Page 248 - Be Reasonable – Do It My Way , Peter E. Daly AM, My Story

CHAPTER 24 - SEAL ROCKS, MELBOURNE ZOO AND AUSTRALIAN LANDSCAPE TRUST (CONSERVATION AND ENVIRONMENTAL PROPERTIES)
During the latter years of the Kennett Government, we were undertaking another project which would certainly have been of interest to anyone visiting Australia and that was to build a tunnel under the sea bed coming up at a tower where you could overlook the actual rocks on which the seal colony lived. I did once visit the seal rocks and I said to a colleague of mine, the next time I think I will wear somebody else’s clothes because the stench was just unbelievable. No doubt I think we would have had windows to keep the stench out.
Anyway, we did the environmental study and to get to the tower, it was planned to build some sort of train. Not only this, we were going to build a monorail on the side of the building leading to the Penguin Parade so that visitors could come and have a great meal at the Seal rocks restaurant and then continue on down to the Penguin Parade.
However, this all came to nought once the Kennett Government lost the unlosable election. The Brack’s Government got in and they needed one vote to gain power and that was an independent whose constituency included Seal Rocks. She was adamant that she would not provide her support to the Brack’s Government unless they ruled that there would be no further development on Crown Land.
There were long Court battles, Seal Rocks withdrew and was forced to close. Much later we did win the litigation against the Government for compensation, but it is extremely disappointing that the Victorian public, international tourists and possibly all of Australia lost what could have been one of its best attractions.
The plan was for Seal Rocks to have only had the contract for 25 years and then the whole operation would have reverted back to the public. It was extremely short-sighted on the part of the then Bracks State Government.
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