Page 493 - Week 02 - Thursday, 22 February 1990
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unwise decisions by Commonwealth Ministers and occasionally errors have occurred in the administrative process.
This Government has already indicated its desire to overcome inefficiencies in all areas of the ACT Government. Allegations of corruption are, of course, a different matter. I invite any member of the Assembly or the public who have information suggesting corruption or mismanagement in the leasehold system to bring these matters to my attention so that they can be immediately investigated. In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, I have full confidence in the integrity of the staff of the Office of Industry and Development who manage the leasehold system.
In 1988 in his report on the Canberra leasehold system, to which Mr Moore referred, Professor Max Neutze cited some of the cases which were stated to be evidence of corruption or serious mismanagement of the leasehold system. By way of response the then Commonwealth Government arranged for the tabling of material on each of the seven cases. If members of the Assembly have not seen that publication, I will table today a copy of that presentation to the meeting of the Commonwealth Joint Standing Committee on Transport, Communications and Infrastructure, which was held in June 1988. I table the following paper:
Leasehold System - Seven case histories
From this publication you will see that in each case the decisions which were alleged to be incompetent or improper had been approved by the Commonwealth Minister responsible and conformed to the law as it then existed. Obviously we do not defend all, or indeed any of these decisions, but we have to acknowledge that they were made in accordance with the rule and system which then operated.
Our dissatisfaction with these sorts of outcomes is reflected in the reforms that I have mentioned earlier today. We have taken a view that there is a need to better protect the public interest. Much of the material presented to the joint standing committee in 1988 indicated a general misunderstanding of the leasehold system and its implications and the administration of it. In any review of the leasehold system it is also necessary to understand the objectives, advantages and difficulties of a leasehold system in Canberra. The objectives of the ACT leasehold system are: to protect community interests, to provide certainty for landowners, to allow reasonable flexibility of land use, to provide simplicity and economy in operation and to facilitate economic and social development.
Members should note that in the debate on the establishment of the ACT the rationale for a leasehold system was based on the benefit that would accrue to the community from such a system. Major concerns which were addressed at that time were: how moneys were to be provided for the construction and maintenance of the new national capital, how opportunities for land speculation could be diminished and
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