Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Families, Community Services, Indigenous Affairs and the Voluntary Sector) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise tonight to celebrate one of the great landmarks of my electorate, Brookvale Oval, which is the home of the Sea Eagles rugby league team and has been for more than 60 years. Brookvale Oval to some is just a sporting ground, but to many people in my area it is more like a shrine than just a place where people play football. It has a great history, it has a great spirit but, unfortunately, it has very poor infrastructure. Compared to so many contemporary football stadia—not just Aussie Stadium but Parramatta Stadium, North Power Stadium, the Panthers Stadium, Jubilee Oval and Endeavour Field—compared to all those NRL grounds, Brookvale Oval is more like a ramshackle relic of the 1970s than a modern up-to-date football stadium.

Every weekend in winter some 20,000 locals go into the dilapidated stands of Brookvale Oval or crowd onto its hill. I say to this House and I say to members opposite—some of whom would probably be Sea Eagles supporters—that those people in my electorate deserve to be treated with the same respect and they deserve to enjoy the same facilities as the fans at these other grounds—grounds which have been extensively redeveloped with state and federal government money. The people of Warringah, the Sea Eagles rugby league team and Brookvale Oval deserve to be on a level playing field with Parramatta Stadium, Endeavour Field, Jubilee Oval, North Power Stadium and Panthers Stadium, which have been extensively redeveloped with state and federal government money.

The only government to spend money on Brookvale Oval has in fact been the Howard government. In the 2005 budget, the Howard government committed $1 million towards bringing the Brookvale Oval lighting system up to television standards. Thanks to that spending, the Sea Eagles were able to continue at Brookvale Oval. But it may not last because the NRL does not just want proper television standard lighting; it wants a proper 21st century-standard stadium. Redeveloping Brookvale Oval to these standards will cost $20 million at a minimum. Prior to the election, the Howard government committed a further $9 million towards that redevelopment, bringing its total commitment to $10 million, half of the redevelopment costs of the oval. I regret to say that the Iemma government in New South Wales, notwithstanding its prime responsibility in this area, has committed nothing at all. It has talked big and it has consulted widely but it has not put a single dollar towards bringing Brookvale Oval into the 21st century. I further regret to say that so far the Rudd government has not committed any money at all to this redevelopment. There is going to be a $20 billion-plus surplus. If the government does nothing and just relies on the policies and good economic management of the former government, there will be a $20 billion-plus surplus. I say to members opposite: spend 1/2000th of that surplus because that is all we are asking for on Brookvale Oval.

If members opposite are prepared to spend $2.5 million to preserve the ‘Dead Tree of Barcaldine’, they ought to be prepared to spend $9 million to upgrade a living football stadium which is a shrine for 20,000 people in Warringah every weekend and which invigorates and gives so much satisfaction to hundreds of thousands of people elsewhere. If they are not prepared to do that, the people of my area will have to conclude that they have committed the crime of voting Liberal. We are all Australians. We all deserve a share of government largesse. (Time expired)