Page 199 - Week 01 - Thursday, 18 February 1993
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
The recommendations have picked out a number of key facilities. I think it is true to say that they have focused on the Civic area of Canberra and have in particular given acknowledgment of the original concept of a cultural precinct in the city. That concept has rather dissipated since it was originally put forward. Rather than have a centre based around the present Canberra Theatre on section 19, it is a little bit more diverse than that. I still think that that idea of a section 19 cultural precinct was a very good one, but the present format, with some facilities on section 19 and some in Childers Street, both near the courts at the other end of the street - that sort of diversified, dispersed arrangement of cultural facilities - is not actually a bad one. We are still seeing Civic as the hub of our cultural activities and that, I think, is basically a good thing.
I notice that the single largest amount recommended by the committee is $5m to be allocated to upgrading the Playhouse theatre to a 600- to 650-seat theatre with an upgrade of the Link at the same time. It naturally falls on the committee to consider the question of the Playhouse. It is a facility which is old, which is showing its age and which is in need of some considerable expenditure to keep it useable for some time to come. I hope that the plans developed separately by the Canberra Theatre Trust, which I think we have all seen, will dovetail in with this proposal, and that we will see a great revival of the capacity of that centre to offer a focus to cultural activity, at least as far as the performing arts and theatre in the ACT are concerned. I think the integration of some kind of exhibition space within that area is also quite important. Where that will finally end up, I cannot say, but I certainly support that as part of the cultural facilities to be offered and I think that that is also what the committee was talking about.
I note that there is a reference in the report to the establishment of a trust of $2.75m for the development of what are called here "appropriate plans for regional facilities". Discussion is made there of integrating school sites, be they continuing schools or discontinued schools, and a further recommendation is that there be a reappraisal of existing policies relating to the community use of schools. I believe that that is also essential. I, for one, am greatly in favour of taking a much more flexible view of school sites, be they functioning or no longer functioning schools. We tend to have a very rigid approach to these sorts of uses and think of schools as being only places for education and the occasional public meeting and not much else. I think we devalue those valuable resources in that way and we also make it very much harder for us to change the use of those sites when they become no longer of optimum use for that particular purpose. A particular example has been referred to in this place in the last few days.
A development of a more flexible approach towards such sites would be very valuable and I applaud that sentiment. I hope that the Government will pick that up and exploit the opportunity to consider our school sites to be more total community facilities than just places for education. Bonython Primary School, which opened last year, pays more than lip-service to that concept. It is a facility which is designed to assume a new life, a new existence, after a time at some point in the future when it will no longer be useful as a school, or perhaps useful only partially as a school. I think we all applaud that kind of use. That kind of flexibility can be incorporated, I believe, even in existing school sites which are not designed in the same foresighted way as Bonython Primary School.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .