Page 1515 - Week 06 - Tuesday, 18 May 1993
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and, indeed, we have to. He has raised these matters, so we do not have any choice but to look at it. We will have an inquiry which will either show the integrity of the system or show that there is a problem, and I have little doubt that it will show the integrity of the system.
I am concerned about the way that this has been dropped today. I have had amiable conversations with Mr Moore in the last couple of days about this process as we seek to come to an agreement about what might be the best way to serve justice. Mr Moore has not served justice today. He never indicated to me anything of the nature that he was raising. He never gave me an opportunity to say anything other than some brief comments I made today about how I believed that the department was operating very efficiently, honourably, decently and with the greatest integrity. I made that point to Mr Moore - and we get this today. I am surprised by his approach. I have to come back to this point. I have probably said it twice and I am repeating myself. I would have expected some evidence. I would have expected something, not innuendos. All that background, all the information that I was likely to give to the Assembly, which it has heard before, is irrelevant. I can address the design and siting issues, but that is not what it is about. I can talk about the process which followed step by step what is legal, what is in the legislation, but that is not the issue. It is not there.
However, I will indicate some of the background about the proposal. Mr Moore asked in his letter to me whether all potential developers had an equal go. Let me say something about that. This is information given to me from ACTEW. In the first place the ACT Housing Trust were approached by the people who owned adjacent blocks to sell their blocks to the inquirer, and that was the company Bobundra. Bobundra said, "Look, we own these blocks; you have these next to us. Can we buy them from you?". The Housing Trust looked at the options for its blocks, including selling them; but, given the government policy on urban renewal and our better cities program, it believed that the site had potential for greater housing density.
The Housing Trust evaluated its options, including leaving the site just as it was, or selling the blocks, or a joint venture redevelopment - a sort of redevelopment common with better cities moneys. The joint venture option was selected on financial grounds and on the ability to achieve replacement public housing stock in the area while meeting urban renewal and environmental objectives. It was a sensible proposal for the Housing Trust; not to sell, because the Housing Trust accepts the policy that we want Housing Trust properties to remain spread throughout the ACT. We do not want to drive Housing Trust tenants out of highly desirable areas. So, given the advantages of a joint venture proposal, the trust decided to enter into such a venture with Bobundra.
The land-holding dictated the choice of partner in section 22. It was not as though the Housing Trust could go somewhere else and ask other people to come in with them. It was more the other way round because they did not own the blocks next door. Fifty per cent participation by each party simplifies amalgamation and ensures accountability on the development. So that is how it started - and what more reasonable way to develop than that, an approach to the Housing Trust? Mr Moore suggests that maybe there was privileged
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