Page 212 - Week 01 - Thursday, 18 February 1993
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For those who cannot read the recommendations on page 16 - they are not very long; it is not very difficult - they state:
(b) establish the western boundary of the heritage area on the western side of the line of pine trees -
we even refer him to the picture -
identified on the plan in Figure 1 of this report;
(c) in consultation with the Heritage Council establish the southern boundary of the site closer to the homestead area to allow for any future residential development along the present Ashley and Johnson Drive boundaries.
The reason we say "any future residential development" is that the responsibility for determining that lies with Mr Kaine, along with other members of the Planning Committee. So what he seems to be doing is trying to inflict on the Heritage Committee his own responsibilities because he seems frightened of them. The reality, of course, is that Mr Stefaniak happens to have come out during an election period, trying to gain a few more votes down in Tuggeranong, and he has said, "I have a whole new idea. This is terrible. We cannot have development somewhere". This is a great change of attitude because for a long time Mr Stefaniak has said, "Don't have development".
The role of our committee was to look at the cultural and heritage significance of the Tuggeranong Homestead. We took particular care to support the notion of the establishment of a recognition of the role of Charles Bean in that particular site because of the contribution that he made to Australian history and the fact that that World War I history was written there. That is significant, but to put that particular homestead in its heritage significance within the site is another question entirely.
Ms Szuty spoke about the integrity of the site, but not having been on the site she cannot possibly understand the significance of the integrity of the site or the fact that the integrity of the site has already long since been damaged. If you want to retain the Tuggeranong Homestead in the same way that Lanyon is retained and if you want to ensure that it has a rural atmosphere, then it should have been preserved before the surrounding suburbs went into place. That is the difficulty. The integrity of that rural setting has already been totally removed and cannot be restored. Therefore, the random assignment of the particular area by the construction of roads is irrelevant to that particular concept of the integrity of the site. That is why it is that the committee very carefully walked over the site in spite of the snakes - and I must say that I did not run from them because they do not worry me as greatly as they seem to worry Mr Kaine, but then he is used to having more snakes around him than I am.
I think the reality is that we have a report that says some quite important things about the cultural and heritage significance of the site, not about whether or not there should be a residential development there. That is after the process that Mr Wood referred to earlier. It seems to me that it is entirely unnecessary.
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