Kevin Hogan (Page, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is good news in the community of Casino today. The Casino Drill Hall was scheduled to be sold by auction on 10 December, next week. I can announce to those here today, and to the community of Casino, that that sales process next week has been cancelled and the sale delayed for at least six months.

The Casino Drill Hall has a longstanding historical and cultural value to the town of Casino. In 2008 it was deemed to be surplus to Defence requirements. It was offered, in 2010, to the Richmond Valley Council to purchase—but, for different reasons, they did not want it. The Defence department since that time has been going through a process to sell it.

The community at large only became aware of this process about four or five weeks ago, when the auction signs went up for this to be sold. I went to a public meeting at the RSM Club in Casino two weeks ago. The will of that meeting was—overwhelmingly—that they wanted the sale process to be delayed. They wanted more community consultation and they wanted the time to come up with alternatives for this. I can announce with great joy the fact that the Parliamentary Secretary for Defence yesterday informed me that he has instructed the Department of Defence to defer the sale for six months, at least.

I acknowledge Tony Hennessy, who chaired the public meeting, Kevin Magney, from the Casino sub-branch, and Bob Marle, who has done a lot of work on this over time as well.