Melissa Parke (Fremantle, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Department of Defence is in the process of selling Leeuwin Barracks in my electorate of Fremantle. This remarkable 14-hectare site is located on the Swan River foreshore in the town of East Fremantle. It is home to 58 different buildings and structures, including some important memorials related to the barracks' role in the training of more than 13,000 RAN junior recruits from 1960 to 1984. Unfortunately, Leeuwin was a place at which serious institutional abuse occurred. While it is clear the property is surplus to current defence requirements, the disposal of the Leeuwin Barracks site marks a critical and transformative shift and one that must occur with great care. The sale and redevelopment of the site provides both an opportunity and a challenge. It should enable a thoughtful riverside development with generous public open space, community facilities, well-planned transport links, the retention of local heritage, including Leeuwin's military training significance and an acknowledgement of abuse suffered by JRs and the site's Indigenous heritage. But such an outcome will only be reached through proper consultation and planning, which must involve the Town of East Fremantle and local community.

I am grateful to the Assistant Minister for Defence who has kept me advised of community consultations and of course my local community members who have taken the time to participate in the consultation process—and I know there has already been some robust advocacy for the necessary heritage and local planning outcomes.

I will continue to assist the East Fremantle Council, residents and veterans in their efforts to ensure that Leeuwin Barracks is sold with appropriate plans and conditions in place. It is very important that the process not be rushed.