Page 308 - Week 02 - Tuesday, 20 February 1990
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Mr Jensen: It is slightly different, Paul.
MR SPEAKER: Order!
MR WHALAN: If it suited my purpose to produce any other documents, I would so do. This sort of hollow challenge from Trevor Kaine shows how desperate these people are to conceal their true position as it relates to the Tuggeranong pool. What has happened is that in today's paper we have seen Mr Duby writing a letter off to the Canberra Times reporting Mr Collaery's motion of the other day. What he failed to do in his letter to the Canberra Times was to say that in moving the amendment to my motion Mr Collaery had removed the commitment to the construction of a pool in the immediate future. He had removed the commitment by the Government to the construction of a pool in the Tuggeranong town centre. He had removed the commitment to the construction of a pool near the bus interchange in the Tuggeranong town centre. He had removed the commitment to the construction of a range of facilities, which was based upon the process of consultation which had been initiated by myself with the relevant community groups in Tuggeranong when we were in Government last year; and he had removed the commitment to pursue the construction in terms of the enclosure of the pool to ensure that there would be all-year facilities available there.
That takes us then to the points that were raised in the document which was distributed to the community at last night's meeting. That particular document contains the historical background to the Follett Government's position as it related to the Tuggeranong pool. Although we had a long-term commitment before we came into Government to the construction of those facilities in Tuggeranong, when we took Government our hands were tied by the fact that there was running at that time an opportunity for the firm Decoin Pty Limited to come forward with a proposal for the development of a pool by the private sector. That particular proposal came about as a result of an advertisement in the Canberra Times in August 1986 when submissions and expressions of interest were sought in relation to a recreation complex in Tuggeranong. There were four expressions of interest and Decoin was selected for the exclusive negotiations with the then Department of Territories in relation to this particular matter.
By August 1989 Decoin had still failed to produce a proposal which was consistent with the original concept and which was acceptable to the ACT Government. However, it did ask for yet a further extension of time to allow it to come up with such a proposal and to demonstrate its capacity to proceed with the project. After some discussion with officers, I very reluctantly agreed to give Decoin an extension of three months at that point of time. After that I indicated to the officers concerned that while that process of the extension of time ran there would also be a period during which attention should be given to the
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