Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

And expanding its membership to include a proper representation of the shire. Maybe one day our state member will be included, but we are very pleased to have the Sutherland Shire Council represented and very pleased that the minister responded to our advocacy on that position. Nevertheless, we are concerned that these planes are not sticking to their flight path. Research is being undertaken—and this is an issue we need to raise—to make sure that planes coming in and over Bundeena are following the proper flight path. The Sydney Airport Community Forum should be a very good outlet to ensure that the minister, the department, the airport and the airlines—everyone involved in this forum—can understand that they need to stick to the rules. I am sure I would have the full support of the minister for transport in ensuring that that the airlines and the airport stick to the rules, so that all of our residents, including those in the electorate of the minister for transport, will have protection when these rules are followed.

There was no aircraft noise insulation available to the residents of Kurnell. They were told they did not qualify because the noise was just not loud enough. Several years ago there was a levy collected from all airline passengers and the funds raised were allocated to the aircraft noise insulation project. This very worthwhile project only applied to areas where the noise was 30 ANEF and above. All of the affected residents at Kurnell, about 700 families in total, are just outside the 30-ANEF contour but fall within the 25- and 30-ANEF contours. Insulation was provided to the Kurnell Public School, which sits under that flight path, because it did fit within the lower standard for noise, the 25-ANEF contour. I would like to express my concern for the residents of Kurnell. I fear that additional growth at Sydney airport will bring more aircraft noise.

The government’s budget contains a $9 increase in the passenger movement charge, which used to be called the departure tax. This decision is expected to recover an additional $459 million for the government, and much of this increase will be put towards recovering the cost of additional aviation security measures. However, I believe that some of this extra revenue could be allocated to providing noise insulation to the worst affected areas, Kurnell included. In this year’s budget, $14½ million worth of funding has been allocated, we note, for aircraft noise insulation at Fort Street High School. The Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government would know about that and would support that initiative. He would also know that, despite the fact of this school not falling within the 25-ANEF contour, the school is still going to get the funding.

The current rule says you have to be between 25 and 30 in order to attract that funding. Kurnell Public School fell within that framework and it got the funding for that noise insulation. The argument being put forward by the residents of Kurnell is that if it is good enough for the parents and kids of Fort Street High School to have their school covered—because it is recognised that there is significant noise falling on Fort Street High School’s students—then why isn’t it good enough for the residents of Kurnell, whose homes sit in a noise contour which is worse than that of Fort Street High School, to also receive that same insulation for their homes? At the very least, why isn’t it possible for us to sit down and consider other ways by which we might be able to provide some sort of support to ensure that this insulation can go into these homes? I know these are issues that the minister would be aware of and that we would like to pursue through the process of the Sydney Airport Community Forum—and we look forward to that conversation.

In March 2004 the former coalition government approved a new master plan for Sydney airport. The approval was contingent upon Sydney airport giving the then minister for transport an assurance that curfews would not change. The minister said at that time:

Of critical importance in my approval was the fact that—

Sydney airport—

strongly committed to its obligations to the Government’s ongoing noise amelioration measures. These include the curfew, movement cap and noise sharing under the Long Term Operating Plan and all of them are here to stay.

The issues that I have raised today in relation to Kurnell are many. I also raise those issues in relation to other parts of my electorate, in particular the significant complaints that I am receiving from Bundeena, which is in a royal national park. They go to the matter of the need to look at the whole issue of noise insulation and how the airport is impacting on the surrounding suburbs due to the changing commercial conditions that are impacting upon that airport and the push for greater business. We have talked about the significant flights increase and the large number of freight flights that are now flying within the period from 11 pm to 6 am. We are looking to see that is recognised and to make sure that the increase in those flights does not provide any burden on the residents who are living under those flight paths.

There is much material here to provide for a very positive discussion with the government. There is much material here for which I think there is a great deal of sympathy, particularly from those members on the other side who have electorates which sit under these flight paths. Having dealt with the politics of noise in previous times, I do sense that there may well be a new sense of cooperation in dealing with these issues.

In concluding I make a particular plea for the recognition of Kurnell in this sense. Kurnell is the modern birthplace of our nation. Frankly, this is a site which has not received the recognition from either side of politics that it deserves. The behaviour of the state government towards Kurnell with repeated industrial activity—most significantly and most recently represented by the desalination plant and the digging of a 45-metre-wide trench across Botany Bay, to lay the desalination pipeline—only adds insult to injury.

As to what we are concerned about and want to see, I would ask the minister to ensure, as there may be some further discussion of future airports for Sydney, that the idea of a second airport at Kurnell is never discussed and that the option is forever ruled out. I place on record my personal objection to it, just as the former member for Cook did. The former member for Cook was very successful in ensuring that it did not take place. He argued the case within his government to ensure that it did not happen. But I am asking the minister for transport and infrastructure to say today that it will never be an agenda item for his government, that there will never be consideration of a second airport at Kurnell. It is a simple matter to rule it out. Enough destruction has been done to Kurnell. Enough lack of recognition and respect has been paid to Cook’s landing site at Kurnell, and it is time to make sure that this is matter is never on the agenda again.

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