Shadow Minister for Transport Mark Parton has backed the Canberra Liberals transport policy to get Canberrans where they want to go when they want to get there and rubbished attacks from Chris Steel regarding the dedicated busway from Civic to Woden.

Mr Parton said currently, Canberrans are able to travel by bus from Civic to Woden in under 20 minutes which will become even quicker under the Canberra Liberals dedicated bus lanes and bus priority measures.

“The Canberra Liberals have released a very comprehensive transport policy that includes a number of measures that will improve public transport frequency for Canberrans which has long been neglected by Labor and the Greens,” Mr Parton said.

“This transport policy has been widely supported by Canberrans and a number of stakeholders that is based on getting Canberrans where they want to go when they want to get there with the tram anticipated to take over 30 minutes between Civic and Woden.

“Chris Steel knows the tram is losing public support among Canberrans with the project in disarray as highlighted late last week with the announcement a tunnel might now need to be built for stage 2B to Woden.”

Mr Parton said the Canberra Liberals will not be lectured to about transport policy by a Minister and a government that has been talking about building a tram to Woden for over 12 years but is still unable to tell Canberrans what the route will be, how many tunnels they will need to build and ultimately how much it will cost?

“It is incredible that the Minister would criticise a small detail of our comprehensive transport policy when he and his government has been unable to provide any detail on stage 2B of the tram.

“The Labor-Greens government is spending $100 million of taxpayers’ money on a contract with AECOM and they can’t even answer basic questions about the project.

“The real questions Chris Steel must answer before even debating the Canberra Liberals transport policy are:

• What is the final route of stage 2B?
• What is the estimated travel time between Civic and Woden by tram?
• How much will stage 2B of the tram cost Canberra taxpayers?”

“If Chris Steel is serious about public transport transparency, he must answer these questions immediately and also be upfront about the true cost of stage 2A which will be $1.42 billion, considerably more than the $577 million he has claimed,” Mr Parton concluded.