Page 806 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 13 April 1994
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people in the community, both experts and ordinary residents, who had some very good comments to make to us which were deserving of our consideration at no less a level than for those of the experts.
I am happy to be part of this report. I am happy to join the other members of the committee in thanking the secretary of the committee yet again. We do this every time we bring in a detailed report from the PDI Committee. The workload and the results produced are enormous. I am very happy to commend this report to the Assembly.
MR CORNWELL (3.50): Madam Speaker, I would like to develop a little the points touched upon by Ms Szuty and certainly by Ms Ellis. The committee has in the report set out very clearly the changes it has recommended in relation to these guidelines. I would, however, like to place on record the fact that we are not clairvoyants. We cannot predict what might happen; nor, I suggest, do most of us have the devious minds that would recognise the tricks some entrepreneurs or fringe developers might get up to and, indeed, get away with; hence the comprehensive review of these guidelines after 12 months. I think that is very good insurance.
I hope that in that first 12 months, and given that we are looking at a 40-year development period, there is not too much damage done in the area. Essentially, that is the fear of most of the residents who have expressed concern. They are fearful that the area they know will change. Whilst one can sympathise with that point, I think it is fair to say that cities are not static. Their nature changes as the population changes and as their suburbs and sometimes regional areas change, and the social mix in those areas also changes. What size a city has to be for this to occur I do not know, but I do suggest to you that a population of 300,000, which is the size of Canberra now, would certainly be within the scope of this changing environment.
If the city's urban environment changes, then in part it will have to be change in planning and development areas as much as societal change. This is a reality that all people in Canberra must face up to. We simply cannot hope that change will not occur and that our comfortable world - and we do live in a comfortable world - will be unaffected. It is inevitable that Canberra must change. I get the impression that there are people who would like everything to stay the way it is now. There could be people in this Assembly who feel that way, but the reality is that it cannot happen.
Just as we ourselves change, and we do through the ageing process, so does the environment in which we live. Like physical ageing, this is not the only change determinant. Sometimes our attitudes change. Occasionally people become more radical; normally, Mr Connolly, they become more conservative as they grow older. But one thing is common to everybody, irrespective of the way their attitudes may change: Their needs change. Therein lies the contradiction, because when our needs change they often require a corresponding change in circumstance, and no more so than in habitation. Simply put, our houses get too big for us and we want something smaller. Often we prefer something in the same area where we have lived very contentedly for most of our lives, yet this is just the area where most of us would prefer no urban change at all.
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