Page 4806 - Week 16 - Monday, 25 November 1991
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That may be one way around the issue of defined land as it is currently applied at the moment. I am not quite sure what amendments would be required to do that. On this occasion we thought it more appropriate possibly to delete that section from the Act and seek to throw back, if you like, community involvement in the planning process as we have it at the moment. As we know, under the current arrangement for draft variations, there is a requirement for the Planning Authority to advise those people affected.
If Mr Wood has any reason to wonder why the community is concerned about some of the actions of the Planning Authority, we just have to refer him to the 232 proposals for policy plan variations in the planning statement attached to the planning legislation. What they are seeking to do, Mr Speaker - some of the changes are quite substantial - is to put these changes through and not advise the community directly that there is going to be a problem.
The story that has been put to us and at various meetings, and it was put again by the Chief Planner on the weekend, is that everybody got a document in their letter box that said that there is a new Territory Plan. That basically is all that document said. It did not tell people in Kambah that there is a proposal to knock down all those trees across the road from them - they are pretty heavily spaced along there - and to develop that as a residential area. It did not tell those people in that part of Kambah. That is the sort of issue that the people and the community are concerned about.
The Planning Authority is seeking to make those changes without directly involving the community, as is currently the case in relation to the proposals for draft variations. That is why the community is concerned, Mr Wood, and that is why the community will continue to be concerned until the Planning Authority and the Government seek to address those issues. You know that I have asked you questions about that in the Assembly, and I will continue to do so until I get an answer.
The community want to know what is going on. It is a bit too late, three months or six months down the track, when this has all gone through and the bulldozers turn up. The Planning Authority and the Minister can put their hands on their hearts and say, "Sorry, but it was in the Territory Plan and you knew all about it. You had all that time to look at it". There is not much point, Mr Wood, if you did not tell the people directly that there was going to be an issue.
I would put to you another example. The majority of people in Longmore Crescent do not know that there is a proposal for an existing area of open space across the road from them to be turned into residential land. They do not know
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