Seaford Rail Line

Mr SPEIRS (Bright) (15:03): My question is to the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure.

Ms Bedford interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Florey is called to order.

Mr SPEIRS: Is the independent investigation into the 28 April breakdown of the Seaford rail line complete and, if so, when will it be released to the public?

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN (Lee—Minister for Transport and Infrastructure, Minister for Housing and Urban Development) (15:03): I thank the member for Bright for his question. Yes, he's right—there has been an ongoing investigation; in fact, the Rail Commissioner engaged an independent expert to examine the issue and provide a report. As to the status of that report, given it has been some six months since the incident occurred, we will be looking to release that as quickly as possible. Where that is up to, I will come back to the house. I did commit at the time that we would be releasing it.

I have continued to update both the community and the house as to what we believe the issue to be, that is, that it was a faulty piece of equipment which was provided to the government by the contractor and that there has been a very extensive process that has been undertaken in order to determine the cause of this because, as the manufacturer has advised the department, this is a piece of equipment that they have never had fail anywhere globally, and so of course there has been an enormous amount of consternation about why this piece of equipment has failed.

In any event, as I prefaced my comments by saying, we did engage an independent expert consultant to produce a report. We will make that available as soon as we can.