21444 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY Tuesday 16 March 2010 __________ The Speaker (The Hon. George Richard Torbay) took the chair at 1.00 p.m. The Speaker read the Prayer and acknowledgement of country. BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE Notices of Motions General Business Notices of Motions (General Notices) given. PRIVATE MEMBERS' STATEMENTS __________ MENAI ELECTORATE WOMAN OF THE YEAR NOMINEE Ms ALISON MEGARRITY (Menai) [1.05 p.m.]: Last week the 2010 New South Wales Woman of the Year event was held in Parliament House. The Menai electorate nominee was Melinda Cruz. Melinda is the founder and chief executive officer of the Miracle Babies Foundation. This charity raises about $500,000 each year for equipment and resources to assist premature and sick babies. It also provides practical and emotional support for families throughout Australia during their journey through a newborn intensive care unit, the transition to home and onwards. In nominating Melinda I said that her initiative in founding and remaining so committed to the development of an organisation that has supported so many families in my electorate and well beyond it was an inspiration. It was a pleasure to welcome Melinda and her husband, Chris, to the event last week. They are clearly loving and devoted parents to sons Elijah, 7, Dillon, 5, and Jasper, 3. The keynote speaker on the night was Cheryl Koenig, the 2009 Menai electorate and overall New South Wales Woman of the Year. Cheryl acknowledged the inspiring role many women play in promoting a socially just, and thereby cohesive, community. It is her belief that the most crucial investment we can make as individuals is in our shared social wellbeing. She said that it was therefore very reassuring to see a Premier and a Government that also shared this principle. Cheryl reminded us that she had accepted the 2009 award on behalf of all New South Wales women carers for the contribution they make every single day. In her trademark honest approach, she also explained that only eight weeks after last year's event her world came crashing down when she was diagnosed with a life-threatening blood cancer. The good news is that she is now in remission, but she wanted to highlight the frequency with which she had noticed that carers suffer illness themselves. In fact, her observations are backed up by Australia's only female Nobel Prize winner, Dr Elizabeth Blackburn, who found that people who live with chronic stress, such as those who are the primary caregivers of dementia patients or children with a disability, are more prone to serious disease. I would like to provide the House with a substantial quote from Cheryl's speech that night. Unfortunately it will not be the same as hearing Cheryl deliver these words straight from her heart, but I think by the conclusion everyone will agree that her advice deserves the widest possible audience. She said: Every experience in life should teach us something. So what life lessons did I learn from 2009? Well, firstly I learnt that when you sit in a chemo ward with toxins roping your veins and stripping away, drip by drip, the very essence of who you once were, it matters little what 'title' you carry or what letters stand before or after your name. What truly matters is, of course, the love of your family and the very precious time you have to spend with them. I also learnt that even though we can't always define our own destiny, as sometimes, when we least expect it, 'life' can get in our way, what we can do is define our own quality of life, and this is now my message at my talks to carers and people with disability. Even when faced with life's hardest challenges, you can choose how you respond to your suffering - you can let it be your undoing, or you can choose to create meaning and purpose from adversity. As the philosopher Socrates said: "The really valuable life is the considered life." Which signifies to me that we really need to be thoughtful about what we do. As women we play an integral role in shaping our home environments, communities, places of work – including boardrooms and governments – so I encourage you all to really think about what it is you truly value, what you're aiming for, and how your own 'considered life' contributes towards a more humane and caring society. 16 March 2010 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY 21445 I only wish that I had time today to have every word of Cheryl's speech recorded in Hansard because from where I was sitting I could tell that her speech touched every person there that night. As the Minister for Women said, upon resuming the microphone, no-one was in any doubt as to why Cheryl was last year's overall winner. Later that night I happened to see television coverage of the Academy Awards held the same day. The celebrity-filled audience jumped up to provide a standing ovation to virtually every second award winner. I recalled and regretted that I had earlier resisted an overwhelming urge to do the very same thing as Cheryl finished her address. Had I done so I believe that every member of our more typically restrained Australian audience would have quickly followed in a fitting tribute. In my capacity as the member for Menai I am fortunate to know Cheryl's whole family. I put on record that my ovation would have honoured also Cheryl's wonderful husband, Robert, and sons Christopher and Jonathan. I join with other members of the House in congratulating every 2010 Woman of the Year nominee and I feel sure that all members join me in wishing the whole Koenig family continued health and happiness. METROBUS ROUTE 30 SERVICE Mrs JILLIAN SKINNER (North Shore—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) [1.10 p.m.]: This month the State Transit Authority introduced a new Metrobus route 30 service between Mosman, in my electorate, and Enmore, via the Sydney central business district, Sydney University and Newtown. The service has caused absolute chaos and despair among the residents in a very small residential street, which is effectively going to be used as the bus depot for these buses. The State Transit Authority wrote to Mosman Council to advise it of this proposal at the very last minute. There was no consultation with the residents and no survey carried out to determine the demand, and no regard has been given to the chaos that it will cause. Yesterday I met one of the residents, Peter Psaltis, and I have received correspondence from a number of residents. I inform the House of some of their concerns. Katarina Smelikova wrote to me on behalf of the residents of Punch Street, Mosman, and stated: The NSW State Government has decided to force upon the residents a bus depot for the layover of 85 additional articulated buses per day— that is once the service is fully operational— (in addition to the existing 30 buses which traverse the street daily); without proper consultation; without ANY research to indicate demand for this service; and without ANY planning to accommodate ANY additional parking of the 22,000 riders who are supposed to ride these buses EVERY DAY. This is a very crowded part of my electorate. Punch Street gives access to an aged care residential facility and the loss of parking will adversely affect not only residents of the street but also the ambulances, doctors and others who use that part of the street to park when they attend to the residents of the aged care facility. Eight parking spaces will be lost in a very short stretch of road, and it has been indicated that part of a kerb will have to be removed to enable the articulated buses to turn the corner in this narrow road. A State Transit Authority representative informed residents that the decision to implement the service had come as a directive from the Premier's office and that the authority was simply following orders. Additional questioning of the representative, following a council meeting in February at which the proposal was discussed, revealed that as far as anyone was aware no research had been carried out. The problems associated with the proposal include loss of parking, noise, pollution and the effect on residents' access to their homes—particularly the aged care facility. The irony is that the councillors and the local residents object to the proposal and there appears to be no local demand for this area to be the depot for this service. The local paper, the Mosman Daily, quotes the general manager of Manly Council as saying that Seaforth would be a great location as a terminus for the service. It seems to me to be a much more sensible proposal for a layover area. If there were a demand for a bus that goes from the northern side of the harbour to Sydney University and beyond then surely it would not start in the electorate of Mosman, it would start further north where more land is available and where there is a site for a depot that Manly Council would welcome. In fact, the general manager, Henry Wong, is quoted in the local newspaper as saying: We would support any public transport taking passengers from the peninsula to the city. Seaforth is a very good location for this. On behalf of my residents I will write to the Premier, the Minister for Transport and Roads, Mosman Council and Manly Council and seek a common-sense solution so that we do not have this total disruption to the lives of 21446 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY 16 March 2010 residents in an already busy part of the suburb of Mosman when a bus depot could be accommodated elsewhere and in an area that would satisfy all demands.