Canberra calling

Mr Goodenough was among the first cohort of councillors in 1999 after the City of Wanneroo split for the creation of the City of Joondalup.

The Liberal MP told the Times he was looking forward to federal politics after winning the seat of Moore in the September 7 election, but it was sad to leave local government and ‘a great team of people’.

‘They come from all different walks of life,’ the former Coastal ward councillor said.

‘We did a lot of things in that 14 years: Marmion Avenue was not a dual carriageway when I started.

‘There was no Clarkson library and the (Quinns Mindarie) surf club was a tin shed.’

Mr Goodenough said the City had started with an asset base worth $360 million but had recently passed the $1 billion mark ” a ‘threefold increase in 14 years’.

‘There has been a broad spectrum of people that I have met over the 14 years,’ he said.

‘There have been some great people, especially volunteers that really did a lot for the community.’

With his federal electorate stretching from Duncraig to his home suburb Mindarie and across to Banksia Grove, Mr Goodenough said there were a handful of main issues.

‘One thing I’ve been working on for a while is the Neerabup industrial area,’ he said.

‘It has got the potential for 20,000 new jobs and would create local employment for all the people yet to move into the coastal corridor.’

The second issue would be creating the region’s third marina at Ocean Reef, which Mr Goodenough said would include residential and tourist accommodation and provide more employment opportunities.

He said he would also support research and development at Edith Cowan University.

‘They have got some terrific new technologies that they are developing but most people don’t know about them. The challenge is to turn that science into real products for commercialisation,’ he said.

Mr Goodenough also identified growth in Joondalup’s CBD as an area to address, saying there was currently $1 billion of construction underway.

‘It would be nice to see more federal agencies coming up ” we’ve got Centrelink but it would be good to see more,’ he said.

‘Joondalup Health Campus has been expanded recently to 650 beds and there are plans to bring that to 1000 beds in the next few years as the population grows.’

Mr Goodenough said, as parliament would sit for about 22 weeks a year, he expected to be travelling to Canberra during those weeks, leaving late on Sundays and returning on Friday mornings.

‘In federal politics everything is on a larger scale ” we get three times as many invitations, sometimes three functions on the same night, four times as many inquiries, four times as many phone calls,’ he said.

‘You have to manage your time carefully.’

While he expected to be busier representing the electorate, Mr Goodenough said he was lucky management took care of his shopping centre development in Currambine so it was not time consuming for him.

Between official duties, he still hoped to find time for his hobbies ” fishing with friends and competitive shooting with clay targets.

Born in Singapore to a family that dated back to that country’s early English settlers, Mr Goodenough moved to Perth with his parents in 1984, when he was nine-years-old.

At his final council briefing session, Mayor Tracey Roberts praised Mr Goodenough’s contribution to council and community.

Fellow councillor and former state Labor candidate Brett Treby said although on opposite sides of politics they worked well together.

‘Ian’s honesty, his integrity and the way he has managed himself right throughout the 14 years speaks volumes,’ he said.

Cr Rudi Steffens, who has served on the council with Mr Goodenough and Cr Treby since 1999, also praised his departing colleague’s dedication, honesty and integrity.