Mr LLOYD (7:27 PM) —I would like to bring to the attention of the House tonight my concerns and the concerns of many of my constituents about the continuing and increasing delays on the F3 freeway between Sydney and the Central Coast. This has been an ongoing issue for many years and is, unfortunately, slowly getting worse with the rapid development of the Central Coast and the increasing numbers of commuters and heavy vehicles using the F3.

Recently this issue has been raised to prominence once again because of very significant delays that occurred on the F3 over the summer months. In fact, on Friday 8 January, there was a truck accident on the F3 which caused the F3 to be blocked and for many motorists to be held up for a number of hours. In fact some of the delays were as long as 16 hours, which was totally unacceptable. There was, of course, a chorus of concern raised by many people in the community and the state government also raised concerns about these delays.

I would like to point out that I have been raising this issue for a number of years. In fact, on 18 November 1996 I held an F3 forum on the Central Coast of New South Wales to prepare a submission to the inquiry into federal road funding. This forum went through all the concerns of the traffic hold- ups that were being experienced on the F3 even back in 1996.

There were three major recommendations made by the forum, which we placed before the inquiry. One was that the Hawkesbury River-Calga section of the F3 be used as a trial for the advanced electronic intelligent transport system, which is similar to those used on many overseas freeways. I am pleased to advise that that recommendation was accepted by the government and $10 million was made available to the state government for utilisation in the construction of those electronic signage boards.

It was interesting that among the people who were held up in the traffic was Premier Bob Carr, who said that he was still waiting for confirmation from the federal government for funding for this electronic signage. The F3, whilst it is a federal road, is managed by the New South Wales government and it is up to them to install these electronic signage systems.

In a media release dated 28 January, the federal Minister for Transport and Regional Services, John Anderson, pointed out to the Premier that federal government funding was first offered some 19 months ago. The money was available in July last year and if they had acted quickly those electronic signage systems could have been in place for the last summer traffic delays.

This call has been made over a number of years by me and by other people. In a report by the local coroner, Brian Wilson, in October 1998, commenting on an accident that occurred on the freeway he said:

I recommend that a copy of this transcript be forwarded to the appropriate authorities, which I assume would be the State Minister for Roads and the Federal Office of Road Safety, with a recommendation that action be taken to install electronic sign boards on the freeway. These can surely be implemented at minimal cost to warn motorists of pending problems . . .

That was one of the major concerns that motorists had at the last significant delays. As I said, these delays lasted some 16 hours and there was no warning to motorists before they entered the F3 freeway that there were these significant delays. Once they were involved in the traffic delays, there was virtually no way that they could get out of them. If they had had prior warning, they could have used the old Pacific Highway, which is something I am pleased and proud to say I was involved in having reopened back in 1994. If it had not been for the efforts of getting that road reopened, we would not have an alternative.

Finally, I would like to point out that that section of the F3 is not just a local issue, because it is the only major road north from Sydney. Once you get to Newcastle there is the Pacific Highway and the New England Highway, but between the Hawkesbury River and Newcastle the F3 is the only road leading north of any significance. Every vehicle—every heavy transport vehicle and every car—leaving Sydney or going to Sydney from northern New South Wales or from Queensland has to pass through that section of the F3. So I will continue to push for the installation of these signs. (Time expired)