Mr McARTHUR (1:52 PM) —I wish to acknowledge the visit of personnel from the Australian Rail Track Corporation on 5 September to Cressy in the heartland of my electorate of Corangamite, where discussions took place about the bushfires that were caused on 2 February this year. The discussions took place between those personnel and local fire brigades because of the now great number of trains that move through this area—approximately eight trains each way each day, including the passenger Overlander. This area is the worst fire prone zone in the whole of the world and local farmers are very concerned about the danger next year.

Inspections took place by farmers and local CFAs as to what might be done to spray the rail track and get rid of the phalaris. Discussions also took place as to what insurance premiums might be if this problem were not fully addressed—the problem of brakes on these steel wheels causing fires during this very difficult fire period. It was a very good discussion, and I thank David Marchant, Chairman of the ARTC, for sending his personnel down to have this discussion. No doubt he will be reporting back to the group, and I will be writing to him indicating the satisfaction of the local fire brigade group in the hope that we might mitigate this quite life threatening and property threatening disaster in the next few years because of the possibility of a fire in that area. (Time expired)