MELBOURNE morning radio came to Torquay last week, with ABC Melbourne presenter Jon Faine grilling the Corangamite candidates at the Torquay Bowls Club on Friday.<\/p>\n
A capacity crowd of about 250 people squeezed into the bowls club on The Esplanade to hear Mr Faine put his own questions and those from the audience to incumbent Liberal MP Sarah Henderson and Labor challenger Libby Coker (who were on air simultaneously), independent candidate Damien Cole and Greens contender Simon Northeast.<\/p>\n
Mr Faine fired pointed questions at all candidates, including asking Ms Henderson about the lack of Liberal Party branding on many of her corflutes and asking Ms Coker why her campaign requested a public meeting in Torquay be held off the record.<\/p>\n
Ms Henderson\u2019s responses to questions were loudly booed by the crowd three times, leading her to quip \u201cI think we might have a slightly stacked audience here\u201d, which was also booed.<\/p>\n
Mr Cole said one of his policies if he won would be introducing a \u201cparks pass\u201d for the Otways.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnyone coming down the Great Ocean Road or going into the Otways has to pay for the pass; any kind of interstate or international visitors.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt happens all over the world and the important thing about this is that the money is not going to go back to Canberra, it\u2019s going to go straight into a conservation fund.\u201d<\/p>\n
Surf Coast Shire mayor Rose Hodge (who Mr Faine referred to as \u201cRosie\u201d four times) and Greater Torquay Alliance president Andrew Cherubin were interviewed together, during which Mr Faine expressed scepticism about why Torquay needed a pool, given its lengthy coastline \u2013 \u201cTo be honest, I don\u2019t get it\u201d \u2013 and the low-development attitude expressed by some.<\/p>\n
\u201cIs that the feeling, ladies and gentlemen: we\u2019re here but now no-one else can come?\u201d he asked the crowd, which received a muted response, \u201cOh, that went down really, really well, didn\u2019t it?<\/p>\n
But that\u2019s effectively what you want\u2026 if someone had said that 20 years ago, most of you people here wouldn\u2019t have been able to come to Torquay, would you?\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr Cherubin disagreed. \u201cThat\u2019s not what we\u2019re after \u2013 we\u2019re after planning control. It\u2019d be nice if VCAT didn\u2019t overturn every decision the community makes,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
MELBOURNE morning radio came to Torquay last week, with ABC Melbourne presenter Jon Faine grilling the Corangamite candidates at the Torquay Bowls Club on Friday. A capacity crowd of about 250 people squeezed into the bowls club on The Esplanade to hear Mr Faine put his own questions and those from the audience to incumbent […]<\/p>\n