Matt Thistlethwaite (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The New South Wales Liberal government is forcing the amalgamation of councils in our community, which will see rates increase, services cut and our community worse off. The community that I represent is very fortunate to be represented by two local councils that do a great job: Randwick and Botany councils. Both are debt free—no borrowings whatsoever. Both run first-class public facilities for residents and the local community. Both run excellent services for the elderly, child care, sporting clubs, charities and residents, and both run exceptionally good events that bring our community together. There is a wonderful sense of community in our area that revolves around Randwick City Council and Botany City Council.

Randwick City Council was the second declared local government area in New South Wales when it was declared in the 18th century. It has fostered a great sense of community; in fact, the motto for Randwick City Council is 'a sense of community'. I believe that our area will lose its identity, will lose that sense of community, if these forced amalgamations go ahead.

The New South Wales government is forcing the Randwick, Waverley and Woollahra councils to merge. Rockdale and Botany councils will also be forced to merge. In respect of Randwick, Waverley and Woollahra there is absolutely no community of interest whatsoever between the people of La Perouse, Maroubra and Matraville and the people living in Vaucluse and Potts Point. There is no community of interest whatsoever. The Woollahra council area is full of parking meters. Wherever you go you have to pay to park. The Waverley council area is full of parking meters. The people of Maroubra, La Perouse and Matraville can bet their life that if these councils are merged they are going to see parking meters all over the Randwick City Council area. That will be one of the first moves that the amalgamated council will make.

Council administration will move to the north. Council administration services are currently in Randwick and they service the people in the south of my electorate. They will no doubt move north to somewhere like Bondi or Woollahra, so people in our area will have to go further to access council services. The mayor will no doubt be from the north, from somewhere like Woollahra, so you will have a mayor that represents La Perouse, Maroubra and Randwick coming from the north in Woollahra. Services will no doubt be cut.

In respect of the Botany and Rockdale amalgamation, there is absolutely no community of interest whatsoever between these two local government areas. In fact, they are separated by the largest body of water in Sydney—Botany Bay. So you are going to amalgamate two councils—one from one side of the bay and one from the other side of the bay. They do not even connect. There is no common border. There is no community of interest whatsoever. Rockdale has the larger population so guess where all the council administration services are going to move? They are going to move to the Rockdale side and people in my community will miss out.

When it comes to those councils, the City of Botany Bay has been debt free since 1995 and Rockdale has borrowings of over $7.2 million. It is projected that average residential rates will increase by 25 per cent. Costs associated with the merger range between $11 million and $13 million. Council's assets are at risk of being sold to pay off some of Rockdale's debt. This is what is going to happen with these amalgamated councils.

The New South Wales state government put on community consultations about the proposed council amalgamations or mergers. Guess where the New South Wales government put the consultations on for the Waverley, Woollahra and Randwick merger? They put them on in Woollahra, in the north, so the people of the community that I represent could not even go to a local area to express their opposition. The same occurred with Rockdale and Botany. That occurred in Sans Souci, so yet again there was no consultation in the area that I represent.

These forced amalgamations are a joke. They will increase rates and they will see services cut, and the people of our community will be worse off. Randwick council is meeting this Saturday. I urge them to reject this proposal for a merger.