Tuesday, 2 August 2022

 Mr FINN (Western Metropolitan) (19:55): (2026) I wish to raise a matter this evening for the attention of the Minister for Tourism, Sport and Major Events. The minister may be aware of the ongoing saga of the St Albans Leisure Centre, something that has got up the snout of many a person in the western suburbs for quite some years, because whilst the St Albans Leisure Centre has needed an upgrade—no, it has not needed an upgrade, its need is to be flattened and rebuilt—there has been very little money forthcoming from either federal or state government.

The Brimbank council have done a magnificent job in supporting the rebuilding of this particular centre. My good friend Cr Maria Kerr of Brimbank council has, with a number of others, started a campaign to raise $10 million to build an outdoor pool at the St Albans Leisure Centre. It seems to me that that is a pretty reasonable sort of thing. Outdoor pools are the norm in the eastern suburbs, the southern suburbs or any of the suburbs where there are margins that could be overcome. That is what we are talking about here. We are talking about safe Labor seats being ignored yet again. This is a classic example of the ALP neglecting the west. Minister Leane over there frowns at me from behind his mask, but the fact of the matter is it is true. If you want to go out to St Albans and do a survey—you can do a survey too—go out to St Albans and ask a few people, and they will tell you exactly what they think of the Labor Party and how they treat them out there.

So what I am asking the minister to do is to provide the $10 million that is necessary to build the outdoor pool, because we are hoping that by summer this year—it is fast approaching—we will have an outdoor pool so that people from St Albans and surrounds can go to the leisure centre and enjoy lazing around the pool on a sunny day, all slipped, slopped and slapped, of course, particularly slapped. The people that we are talking about are ones who enjoy a day at the pool, and I think it is absolutely imperative that the government come up with the money to ensure that people in St Albans and people in the areas surrounding St Albans in Brimbank are able to get to the pool and enjoy the outdoor pool this summer. If the government does not come up with the money, I doubt it will happen, and that would be a very, very sad thing indeed. So I ask the minister to come up with $10 million for the people of St Albans.