Mr SWAN (12:19 PM) —I rise to support the Damage by Aircraft Bill 1999 because it is of great importance to the residents of Lilley, in particular those who live around what is becoming an extremely busy airport—an airport which will have the same problems in 20 years time that the member for Grayndler was talking about if we do not get a change to the secretive approach of the operator and of the federal government.

The only way these airports can expand is if they live in harmony with and work with their communities. The secretive approach in relation to the problems of the Brisbane airport master plan—withholding of flight paths, the venting of fuel and on-ground noise—continues in Brisbane, as it has in Sydney over the years. It will produce all of those problems in Brisbane if a much more mature relationship does not develop between the communities affected, the airport operators and the federal government.

It is very good to see this bill, the purpose of which is to improve compensation for members of the public who suffer personal injury or property damage as third parties on the ground involved in air accident. It is just a pity we cannot have stronger regulation of what happens when operators and airport authorities breach their own guidelines in the operation of aircraft onto and off the airport. I will talk about that in a moment.

Aeroplanes fly all over the electorate of Lilley all day and most of the night. They fly over the suburbs of Chermside, Wavell Heights, Kedron, Gordon Park, Wooloowin, Clayfield, Ascot, Albion, Hamilton, Hendra, Shorncliffe, Deagon, Banyo, Boondall, Virginia, Nudgee Beach, Northgate and Nundah. In the last three years, there has been a deterioration in noise management procedures surrounding the airport, to which the BACL, the minister and this government have been completely indifferent.

Aircraft are deviating needlessly and causing unnecessary noise. Too many aircraft are not adhering to the correct ascent and descent profiles. In short, they are flying too low, and when they fly too low they disturb communities and also increase risk. We ought to have much more effective policing of the proper ascent and descent profiles in the electorate.

None of the residents in these suburbs doubt the importance of Brisbane airport to the economic future of our local community and to south-east Queensland in general. But now they are being told that they have to accept a new runway, when they cannot even get the operation of the current runway in proper context. They cannot get best practice at the existing runway, and the government want to expand it with a new runway which is going to double the capacity of the airport. All of this has been done without any comprehensive economic, social, environmental or public health impact statement. The federal government has approved a new runway 2.1 kilometres west of the existing runway without a comprehensive analysis of what effect it will have on the local community.

How can residents believe the BACL and the federal government when they say that the new runway will not impact upon them, when they have not implemented on the old runway the best practice that they claim they are going to implement on the new runway? This proposed parallel runway has the potential to cause serious problems in the northern suburbs. Air traffic will increase over suburbs like Aspley, Chermside, Kedron, Gordon Park, Wooloowin, Hamilton and Hendra. The location of the new runway will be close to Shorncliffe, Deagon, Banyo, Nudgee Beach, Northgate, Nundah and Hamilton. All of these suburbs will have significantly more noise if the new runway goes ahead, and it has been approved under the master plan by the federal government. In that master plan—a document of some 240 pages—only three pages specifically examine the options. The whole document was rigged so that only one conclusion could be reached—that a new parallel runway be located 2.1 kilometres west of the existing runway.

The transport minister has now locked into that option, so concerned residents are constantly contacting my office regarding this proposed runway. I believe we do need to have that comprehensive economic, social, environmental and public health study. We need to have it and we need to have the flight paths, but they are being withheld as well. One reason why we will have to have a Senate inquiry into the master plan process is that locals have been left in the dark.

The problem we have at the moment is that the BACL and the federal government are continually refusing to supply flight paths. They are deliberately keeping residents in the dark. What is more disturbing is that in the master plan the new parallel proposed runway is located 2.1 kilometres west of the existing runway—virtually on top of a whole number of suburbs that existed in this area before the existing runway was built. These are not new suburbs; these are not homes that have been built since the airport was expanded. They have been there for 50 years. They are proposing to build a runway 2.1 kilometres west of the existing runway, virtually on top of these suburbs.

Many people come to me and they say, `Wayne, if this new parallel runway has to go ahead, why does it have to be 2.1 kilometres west of the existing runway? Why can't it be one kilometre? Why can't it be 1.2? Why can't it be 1.5?' But, as is the case with the master plan, we can get no answers from the BACL or the federal government. If this dastardly proposal must go ahead, the new runway could be located closer to the existing runway, thereby alleviating the effects on local suburbs such as Banyo, Northgate, Nundah and Deagon. But we cannot get an answer. We cannot get any analysis. We cannot get any commonsense. And if we do not get any commonsense and this proposal goes ahead, we will have the situation that we had in Sydney when their parallel runway went ahead—we will have the whole community in uproar about this proposal. So wouldn't it be better in the interim if we just had some consultation, if we could just develop some faith, if we could just get rid of the secrecy and if we could just get a dialogue going? We need the jobs and we need the economic expansion, but we do not need a divisive debate which will kill the potential economics of this airport and bring with it the divisiveness of Sydney and all of the things that came with it, such as curfews and the like. If this goes ahead, make no mistake, that is the future that we will be looking at in Brisbane.

Wouldn't it be good if the BACL and the federal government also paid some attention to air quality in the area? We are now dealing with a bill that compensates people for damage. Why don't we talk about compensating people for damage that comes from the venting of fuel over their suburbs? As the member for Grayndler said before, we have been constantly pressuring the federal government to do something about this. We are now told there are regulations, but those regulations could not even be given to us before this debate today. We had an example of a Qantas jet that vented fuel over Brisbane not too long ago. I have been told that it was not immediately over the airport area, but how many jets have been doing it that we do not know about?

In the new environmental plan—in the master plan—there has been a study of the impact on the immediate environment of the airport site, but no studies of the air quality in the suburbs immediately surrounding the airport have taken place in Brisbane. Why don't the BACL and the federal government get together and work with those local communities so we can have some analysis of air quality and so residents can be assured that their quality of life is not being adversely affected by the sorts of incidents that have been occurring in Sydney?

I call on the BACL and the federal government to do something substantial about measuring air quality in the suburbs immediately surrounding Brisbane airport. That would be something that would naturally complement the sorts of initiatives that are in this bill today. The health and welfare of all of those residents in those suburbs surrounding this community must be paramount because, if this airport is to expand, there has to be a broad community consensus behind it. It cannot expand, and it will not be able to operate effectively, if that consensus is fractured.

That consensus is being fractured by the failure of the government to provide the flight paths for the parallel runway, the failure to put in place sufficient environmental standards and measurement, and the fuel venting incidents that we have seen in Sydney. There is a need for a tighter regulatory approach. As the member for Grayndler said, at the end of the day, the way we can regulate this is going to be economic. In Sydney and Brisbane we have to have tougher fines for aircraft operators who do not adhere to the regulations, tougher fines for aircraft operators that vent fuel and tougher fines for aircraft operators that rev their engines on the ground in the middle of the night and wake up most of the people surrounding those suburbs.

We need tougher regulation so that we can get an effective transport industry that lives in harmony with those people who are, in the first instance, most adversely affected by the economic growth of an airport such as Brisbane. We need that. It is commonsense. Why can't we get some commonsense out of the federal government? Why can't we get some genuine consultation? Why can't we get some genuine regulation?

I call on the federal government and the BACL to change their practice of the last couple of years and do something decent to deliver genuine consultation and collaboration between the airport community and the airport in the long-term interests of the north Brisbane suburbs and the generation of jobs and wealth in our community.

Debate interrupted.