in great detail and giving up their time—and you can see that tonight, Madam Chair, the time and effort that they've taken out of their busy schedule to sit very patiently—I hope not too annoyingly—to watch us here in the Chamber, but that's the sort of dedication that they've had.

There was a public meeting—sorry, a presentation on Saturday where a number of residents also covered and heard firsthand the plans and they are very worried about what is proposed. So we need to take a strategic approach as the Council to make sure those issues are addressed. We need to ensure that the future residents and existing residents are protected to ensure there is a quality development on site, because at the end of the day if we are to encourage people to live in ageing in place and then to see more retirement villages being built around our city, we've got to address those fundamental issues that I've outlined tonight.

The residents simply want a fair go, they want their voices to be heard, they want to make sure that their mark is very, very, clear on the Council's agenda. That is why I gave that commitment at the public meeting to speak tonight, to put it fairly and squarely not only to every single Councillor, but on the Hansard, so that we can ensure when that development application comes forward it's made clear it comes to the Neighbourhood Planning and Development Assessment Committee.

It's brought to the full Council so that we can scrutinise, analyse, and make sure that we get the best possible outcome for those existing frail residents, but also


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in a positive way for those existing residents as well so that their way of life and that their tight environment which is constrained by a number of traffic considerations and particularly the environmental concerns are addressed.

So I speak on behalf of those residents. I look forward to playing a constructive and positive role to ensure that we have a quality development there, not only for those existing residents but for future retirement residents in that part of Brisbane.


Chairman: Councillor COOPER?

Councillor COOPER: Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I rise to respond to some of those comments made by Councillor DICK. So I understand that Councillor DICK from the advice that I've had that Aveo have been undertaking consultation with their residents at a site in Newmarket, so I think that's Free Street, Newmarket. They have been talking to their existing residents and surrounding neighbours about a proposed development of the Aveo aged care facility.

So I just think it's really important to be very, very clear—there is no application lodged with Brisbane City Council. Councillor ABRAHAMS I think it's important because we do know that these sorts of things are being presented in all sorts of fashions with people because people need to understand that if an application is lodged with Council and if that application—Councillor ABRAHAMS yet again—if that application is not in compliance with the existing planning provisions, then it will trigger this application to be impact-assessable.

So if this application—it is a low density area and I understand they are proposing more than one or two stories—if they are proposing something above that, I understand that that will trigger it to be an impact-assessable application. Therefore if it is an impact-assessable application it will go through a public notification period, and the local residents will have every opportunity to put forward their views, to have their say and whatever the decision of Council is—and this is highly speculative because there is no application lodged—then they will have an opportunity to—whatever the decision of Council is they will have an opportunity to take that matter further.

So they will be able to appeal any decision of Brisbane City Council with respect to this application. So it will go through if it is lodged—and again, this is all theory because there is nothing currently lodged—if that is the case, if they propose something that is above what is expected in the local planning scheme for that particular site, then they will go through a process and that process will consider a whole range of things.

It will consider the built form; it will consider what is around that site; what is appropriate for that site. It will consider traffic issues; it will see if the local road network can accommodate some change. There is currently a facility on that site, so it's not a greenfield site, but any new application, whatever traffic generation that it would put forward, there would have to be a report submitted to Council which the officers would have to carefully consider.

There would be—and I note that Councillor ABRAHAMS seems to think it's funny, but there is a very lengthy process that they would be obliged to go through, and Council officers would carefully, professionally assess what is proposed and they would ask the applicant to respond to the issues that are raised by submitters.

So this is not something that Council has already formed an opinion on because there is nothing to form an opinion on at this time. There will—if someone chooses to submit an application, there will be every opportunity for people to have their say as is appropriate, Madam Chair, and I think it's really deeply upsetting that the meeting that occurred didn't present these facts to the local community, because the facts are—



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Chairman: Councillor DICK. Councillor DICK, you don't have the floor. Councillor DICK, I ask you to withdraw that comment.

Councillor DICK: Madam Chair, I'll withdraw it and say that Councillor COOPER is misleading the Chamber.

Chairman: Councillor COOPER.

Councillor COOPER: Well that is typical from Councillor DICK isn't it, Madam Chair, because all he's interested in is political posturing. That is all he's interested in; not giving proper information to local residents and local residents—

Councillors Interjecting.

Chairman: Order.

Councillor COOPER: —local residents deserve to understand that they will have every opportunity—they will have every opportunity to respond to the application if it is presented as I believe it was discussed. If that is the case they will—if that is the case they will have every opportunity to put forward their issues and those issues must be responded to as part of the process.

It's time that the Australian Labor Party Councillors were factual in their representations rather than being political.


Chairman: Order. Councillor DICK.

Councillor COOPER: I agree.

Chairman: Councillor DICK, I ask you to apologise for your behaviour just now, it is appalling.

Councillor DICK: Madam Chair, everything Councillor COOPER said was wrong and she knows she wasn't—

Chairman: Councillor DICK! Councillor DICK.

Councillor DICK: It's insulting to the residents.

Chairman: Councillor DICK, there is an appropriate way to behave in this place. You are supposed to be the Leader of the Opposition in this Chamber and I would just remind you of what Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said this morning. She said the people's house will be treated with the respect and dignity it deserves and the same applies in this place and we are not seeing it from you.


Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON. Order. Councillor SUTTON I think you were next on your feet.

Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON?

Councillor JOHNSTON: Yes, Madam Chairman, I rise to speak on a couple of matters. Firstly, development issues in the Gap Ward and secondly, disaster management.

I just want to say to the residents who are sitting in the gallery, as a Councillor who works with—

Chairman: Councillor JOHNSTON, you will address the Chairman thank you.

Councillor JOHNSTON: Yes, Madam Chairman, through you to the residents in the gallery—

Chairman: Yes, you don't put your back to the Chair. You speak to the Chair.

Councillor JOHNSTON: I have not put my back to the Chair, Madam Chairman, I'm standing right here looking at you. So, Madam Chairman, I could do this and then maybe people would think I've got my back to you but that's not been the case.

So, Madam Chairman, I want to put a couple of things on the record. To the residents who are concerned about any future or current development in their ward I urge them to be informed and to speak up. You can do so at any time. I


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urge you to raise it with your local Councillor, to raise it with the Planning Chairperson and raise it with the LORD MAYOR of the city.

Town planning is a very complicated area and you have the right to ask questions, you have the right to understand what is happening, and I urge you to keep doing that. Don't be put off—


Chairman: Councillor ABRAHAMS if you want to conduct a conversation, take it outside. Don't just sit there and talk the way you do. I've made the comment once already today. You all sit there and you speak so loudly I hear everything you say. That is not what should be happening in this place. If you want to have a conversation, do it very quietly or you take it outside.

Councillor ABRAHAMS: I apologise, Madam Chair, I didn't mean to cause you distress.

Chairman: Thank you. My apology, Councillor JOHNSTON for the interruption.

Councillor JOHNSTON: Well I couldn't even hear what Councillor ABRAHAMS was saying, but your interruption has been noted and, Madam Chairman, just for the record, I just want to say to these residents you have every right in our democracy to speak up. You're ratepayers. Please go onto the Council website—Madam Chairman, through you—I'm sure you encourage them. You can be a speaker here at Council and you can come and speak for five minutes at the beginning of the Council meeting and have your say, but once this development application is lodged as you expect, I urge you to participate in the debate. If it comes to this Council meeting I'll be happy to take your views onboard when a decision's being made.

I'm a bit appalled by Councillor COOPER's behaviour here today and I just feel very disappointed that these residents who've sat quietly in the gallery were treated with such disrespect, because obviously Councillor DICK had made an obligation to raise these issues, and I didn't hear anything unreasonable in what he was saying here in the Chamber today.

I just want to let them know that you will always be heard in this place, and we look forward to having a proper debate about the matter.

But mostly, Madam Chairman, I rose to speak very briefly on disaster management. Now I'm a little bit appalled by Councillor SIMMONDS' behaviour in the Chamber a few minutes ago. I apparently have no right to raise issues here about disaster recovery in my ward of Tennyson, and I want to place on the record just a few of the things that I have done over the past few months with respect to improving recovery and rehabilitation services in this city and particularly in my ward.

Now the first and major concern I have is via the questions I've put directly to the LORD MAYOR at previous meetings and the questions on notice. We know that this Council is not putting any additional funding into the recovery and rehabilitation following the super-storm disaster. This Council did contribute $25 million to the initial clean up, picking up the green waste, but they've made it very clear that the funding for future rehabilitation is coming out of the current recurrent budget of our parks and operational teams.

Now, Madam Chairman that means that our officers have to repair parks that were damaged significantly; playground equipment, trees, footpaths, grass. All of those things have to be done out of their everyday operating budget. There is not a single cent of extra money coming from this Administration to undertake the long term recovery efforts that are needed.

Now the officers in my area have told me it will be up to two years before the parks in my area that were so devastated will recover. I just don't think that is good enough. They pay some of the highest rates in the city out my way and I believe that they are entitled to (1) a clear recovery plan, (2) a well-funded recovery plan, (3) a well-communicated recovery plan, and I can tell you that on 6 February I wrote to the LORD MAYOR outlining my concerns and a suggested course of action.


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On 25 February I wrote again to the LORD MAYOR saying he had not responded to my concerns, and again no response. On 3 March I wrote again to the LORD MAYOR outlining my concerns with no response, and I've written again today and I've copied in Councillor SIMMONDS on that because there has been no response after six weeks.

Now, Madam Chairman, I made a simple suggestion. I said that we should take 10 per cent of the $22 million budget from Brisbane Marketing and we should allocate it to Local Asset Services so that they could get on and do the recovery and rehabilitation work that this city needs. That's a 10 per cent cut to the marketing and travel budget of this city.

We know Councillor SIMMONDS is spending $12,000 to go overseas. I prefer that money go into the recovery of our parks. So when Councillor SIMMONDS wants to stand up and say I've got nothing to contribute, he is wrong and the people who are letting this city down are the LNP Administration who don't want to fund a proper recovery and rehabilitation plan.


Chairman: Councillor SUTTON?

Councillor SUTTON: Thank you, Madam Chair. Well I hate to bring the tone of debate down but I'd like to give a short speech about my tenth annual Princesses and Pirates Day that was held in Vic Lucas Park on Sunday. I'm sure I don't need to remind anyone about what the weather was like over the weekend, but it was the tenth anniversary and I had to make a decision—my first decision on the day at about 7am when I woke up and it was raining, was whether or not I should cancel this event. But I decided that the event would go ahead unless I got to the park and it was physically raining too much that we couldn't set up.

So I'm very grateful for the fact that the powers that be enabled me to get down to the park at 8am. The sun was shining; it looked like it would be a beautiful day. So we proceeded with Princesses and Pirates Day which started at 9am and as the parents were coming into the park they were actually saying to me I am so glad this is still on because my five year old, my six year old, was up at 5am this morning with their princess outfit on, ready to get down to the park for Princesses and Pirates Day.

I know that to be true not from one but all because I actually received a call from the Council call centre on my mobile phone saying that they were being inundated with calls about whether or not the event was still going to go ahead, at which point I was able to advise, yes, we were going ahead.

So I have to say that we went from 9am until about 10:30 when the skies opened up and there was a massive downpour of rain, but that only went for about 10 minutes and the thing that was so wonderful about the day is that everyone stayed. We ran for shelter in the toilets and under the pop-up shelters, but then after about 10 minutes the sun came back out again and everyone stayed which was lovely.

But the thing that made the tenth anniversary of this event so special was the providers, the suppliers for the event, and a big part of me wanting to make this speech tonight was actually to recognise those wonderful, wonderful suppliers, many of whom have been working with me for the entire 10 years of the event. Because without them this event, particularly in and around the rain, wouldn't have been what it was on Sunday and wouldn't have been what it has become over the last 10 years.

The first Princesses and Pirates Day event was held in 2005. It was actually held at Bulimba Memorial Park and it was just a band provided through the Bands in the Park program, and that particular band was playing Pirates of Penzance songs that particular day. So I invited the kids to the park to dress up as Princesses and Pirates Day and I was—as princesses and pirates—and I was absolutely gobsmacked with the number of children who showed up on that day in dress. So I thought well this is something that's got legs and we're going to have to continue that.


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We then moved the—I then had the opportunity to actually put a pirate ship themed playground down at Bulimba down at Vic Lucas Park which is where we then relocated the event the following year. Since then a lot of things have happened. The Bulimba Sailing Squadron based down at that park are just tremendous supporters of this event. Their members actually dress as pirates, put flags—pirate flags—on their boats and cruise out into the Brisbane River and give all our local children the opportunity to actually sail on the Brisbane River pretending to be real pirates or real princesses on that day.

I could not—this event would not be what it is today without the Bulimba Sailing Squadron. We also have the fabulous Mark and Lexie of Jumpin' Around, our local jumping castle company based in Bulimba. I could actually only afford to pay for one jumping castle and Mark and Lexie said—and it was going to be a princess themed jumping castle because we have the pirate ship playground, but Mark and Lexie said you can't possibly have Princesses and Pirates Day with just one jumping castle, particularly after 10 years. We're going to provide the second pirate inspired jumping castle for free so you can have two jumping castles at your event. So I really want to thank them as well.

I want to thank my Captain Jack Sparrow who has been coming to my event for about eight years and I could not do it without him. I tend to think that half of the success of this event is the mummies who come back year after year to have their photo taken with Captain Jack because he looks just like Johnny Depp. If anyone doesn't believe me I encourage them to get on my Facebook site. There is a photo of me with him. He has Johnny Depp all over, right down to the hippy swagger and I can tell you there are a lot of people that I know come to that event just to see Captain Jack Sparrow every year.

We also had the fabulous Basil Brumble who I know do some of Council's Active and Healthy events. They provided two other special guests for this event. You can't have an event for the under10s in this city without actually inviting Queen Elsa and Princess Anna from Frozen—from Disney's Frozen. So they attended my tenth annual Princesses and Pirates Day and I don't know what the collective noun is for a group of Elsas but I can tell you we needed that collective noun in the park because the entire park was full of Elsas and Annas that day.

The really beautiful moment came after the rain where—because the rain came right at the point where we were starting our disco dance party. Then the rain came and then we restarted our disco dance party and you just had a huge number of girls and boys dancing around with Princess Elsa and Anna singing Let It Go at the top of their lungs as the rain was still filtering down.

It was just—it was just beautiful. I have to hand it when we're talking about our disco dance party; I have a fabulous DJ, DJ Electra who also does my Hocus Pocus event. She's a fabulous, fabulous kids' DJ. She gets them up, she gets them dancing, she really engages with them, and the really special thing she does at the end is make sure that all the kids go get their mums and dads. So all of us were in the park dancing and she just does a wonderful tremendous job at her DJ'ing, and as I said, her disco was cut short by the rain, but the minute that rain stopped she was out there and she was getting them dancing again. It was just wonderful.

I also want to thank the Hawthorne Bakery. You can't turn 10 without having a great big fabulous cake, and we had the biggest slab cake that was decorated with the most beautiful images of princesses and pirates. It was so big and so heavy, the bakery actually had to give me a metal tray from their oven so that we could carry it because the wooden cake tray was not strong enough to support it. My goodness, I have never had so much cream everywhere ever. It was just everywhere. It was worse—Councillor ADAMS isn't here, but it was worse than the Gold Star Reading program cakes. There was just—it was just everywhere from head to toe for one end of the park to the other, but it was a lot of fun.

We also had Suzanne from Creative Kindy, another local business, local mum, setting up her own local business, who came along and had crowns and treasure


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chests that the kids could decorate themselves, and that was a fabulous craft activity that they could participate. Suzanne, who also came to the opening of the Bulimba Ferry Terminal, she was also at this event creating some great craft activities as well.

I want to make special mention of the fabulous Luke Monsour from Bulimba Studios—


Chairman: Order. Order, there's too much noise.

Councillor SUTTON: —from Bulimba Studios who came along and took photos of the event, and as I said, I know you've all been listening with interest so I encourage you to get on Bulimba Studios' Facebook page or my Facebook page and have a look at the photos because you will see what a wonderful fun day it was, but also what a fabulous photographer Luke Monsour from Bulimba Studios is and Luke also did the photos, Councillor MATIC, for the Bulimba Ferry Terminal opening. They are fabulous professional shots that I think will be a great—play part of chronicling the history of that event as well.

What Luke is doing is he's allowing locals to buy those photos from the event and he will be giving donations to the Red Cross' Cyclone Pam appeal as well. So there's a broader community benefit.

So it has been my absolute pleasure to have been able to organise this event for 10 years. I actually see some of the kids that came to my first event in the first few years now on their way to the Bulimba Ferry Terminal—on their way to university.

Chairman: Councillor SUTTON your time has expired.

Councillor SUTTON: Thank you very much.

Chairman: Thank you. Further general business?

Chairman: I declare the meeting closed.

QUESTIONS OF WHICH DUE NOTICE HAS BEEN GIVEN:(Questions of which due notice has been given are printed as supplied and are not edited)

Submitted by Councillor Victoria Newton on 19 March 2015Q1. Can you please advise the total expenditure relating to CityCycle (including the preparation work for

Brisbane’s public bicycle hire scheme prior to the contract being awarded) for each of the following financial years:-- 2008/09- 2009/10- 2010/11- 2011/12- 2012/13- 2013/14

Q2. Can you please advise the anticipated expenditure related to CityCycle for the 2014/15 financial year?

Q3. Can you please confirm the current population and household density for each of the suburbs of New Farm/ Fortitude Valley and Teneriffe?

Q4. Can you please advise what are the (a) commercial and (b) residential rates collected from each of the 4005 and 4006 postcode areas as per the table below?

4005 postcode 4006 postcode

Commercial Rates

Residential Rates


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Q5. Can you please advise what does the above rates revenue in each of the 4005 and 4006 postcodes constitute as a percentage if the total (a) commercial and (b) residential rates paid to Council by the whole of Brisbane?

4005 postcode 4006 post ode

Percentage of Brisbane’s Commercial Rates

Percentage of Brisbane’s Residential Rates

Q6. Can you please advise what is the percentage of the total (a) works (b) traffic and (c) parks budgets allocated to each of the 4005 and 4006 postcode areas?

4005 postcode 4006 postcode

Total Infrastructure Works

Traffic Infrastructure

Parks Infrastucture

RISING OF COUNCIL: 6.43pm.

PRESENTED: and CONFIRMED

CHAIRMAN

Council officers in attendance:

James Withers (Senior Council and Committee Officer)Shivaji Solao (Council and Committee Officer)Billy Peers (Personal Support Officer to the Lord Mayor and Council Orderly)


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