Page 3894 - Week 15 - Tuesday, 15 December 1992
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Madam Speaker, the committee was lucky enough to inspect the property a couple of weeks ago. I, along with the greater proportion of residents of the ACT, had never been inside the property before. This visit really put into perspective for me what we are really talking about when we are discussing preservation of the homestead. As the Freeman report notes, Madam Speaker, the homestead includes a variety of architectural styles over a considerable period, and I must confess to a degree of surprise as I drove into the property. It is not, at first glance, as I imagined it to be, that is, a colonial-style structure with verandah and so on, but rather of pink brick reminiscent of the 1950s architecture. I am pleased to say that there are parts of the homestead building that have great appeal as they came from what I would consider a more significant part of our history. The associated buildings on the property are, I believe, of great value and should be preserved and enhanced at all costs. I was particularly impressed with the stable, which I understand is convict built, and in that sense it is very rare in the Canberra region. The stable has magnificent potential. The schoolhouse, the maids quarters and the woolshed also have significant heritage value.
Even though the current homestead building reflects, as I said, a variety of architectural designs over the years, seeing those changes and being told how much of the original homestead has disappeared made me firmer in my resolution that, at this stage of its life, the homestead be handled with a great deal of care. Today, Madam Speaker, it is hard to imagine 50,000 sheep from Lanyon per year being shorn at the Tuggeranong Homestead, and it is exactly that type of memory that needs to be captured at places like that homestead. Just leaving the homestead as it is, or alternatively building houses all over the property, or developing a convention centre on the property, or whatever other options there are, without heritage value and good planning in mind, will not capture those memories and will not preserve the homestead. What is needed is good planning, commonsense, strict guidelines and considerable investment - in other words, lots of money.
Madam Speaker, the homestead, let alone options for its future, is a very emotive subject in the Canberra community, and the number of submissions received by the committee indicates the strong level of interest in the community. I would also like at this stage to mention my appreciation to the individuals and groups who went to such trouble to present their views to the committee at the public hearings.
It was unfortunate that some confusion arose from conflicting opinions and reports presented to the committee. These included claims that significant Aboriginal sites were on the property, along with archaeologically important remnants of the early days. These claims could not be substantiated and served only to confuse the relevant issues. Some groups and individuals also placed great significance on the current boundaries of the property. They did this by asking that the whole 31 hectares be preserved. At the same time the ACT Planning Authority conceded that the current boundaries were more a result of urban planning than historical significance.
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