Hands Off Point Peron Inc (HOPP) sent an open letter on the 13 November 2016 to the member for Rockingham Mark McGowan MP, in whose electorate the ‘Mangles Bay Marina’ (MBM) development is proposed, in an effort to get clear answers from him as to his stance on the proposed rezoning to urban of 105 hectares of Point Peron public land and regional parklands for the MBM housing estate. Unfortunately Mr McGowan’s answers were evasive and did not directly address the questions that we put to him.
Based his comments so far we must assume that he supports the MRS amendment which would allow the bush forever parkland to be bulldozed and sold off for housing, thus destroying the Cape Peron Coastal Park plan. We assume this because if he opposes the MRS amendment surely he would be willing to say so.
And, given that Mr McGowan says that he opposes canals we must assume that he opposes the Mangles Bay inland marina at Point Peron because it would clearly be a canal, which is defined as “an artificial waterway constructed to allow the passage of boats inland”.
Unless Mr McGowan can unequivocally demonstrate that our understanding of his position is incorrect, we must assume that he supports a scam whereby the proponent gets the land based on the promise of a marina, but is then allowed to sell it for housing without a marina, even though the marina was the whole rationale for the development and housing was never used to try and justify the taking of this public parkland.
Given that Mr McGowan is the local member and Leader of the Opposition, surely he should have the courage and honesty to make his position crystal clear in regard to the MRS amendment, the marina and the Cape Peron Coastal Park plan. The time for evasion and doublespeak is over.
HOPP sent a follow up open letter to Mark McGowan on the 28 November 2016. To date there has been no response.
Find out more here in this WAtoday story
