Mr BAYLEY (Clark) - Mr Speaker, the Australian Human Rights Commission lists the right to transport as a basic human right. It is critical to everyday Tasmanians. The impacts on Tasmanians of this bus crisis is really clear. Some of them have been spoken about today. You cannot get to work, you cannot get to health care, you cannot get to sport, you cannot get to your social engagements and that has a really significant impact on everyday Tasmanians literally every day.
I will start where this motion finishes, condemning the Government and its approach to public transport, because the responsibility for this crisis does sit with this minister and this Government. The writing has been on the wall for many months, over a year now. Since COVIS, the expectation that we would be in this situation now, with the pressures on the workforce and the pressures on the public in terms of cost of living, have been abundantly clear. These issues have been on the table for a long time and yet we have only just seen the Government in the last couple of weeks make an announcement and release money via a supplementary appropriation bill to start doing something about the issues that are of concern, such as the pay for drivers, the screens for protection and the like - the $8.1 million.
We support this motion in full and we will not be supporting the Government's amendment. It is critical that we get this service back on track. There have been 1000 services suspended. The minister said he wanted to take the chaos out of the system. Let me tell the minister that the chaos is still well and truly in the system. Not only do we have 80 services cancelled today, so that is hundreds of people left confused and stranded and so forth, but because the service is constrained we regularly have full buses driving past full bus stops now and failing to stop. They cannot pick those people up. We have outlined the impact on peoples' lives in terms of their ability to come to work.
The Greens have put on the record that we have attempted in this House to pass legislation to increase the funding provided to the public company so that public transport via Metro can be free. It would not take a lot of money, it would reduce a lot of pressure on government, it would reduce cost-of-living pressure, it would assist with driver retention, and through the Government's own trial of this a year or so ago, it increases usage, which is ultimately what we need to do. We need to increase usage by delivering a reliable and free public transport service.
On top of some of the infrastructure announcements mention in this motion -
Time expired.
