John Murphy (Lowe, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I wish to again draw to the attention of the House the disgraceful failure by the Howard government in relation to fixing aircraft noise associated with Sydney airport. I will be speaking in more detail in the grievance debate later this afternoon in relation to this very important matter for my constituents in Lowe in Sydney’s inner west.

The latest figures published by Airservices Australia indicate that we are receiving 31.78 per cent of air traffic movements to the north of Sydney airport. The Howard government promised that we would receive only 17 per cent of air traffic movements to the north of Sydney airport when they introduced the long-term operating plan. They promised to fix aircraft noise in Sydney, particularly for my constituents. It was attempted by the previous member for Lowe, but sadly the government did not listen to him and he had to resign from the government. It is an absolute disgrace that we are receiving twice as much noise as we were promised by the government and that the government has sold the airport to Southern Cross Consortium, which has been bankrolled by Macquarie Bank. As an airport, Sydney airport is working very well as a shopping centre and a car park but it is not delivering in relation to the environmental impact on the people I represent. I will be going into more detail later this afternoon about this. (Time expired)