November 17, 2023
Member for Hill Shane Knuth said Minister for Transport and Main Roads Mark Bailey was now blatantly showing his disrespect after failing to show up to a meeting his own office organised and failing to investigate the issue.
This week, Mr Knuth put a second Question without Notice (QwN) to Minister Bailey requesting physical evidence that the unmanned speed camera located at Malanda/Atherton Road in September was tested for accuracy.
The Member for Hill has requested this evidence several times over the past 3 weeks but to date nothing has been provided.
Mr Knuth said he was furious with the Minister because after his QwN on Tuesday, November 14 the Minister’s office rang and arranged a meeting with himself and fellow KAP members only to send a staff member to the meeting to say it was cancelled.
“This is not good enough especially after he committed to investigate the matter,” Mr Knuth said.
“We don’t believe he has the documentation to prove that the machine was correctly calibrated.
“We have written letters, provided him with hundreds of short statements from those with speeding fines, asked a number of questions and spoke to the issue.
“Still, he continues to evade us and fails to provide proof that the speed camera was calibrated correctly.”
Mr Knuth said there was no evidence whatsoever to suggest this section of road was a high crash incident location which warrants the placement of this device.
To date 363 individuals have contacted the Hill Electorate office with 590 fines and will have to fork out close to $300,000 before Christmas.
“These types of cameras aren’t about road safety. They are about racking in as much revenue for the Government as possible,” he said.
The majority have reported they firmly believe the camera was not functioning correctly.