Question Time

BRITANNIA ROUNDABOUT

Mr MARSHALL (Norwood—Leader of the Opposition) (14:15): My question is to the Premier. Why should the public trust the government to upgrade the Britannia roundabout, when they have promised this project before, only to cancel it?

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL (Cheltenham—Premier, Treasurer, Minister for State Development, Minister for the Public Sector, Minister for the Arts) (14:15): I thank the honourable member for his question. He seems to be about the only person who is not pleased with this excellent news today that finally we are trying to grapple with something which has plagued South Australia for decades, that is, a roundabout which has caused countless accidents and struck fear into the hearts of motorists as they approach the Britannia roundabout.

We have found a solution now which is elegant, I must say, in its simplicity. It has another benefit, speaking now as Treasurer: it is actually quite affordable at $3.2 million. It is very pleasing to find that the best solution actually happens to be the least expensive solution. Of course, those opposite, who have proposed many different models for the upgrade of the Britannia roundabout over the years, never got around to it during the 10 or so years when they were in government. The Britannia roundabout has not presented as a difficulty just in the last period since 2002; it has been a problem for decades. Some of the solutions, to be frank, have been quite expensive, and some of them have done quite a lot of violence to the Parklands—

Members interjecting:

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL: Look, we are doing you a favour here. This is going to be great for the people of Burnside. When they go up to the Burnside shopping centre they will be able to do that without fear in their heart. The only fear they will have is how much they are going to spend at the Burnside shopping centre. They will be able to cruise on through beautifully. This is going to be a great result for the people of South Australia. People will be able to use the ring route without having the fear and trepidation of approaching this awful roundabout. That is a good thing for the traffic network.

The advantages are that not only is it affordable but it also takes a mere 60 square metres of the Parklands, most of which, I think, is already concrete, or already bitumen. It is a very small sliver compared with a very large amount of Parklands that would have been required for some of the other propositions. Of course, there's the trees. There were many trees that were proposed to go under previous propositions. This now saves substantially all of the large river gum trees in the Parklands. There is one very small gum tree which is to go and a few plane trees. This is great result in terms of both.

So, we have saved the trees, we have saved the money, and we have also saved you the embarrassment of having to come up with a proposition yourself for this matter. This has been something that has been worked on by the road traffic engineers. It is not something that we have designed; it has been worked on by them. It is an intelligent solution and we are very pleased to back it. It also happens to be the RAA's top pick of all of the traffic intersections to be done up around South Australia.

The SPEAKER: Arising out of that answer, I call the member for Morialta to order and warn him for the first time. I call the member for Bragg to order and warn her for the first time. Also the member for Davenport is called to order and warned for the first time. The member for Hammond is called to order and warned for the first time. Those who are called to order include the member for Heysen, the leader, the member for Finniss, the member for Unley and the initiator of all the trouble: the member for Kavel.

The Hon. I.F. Evans: What about the Minister for Transport?

The SPEAKER: And the Minister for Transport is called to order. I call the member for Taylor.