Vote for new probe into Luna Park ghost train fire

A special commission of inquiry with royal commission powers will investigate Sydney’s Luna Park fire and police investigation.

Firemen at the scene of of the ghost train fire that killed six children and one adult in 1979.

The NSW upper house has voted narrowly to support the establishment of a special commission of inquiry with royal commission powers to investigate Sydney’s Luna Park ghost train fire and subsequent police investigation.

The private member’s motion moved by Greens MP David Shoebridge, adopted with a 20-16 vote of MPs, was supported by Labor and Fred Nile’s Christian Democrats but opposed by the Coalition and Mark Latham’s One Nation.

The government has ruled out establishing a commission.

The debate was conducted in the presence of Jenny Godson and Jason Holman, who lost family and friends in the 1979 fire, and saw the ABC sharply criticised by One Nation and Labor for implicating Neville Wran in an alleged fire cover-up.

Mr Shoebridge praised the recent ABC documentary on the fire and criticised the original police investigation. He said families had waited too long for justice and “the broader community is also demanding answers”.

He said the parliament should establish an inquiry if the government did not.

While Labor MP John Graham supported an inquiry into the “tragic incident”, he said the opposition had concerns over the ABC’s reporting about Wran, alleging that he orchestrated the Luna Park lease to go a front company linked to crime boss Abe Saffron.

The Australian understands that at the Labor caucus meeting this week, MPs noted that former leader Jodi McKay had supported a new inquiry but this should now be qualified by stating the party did not endorse the ABC’s assertions about Wran.

Mr Graham, Labor’s deputy leader in the upper house, read a letter from Wran’s former staff published in The Australian trashing the ABC’s Exposed: The Ghost Train Fire documentary for making unsubstantiated corruption claims about Wran.

He said Labor supported the letter.

One Nation leader Mark Latham savaged ABC journalist Caro Meldrum-Hanna, who claimed Wran and High Court judge Lionel Murphy were corrupt. Mr Latham said Meldrum-Hanna was “a fake news merchant” and her reporting was “fanciful” and “not credible”.

“How many witch-hunts do Neville Wran and Lionel Murphy have to endure, even in their graves,” Mr Latham said.

“I knew Neville Wran. Neville Wran was a good man, an honest man and a great premier of this state.

“And the shameful pursuit of him by the ABC time after time after time, even now when he is long dead, is a disgrace to public broadcasting in this country.”

Damien Tudehope, the Minister for Finance and Small Business, noted that NSW police were responding to a request from the coroner to examine new evidence about the fire.

He said the ABC should hand over all of its documentary ­material and expressed con­fidence in the police review.