Middleborough Road grade separation: Ombudsman’s recommendations

Hansard: 7 August 2007 ASSEMBLY

Mr CLARK (Box Hill) — I raise with the Minister for Roads and Ports the results of an investigation by the Victorian Ombudsman which have confirmed a series of failures by VicRoads and the Environment Protection Authority that have left local residents in Box Hill exposed to long hours of loud noise during the Middleborough Road grade separation project. Both VicRoads and the EPA are now saying that they are reviewing what happened and are developing or improving their guidelines. I ask the minister to make sure that proper guidelines are implemented so that no other residents will in future have to endure what Box Hill residents have suffered on this project.

Much of the suffering of the residents occurred because of government delays and the government’s broken promise to consult with residents.

The Bracks government promised the project during the 2002 election but delayed it for over three years and then rushed to cut corners on the design and planning to get the project under way before the 2006 election. The Ombudsman began an investigation after I lodged a complaint in February this year on behalf of local residents who had suffered loud and painful noise 24 hours a day for days on end and who had struggled to get any help from VicRoads or the EPA.

In a letter to me dated 26 July the Ombudsman found that high noise occurred at night time despite a VicRoads work management plan strategy to limit high noise to daylight hours; that residents were not sufficiently informed about the option to be relocated during periods of high noise; that the EPA noise guidelines referred to by VicRoads and its contractors were not the appropriate guidelines to follow for a major road/rail construction project like the Middleborough Road project; that the EPA did not have statutory authority for approval of the project; that there are no statutory limits for noise levels for construction works like the Middleborough Road project; and that guidelines are required to help determine what constitutes unreasonable noise emissions from construction works.

These findings by the Ombudsman are a vindication of the concerns of local residents, who were treated with contempt by the government and by VicRoads and who received little help from the EPA. It is reasonable for members of the community to accept some level of noise and other disruption in the public interest. However, the level of suffering inflicted on residents by this project shows that the Labor government and its bureaucracy have little true care for protecting individuals and their families.

It is too late to undo or stop the damage and hurt that has been suffered by those residents in Box Hill, but I ask the minister now to make sure that VicRoads acts to implement guidelines that will prevent this happening in future, and to use his good offices to ensure that the EPA adopts appropriate guidelines and that they are suitably enforced on any future similar projects.