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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2023-09-12 Daily Xml
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Hahndorf Truck Diversion

Mr TEAGUE (Heysen) (15:23): On 24 August, the Minister for Infrastructure and Transport stood at Hahndorf and announced a plan to divert heavy trucks—long and heavy trucks—down River Road to the bottom of River Road and along Strathalbyn Road as a diversion away from Main Street.

Far from committing to the bypass that state and federal Liberal governments set aside $250 million to achieve, the minister instead—without consulting local residents, without consulting industry and without, dare I say, saying a word to the local state member of parliament—announced a click of the fingers plan to exclude those long and heavy trucks from Main Street, Hahndorf, and instead push them down River Road to Strathalbyn Road. Against the background of no consultation, what did the local residents do? On Sunday just gone, and the Sunday prior to that, local residents made very clear their view, their knowledge, that this plan is not safe. River Road is not safe for heavy and long vehicles.

To make good that proposition, local residents were supported by the truck drivers who operate in that area on a daily basis who were moved equally to come and to spend their own precious time on those two Sunday mornings to bring their teams, and to bring their trucks, to show that this cannot happen. It is not safe and must be stopped. I say it is a click of the fingers decision.

The minister has said that, as of 1 November, these trucks are going to go down this road. In the same breath, the minister says, 'Well, the government is going to spend some amount of money,' and he said, 'It might be $30 million or it might be $40 million, and we might make it safe.' Of course, the truth was borne out in radio interviews in days following when the question was put to the minister, 'If the road is safe, why are you spending the $30 million or $40 million on it? If you are going to spend the $30 million or $40 million, how is that going to make it safe?' The minister had absolutely no answer for either of those propositions.

I want to take my hat off in tribute to those many local residents who have not only spoken up against this dangerous plan but they have spoken sense to government, they have spoken sense to power and they have taken all necessary steps reasonably to do so, and they ought to be applauded. I want to thank in particular Ben Simounds at Simounds Transport and Ben's father, Anthony, who came and joined him last Sunday, bringing their two livestock trucks along to demonstrate this route and how dangerous it is for them and those that they would confront.

I want to thank Pete Magarey and his team from Magarey Transport for loading up long trucks at the end of a long week on Friday, running a log truck on Friday afternoon and then running log trucks fully loaded on Sunday in both directions for the Leader of the Opposition and for the shadow minister for infrastructure and transport to see for themselves. I have done this now several times, and I can tell the house that it only took one time for me to hop down from that truck and to be moved to call on the Premier to come out and see it for himself, because I can tell all those here that it was immediately obvious that these roads are not fit for this purpose.

We have heard from the minister in various forums, including today, that this is a general access road. It is a general access road because, if you are going to pick up a mob of sheep from a particular location, you have to be able to get there. Just about every road in the state is a general access road; it does not make it a freight route. It is no answer to say, 'Well, this is a general access road, so no change, nothing to see here.'

There is going to be a transfer, as we understand, to state responsibility so works can be done, and there is a decision to ban heavy vehicles from the main road of Hahndorf. Those two decisions together mean that the government cannot wash its hands of responsibility for what occurs as a result of this bad decision. The decision that now needs to be taken by the Premier is to stop this before it starts, so tribute to all those who have spoken up, and I am just one.

Do not believe a word you hear from the minister about plans of previous governments to run trucks down River Road. It was ruled out by Jacobs in 2020 and, as a reminder, the government's own report conducted by AECOM in the last year referred to it and again ruled it out. So there has never been a suggestion that this occur. It should not occur. It must be stopped right now.

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