Richard Marles (Corio, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As this summer comes to a close, it has again been clear that many people chose to spend their summer gravitating towards Geelong's Corio Bay and all that it has to offer. I like to start some of my mornings running from my house, through Eastern Gardens and along the waterfront. For others, they come to fish at St Helens, and many enjoy a picnic and a swim at the iconic Eastern Beach public swimming pool. This really is a remarkable art deco precinct. The boardwalk-enclosed swimming area speaks to an earlier time and the way Australians gave expression to their love affair with swimming and the sea. It has been a centre of recreation from the earliest days of Geelong. This precinct should be on the National Heritage List.

But today I particularly want to reflect upon Limeburners Point, one of the principal places where people can take a boat out onto Corio Bay. I frequently run past Limeburners Point on my morning runs. Unfortunately, the boat ramp area at Limeburners Point has a chequered history. It continues to be a hooning hotspot. Unorganised burnouts leave the space littered with shredded tyres and broken bottles, and rubbish is being dumped there. Local schoolchildren who participate in the Geelong local history walk, an excursion to see our beautiful bollards along the bay, start that very excursion from the car park at Limeburners Point.

This has been an ongoing issue, and local anglers are angry that this amenity has been misused for years without proper action from the City of Greater Geelong. Many local anglers have made representation to council over many years. In April of last year, a local angler spoke to the Geelong Advertiser, saying: 'Sooner or later some car or boat trailer is going to get wiped out. It's a disaster waiting to happen.' In August of last year a horrific incident occurred at Limeburners Point when two women were flung from the back of a ute. The ute was engaging in hooning behaviour, reportedly doing burnouts in the car park. One of the woman lost consciousness after her head struck the ground, while the other woman escaped with grazes and bruises. Both were incredibly lucky to walk away from the incident without more serious injury.

The effects of the antisocial behaviour that is occurring at the Limeburners Point car park extend to environmental impacts as well. Last year, a local Geelong family created a short documentary for a school project, entitled Project 10-10. The Woods family visited and cleaned 10 beaches along the south-west coast in 10 hours. What was glaringly obvious from the documentary was that Limeburners Point was by far the most polluted of all of these 10 locations.

The CCTV installed by the council does not and has not solved the issue of hooning. The sheriff department of Victoria Police often send officers down to Limeburner Point after reports of hooning or bad behaviour. These aren't solutions; they're purely reactive and continue to cost ratepayers. Hooning behaviour continues to take up valuable police resources and put local residents at risk. We can't afford to wait until someone gets seriously injured or even worse before we act. It's now time for the City of Greater Geelong to acknowledge that something needs to be done about the design and layout of the car park and come up with a plan that will make Limeburners Point a safe place for anglers, locals and tourists.