Page 4228 - Week 14 - Thursday, 24 October 1991
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
I think the lack of imagination of which I spoke is typified by, in particular, the land administration part of this Bill, but it is evident throughout other clauses of the proposed legislation. For example, there is no attempt to address the continued existence of land use regulation by lease purpose clauses. There is no attempt to move to a more flexible system of land use, such as might occur with a system emphasising, and based wholly on, broad-based zoning as its operational control.
Obviously, Mr Moore and I disagree on this. Clearly, he sees the imposition of that extra layer as a further complication, adding to the bureaucracy that administers this process. I attack the legislation, I suppose, from the other end. I think that additional layer is entirely appropriate; but it should be accompanied by the easing, at least, if not the total removal, of the other layer, the existing layer, which relies on individual lease purpose clauses.
It seems to me that we can achieve the objectives, which have made Canberra the city that it is today, through a system of zoning. I cannot see why it cannot be done here. I believe that the compromise that we reach in this, where we have both systems, is unfortunate; but I feel that it is unfortunate for different reasons from those put forward by Mr Moore.
I feel that businesses throughout Canberra will still be plagued by questions about whether a lease for a shop, for example, allows the proprietor to conduct a restaurant. They will still be faced with disputes such as where a lessee with a lease purpose clause for the sale of landscaping supplies takes action to try to restrain a lessee with a lease purpose clause for the sale of gardening equipment selling bush rocks.
Those are the sorts of things which happen all the time in this community and which are, with respect, ridiculous. It ought not to be the sort of complication that we have to face in the everyday conduct of our lives, particularly our lives in business. The ACT taxpayers will still pay for government lawyers and land branch bureaucrats, and let us not forget the omnipresent Planning Authority, to agonise over whether lessees are or are not breaching their lease purpose clauses.
I am all in favour of tight controls. I am all in favour of setting high standards for the planning of our community. I am not in favour of standards which are drawn up in such a way that every citizen who seeks to make a small change to the way in which his or her land is used needs to go through an incredibly complex and expensive set of legal and other steps to achieve that aim.
Mr Moore: That is right. That is where we should have been aiming. That is where we should have been making it cheap, accessible and fast.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .