Page 3239 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 18 October 2022
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We need to make sure that our new planning system creates settings, within its control, to support more affordable housing for Canberrans. This is really important. We need a planning system that respectfully and genuinely listens to communities and provides communities with useful and accessible information about planning proposals, and that includes genuine attempts to incorporate the concerns of the community.
We would like to see better protection of trees and green spaces for current and future generations. We have recently seen quite a lot of law reform that delivers on that, so that is really good. It is important that all of that package of law reform, and all of that package of review, protects our biodiversity and habitat. We need to make sure that our future development is not harming threatened species.
We need decisions that are based on environmental impact statements to be independently assessed. We need to understand and track the cumulative effect of development on threatened species and wildlife corridors. We need to consider our environment as a whole, not block by block.
This land always was, and always will be, Aboriginal land. We need a new planning system that recognises that and requires respectful engagement with traditional custodians. We need to see integrity in the system. We want to make sure that there is sufficient independence and expertise for assessment and review. Finally, we want to ensure that reviews of planning decisions are assessed quickly by properly resourced review bodies.
Those are a number of comments that the Greens made a year ago, when the review commenced, and we wanted to reiterate those because the review is ongoing.
I am also pleased to see quite a lot of other work progressing in this budget. We have seen Greens Minister Rattenbury’s development of a new office for water. We have had a number of Healthy Waterways announcements recently, including some in Ginninderra, which are really great to see. Greens Minister Vassarotti recently announced funding to further protect environment biodiversity, including grants to local community groups that will conserve and protect the environment.
We have seen quite a lot of announcements that will help to establish more trees and plants in our urban areas and that will support the Canberra Nature Map platform. I am looking forward to seeing that work progress and making sure that we are progressing that good work on urban habitat connectivity and mapping.
We have also seen quite a lot of recent announcements. We see in this budget quite a lot of the work that is linking community wellbeing with our access to nature and our appreciation for nature, including things like nature prescriptions. It is pleasing to see that work coming along.
The ACT Greens are happy to support this budget. It is good to see progress on quite a lot of major projects.
MR PARTON (Brindabella) (4.21): I just wanted to make some comments in the sustainable building space. The Canberra Liberals are of the belief that some good
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