Page 5367 - Week 17 - Tuesday, 3 December 1991
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living there for years; they see that piece of ground in a particular light, and you have to deal with that very small plot of land in a very sensitive way. You have to go through a comprehensive process. But when you are dealing with greenfields development on the outskirts of town it is a different matter.
So, I think the concept of defined land is very important if we are going to see Canberra continue to grow in a logical and orderly way; and to encourage people to get out there and build more houses you have to allow them to use their innovation. The Government itself has to have a certain amount of flexibility in how it goes about the development of new suburbs and new neighbourhoods in Canberra. To remove from this Bill the concept of defined land, in my view, takes away entirely that innovation and flexibility from the Government and from future builders and developers out there.
It would bind us to the concept that every individual plot of land has to be developed and dealt with in isolation from all the rest, and I do not accept that as being a reasonable and sensible way to go. I think the concept of defined land is a good one; it allows the Government the flexibility that it needs - and it can prescribe the guidelines, the terms and conditions under which development within a prescribed area shall take place. There is no suggestion, as is often implied by opponents of further development, that the Government is simply going to say to some developer, "Here is 100 hectares. Do what you like". That is not going to happen ever in Canberra. No government would be that stupid; no planning authority would be so lax in the performance of its duty as to allow that sort of thing to occur.
So, even within an area of land defined for this purpose, the development will be ordered and orderly, and it will be carried out under proper guidelines, design and siting rules and all of those things that apply. I believe that it is an essential element of this Bill to allow new areas of Canberra to be developed in different ways.
I could concede, as a result of the sustainable Canberra paper that was published recently, the concept of urban villages. I can see that this fits very nicely; that you can say to some prospective developer or consortium - or perhaps it could be on some joint venture basis - "There is an area of land on which we jointly will build an urban village. It is defined land, and now you, the consortium, come and tell us how you see this being developed. Let us see how innovative you can be; let us see new concepts being built into this, instead of building more suburbs that look like Page, Lyons and Chifley". We can do better, and we can be more innovative; and the concept of defined land allows us to do so.
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