Tuesday, 26 November 2024

 Iwan WALTERS (Greenvale) (19:23): (950) My adjournment matter this evening is for the Minister for Water in the other place, and the action I seek is for the minister to provide me and my community with an update on the funded plans to reopen the southern section of Greenvale Reservoir Park following last week’s momentous announcement of $3 million to upgrade and reopen this park. It was very exciting to join the minister and senior leaders of Parks Victoria and Melbourne Water to make this announcement, which is something that I have been tirelessly working to secure, alongside members of the Greenvale community, since I was elected two years ago today. Greenvale Reservoir supplies over a million people across Melbourne’s west and north with the freshest drinking water in the world, and while essential works to strengthen the dam wall and safeguard Melbourne’s water supply led to the park’s closure for a number of years, with this new funding Parks Victoria and Melbourne Water can now undertake the upgrade works to make the southern section of the park safe and accessible for community enjoyment. This investment will deliver new entry points for pedestrians, upgraded walking trails and new facilities as well as critical vegetation clean-up and street safety works.

Generations of local families have enjoyed spending time here, and I am delighted that this investment by the Allan Labor government means that Greenvale residents will again have access to this beautiful parkland right on their doorstep. For many whose parents worked in Australia’s manufacturing heartland of Broadmeadows, it was precious open space known locally as ‘out the back of Ford’, or ‘Ford’un Arkasι’ to the thousands of Turkish families for whom it was such a special gathering place. While works to expand the reservoir wall and safeguard Melbourne’s drinking water supply have changed the park’s footprint from the space that our community remembers, this funding ensures that all parts of Greenvale Reservoir Park can be accessed by our growing community and enjoyed by generations to come. This is real action that is delivering what matters for Greenvale, not the empty words of Liberals more interested in division and slogans than delivery and substance.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Before I call the minister, just for clarity, the member for Bentleigh raised a matter on mobile coverage in Bentleigh. The action, as I took it, was to raise the matter with the federal minister. In Rulings from the Chair, Acting Speaker Crisp, 2015, states:

Asking for advocacy is not a matter for the adjournment debate.

However, Speaker Brooks in 2017 did say that writing a letter is an action. Would the member for Bentleigh like to clarify how he would like the minister to raise the matter?

Nick Staikos: Yes, I want the Minister for Government Services to write a letter to the Honourable Michelle Rowland MP about mobile coverage in East Bentleigh.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I thank the member for Bentleigh for the clarification.