Page 3026 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 14 September 1993
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This will provide a considerable incentive for lessees in that area to seek to change their lease purposes in that period. In respect of the Kingston-Griffith redevelopment area, policies based on an augmentation fee have applied there for quite some time. Development of the area is nearly complete, and the present policies should remain. The changes I have announced today provide the best possible outcome for the citizens of the ACT, bearing in mind the dramatic and irrevocable change to the leasehold system in 1970. I present a copy of this statement, and I move:
That the Assembly takes note of the paper.
MR MOORE (4.43): I would like to make some comments on the statement. I welcome this very significant change in position from the Government. I recognise that it largely meets the expectations I have had and the expectations I wanted to achieve in terms of betterment and in terms of speculation on land in the ACT.
Mr Lamont: You pinched most of our other policies. You may as well pinch that one.
MR MOORE: The reality is that, if they would like to search the Canberra Times, they will find at least 10 years ago statements consistent with what I am saying now.
Mr Lamont: That is how long it has been our policy for, Michael.
MR MOORE: I feel very comfortable about welcoming it. Mr Lamont continues to interject along the lines that this has been their policy for that long. In that case, why has it taken so long to implement? The only reason is that people have managed to urge the Government and push the Government until they finally respond and do something positive for the community.
My own view is in accordance with the Bill that is currently on the table in the Assembly; that is, the 100 per cent betterment should apply right across, although I accept the exemptions Mr Wood has identified for Fyshwick and Kingston. The augmentation process, as I recall it, is $10,000 per unit, and that was a method of recouping some of the costs the community would have lost otherwise. Because the Kingston development is so close to being finished, I think it is appropriate that it be left, as the old cliche goes, as a level playing field for the people there.
Mr Wood indicates that the urban renewal policy might well founder if there were not the profit motive to urge people to continue along this process, not profiting from their building but profiting from speculation on the land.
Mr Lamont: In the short term.
MR MOORE: That is a little irrelevant. The main point is that urban renewal and development ought to take place not because of profit but because there is a good reason for us to have that particular development. The technique that is being used here, I think, is not good enough. However, let me emphasise again that I welcome the statement by the Minister and the fact that he has finally made the decision to take action in this way. Certainly we will support the legislation he will table in due time.
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