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renewed at 10 per cent of value. I might ask Mr Wood to explain how it is that the community has this overriding interest and proprietorship in that particular arrangement but still can ask for only 10 per cent of the commercial value when it gets a renewal of that particular lease. Is there not a contradiction there?

We did go to the last election with a policy which was at least quite clear and well enunciated - and I see Mr Wood now flicking through the pages of our policy. What that policy said was that we thought it would be appropriate not to treat residential leases and commercial leases any differently. In both cases people make substantial investments in those things. Whether they do so as business people and as proprietors or retailers of commercial enterprises or whether they do so as an investment in their own homes, they make that substantial investment, and they are entitled to have a policy which is clear and unchanging and that treats that particular investment of theirs in a fair fashion. We said that we believed that it would be appropriate for leases to be renewed automatically and that people should be able to do so on a commercial basis and on a residential basis in the same fashion.

We recognise reality, of course, and we realise that there are members of this Assembly who hold a different view about that matter. That is fine. We did not win nine seats, which means that we do not have an automatic right to have our policy passed into law; but I would argue that we have the right to consider and put forward changes in this area. In his remarks Mr Wood made reference to the fact that what we are proposing to give the people who operate commercial leaseholds in the ACT at the present time is a free gift. He said that we are proposing something for nothing. As I say, this is not the time for a full debate about what an automatic renewal policy might mean; but I will say that I think it is quite unfair to those people who have paid very substantial sums of money to get those commercial leaseholds in the first place to suggest that they are getting something for nothing. Members will be aware that some commercial leaseholds in this Territory have fetched extraordinarily large sums of money in recent years - quite enormous sums of money. I recall a petrol station site in Tuggeranong, a dual site, that fetched $7m for a commercial leasehold. To suggest that that is something for nothing is quite bizarre.

Mr Speaker, the important point about this arrangement is that we are not suggesting that there ought to be a change from the present leasehold system, in the sense that we change from leasehold to freehold. That is not Liberal Party policy. It is not what we will be bringing forward to this place for its consideration. What we are saying is that we should preserve the leasehold system, but with considerably longer periods of leasehold and automatic renewal of those leaseholds when they come up to expiry, in order that people can operate on the assumption that their leasehold is theirs; that they have the right to continue to operate it for the foreseeable future, to dispose of it, to deed it to their children when they die, or whatever it might be, on the assumption that it is an arrangement entered into that is similar to freehold but has some of the controls which leasehold does bring with it. Mr Speaker, it is most unfortunate that the Labor Party is not prepared to let that debate take place. Our view is that opposing policies should be discussed on their merits and that the Labor Party should put forward its policy and try to explain what it is, rather than put the matter to one side.

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