Below is part of the transcript from yesterday’s parliamentary sitting.
Caulfield electorate: open space
Mr SOUTHWICK (Caulfield) — I rise to speak on the adjournment tonight and address a matter to the Minister for Sport and Recreation. The matter I seek to raise relates to the important issue of open space and sporting facilities in my electorate of Caulfield. I ask the minister to investigate whether his department can provide some support for my local councils to investigate improving and increasing the available open space in my electorate. This is a great problem within our community because we have so many young up-and-coming people who want to play sport, including juniors who are coming through the clubs, and they are in desperate need of grounds to play on.
Open space is a real concern in the community, and it is an issue I have raised on countless occasions in this chamber. I have noted that the city of Glen Eira has the lowest amount of open space of any municipality in Melbourne, with only about 6 per cent of the city’s 230 hectares classified as public land.
There is open space in our neighbouring areas that many of our constituents use. Elsternwick Park in the Brighton electorate is an area that is used, and the member for Brighton has also been advocating for some time for the upgrade of the facilities in the park.
The park is a great facility, but it is in desperate need of an upgrade. Given the growing population of Melbourne and the importance of local people being able to utilise open space, we need something to be done about it. Access to open space is as important as roads and infrastructure, and it provides the much-needed heart that breathes life into a city. There is no question that in our case we are in desperate need of a heart transplant.
We need to look at ways to get more open space. I have looked into this issue, and it was back in the 1990s that work was last done within the council to look at how open space could be utilised. We have a number of areas within my electorate that could be further utilised, such as the former reservoir on the corner of Glen Huntly and Booran roads, which is currently fenced and not used. It has been fenced for some time. Whether it be passive space or whether it be active space for sporting clubs such as football, cricket or soccer, which has experienced increased participation rates right across Victoria, there is a desperate need to do something about this issue. We have a number of people using open space passively, including for dog walking, and we have recently done some work on the five precincts of open space at Caulfield Racecourse.
That also needs to be factored in as part of a review. I ask the Minister for Sport and Recreation to provide some much-needed funds to conduct research into how we could better utilise our open space and come up with a better plan for the city
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MS. ASHER
I am delighted to inform the member for Bentleigh that the coalition government, through Tourism Victoria’s events program, has allocated $10 000 to help market the games. The idea is to encourage spectators, competitors and their accompanying family members and friends to stay on and explore Melbourne and regional Victoria. As the Deputy Speaker knows, Victoria is a very compact state and people can get around very easily. I know the member for Bentleigh will be forcefully advocating this event amongst 2014 games.
The funding will be used for website development and for advertising in agency journals, magazines and newsletters as well as for posters, postcards, brochures and promotional activities at the upcoming 2012 games to be held in New Zealand next month. I am sure the Victoria Police members from the Moorabbin and Caulfield police stations who service the member for Bentleigh’s electorate will be very involved in promotional activities for a very good purpose rather than for purposes that have nothing to do with the economic development of the state of Victoria.
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MR DELAHANTY
I am also pleased to inform the member for Caulfield, who is here tonight, that the Glen Eira City Council has been provided with $30 000 for its open space strategy. The member for Caulfield spoke about the fact that we cannot create any more open space; it is about how we use the space we have. It is important that we plan for its use and all those types of things. One of the things that was brought to my attention when I was the shadow Minister for Sport and Recreation was people’s concern about access to sporting facilities, whether that be for passive or active recreation. As we know, Melbourne is the sporting capital of the world and Victoria is the sporting state. We need to plan for the further use of our sporting facilities.
I am also pleased to announce that the Bayside City Council has been awarded $22 500 for the Elsternwick Park precinct. I know that the member for Caulfield raised this matter, but the member for Brighton, who is in the house, also spoke to me about it; it is in her electorate. I had a brother who used to live not far from there, and I know the park very well. This funding will enable options to be investigated for providing new and upgraded sporting facilities at Elsternwick Park.
The Victorian government is committed to helping communities stay active, enjoy their sport and recreation facilities and lead healthier lives. The first step in achieving this is to identify opportunities and priorities through strategic planning.
This funding will support a strategic approach through community working with councils in the provision of sport and recreation facilities and programs. We want to see people stay more active more often, and this planning will allow that to happen
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This latest funding is on top of the $80,000 announced on Tuesday for lighting at the Packer Park vel0drome.
Glen Eira Debates 
March 2, 2012 at 11:10 AM
Golly gosh – what a coincidence. Esakoff and Lipshutz bring up Booran rd and the depot and whatya know? Manna from heaven via their lib mates within days. Reckon the libs are worried sick about October that’s why all this money is suddenly pouring in. Shame that the fate of Booran Rd is settled – it’ll be another soccer/footy pitch without a shadow of a doubt.
March 2, 2012 at 12:24 PM
yes I am a sporting fan. Just worried that if it becomes sporting fields it will be used by a small section of the community whereas a community garden could be used by a lot more people.
March 2, 2012 at 1:30 PM
Public open space per capita varies widely from one hectare/1000 people in Glen Eira The median public open space per capita across all metropolitan Melbourne is 7 hectares/1000 people.
This above sums up GE open space problem, not those goobly-gook figures presented to Southwick
Glen Eira is down the tube by a fantastic amount in pubic open.
The town hall mob don’t want to know about about little problems like open space provision. Even though its biting them them on the bum as we speak. With problems like storm-water run-off causing flooding from ever increasing impervious surfaces. The the consistent shrinking of private open space which is in-effect de-treeing of our city.
The problem with this double-wammy of the population increase, diminishing private open space and decreasing public open space per head of population is it is going to compound our planning options for flood control, areas to plant trees to make up for the loss in private opens space and mitigate temperature locally.
Provision for recreational needs both passive and active are narrowing and becoming more and more contentious, as we burn our bridges behind us. The protection of local biodiversity is also another local issue that need addressing in Glen Eira.
As our options become more and more limited. With climate change happening now and scientist saying it will effect or change our weather patterns more as time goes on. We are going to need areas of land to mitigate some of the more unpleasant results of carbon pollution and the resulting climate change.
Glen Eira should not be selling any land areas that could be planted with greenery, this includes lane-ways, that are being treating as cash-cow by council, these lanes could be green-belts running between developments. When your options with open space are as dire as Glen Eiras are, we need to be creative and use what we have. Unfortunately there is no such thinking coming from the town hall.
People continually ask for quality passive open, but council considers it a second class use of public open space. Of course this is ignorance coupled with expedience from vote hunting councillors and bureaucrats being responsible for the former.
March 2, 2012 at 4:36 PM
The Caulfield racecourse agreement and the lack of action by the MRC has become the real elephant in the room. Until the MRC adhere to the agreement, Southwick should just stop the waffle and show some action.
March 3, 2012 at 11:54 AM
This is grandstanding on the part of David. Open space *is* an issue, because its not distributed evenly, and because the demand is rising through population increase at the same time as governments and councils sell off land they consider “surplus”. It is government policy to herd people into urban ghettos without open space in close safe proximity. It is council policy to collect money from developers as an open space contribution, and then not spend it on providing open space. It is government policy to constrain the amount of money councils can collect as open space contribution to something insufficient even to provide a house block for Activity Centre inmates. Glen Eira Council bulldozed a children’s playground and built over the top of it in Carnegie as a reminder of their priorities.
As for David’s comments about “Caulfield Racecourse”, any work done on the portion of the Crown Land that Government has reluctantly decided should be used for the purposes it was set aside for over 150 years ago has been done at MRC expense, not the Government’s. The MRC was told bluntly that they had better do something about the centre of the Caulfield Racecourse and Public Reserve if they wanted C60 approved. It remains an unacceptable situation that the MRC has all of the revenue stream from the centre of the Reserve, so that ongoing maintenance is dependent on their beneficence. This situation is by government fiat, having stacked the Trustees of the Reserve with racing hacks and removed all accountability from them.