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MR WOOD: And lawyers are still not allowed in?

Mr Humphries: That is right.

MR WOOD: I wish that you had said that. They are my comments for the moment. I repeat that it seems to me very much a stop-start process. This Government has stopped what has been happening in planning for three months. They are not starting anything today. They are going to start the process whereby things can get under way at some time in the future. I do not think that is a good indication of how things will be in planning under this Government.

MR MOORE (4.00): Mr Speaker, I think this is a pleasantly surprising document. On a couple of issues that I shall talk about shortly I have some differences of opinion with Mr Humphries, and no doubt tomorrow morning, when Mr Humphries appears before the Planning and Environment Committee, we will flesh out some of those issues. When Mr Wood was speaking, Mr Humphries interjected to correct Mr Wood’s understanding, filling out some of what he had said in the statement, for example, about the Planning Appeals Board going into the AAT. That sort of discussion can continue at length tomorrow.

The statement begins with a general overview of what we can expect Canberra's future to look like. Mr Humphries says that we need to map a strategic plan to evaluate that. On my interpretation of Mr Humphries's statement, that strategic plan would include Canberra and the region. Mr Humphries appropriately deals with the region, and then at the bottom of the second page of the copy of the statement that I have he talks about the best of what our environment offers. Unfortunately, the environment is not mentioned a great deal after that, although what Mr Humphries talks about certainly looks to me to be seeking to find a better environment. To get that better environment, it talks about an atmosphere of balance. Mr Speaker, I would argue that for a long time the balance has been incorrect.

One of the issues that Mr Humphries then takes up is a strategic plan for Canberra. He states:

Some members of the Assembly may well remember the debate on the Land (Planning and Environment) Bill in 1991 when the Assembly added a specific provision, subsection 15(3), which envisaged the replacement of the NCDC Metropolitan Policy Plan of 1984 by “a further comprehensive strategy for the long-term development of land in the Territory”.

Indeed, Mr Humphries, some members do remember very well - in fact, so well that I went back to the minutes to determine exactly what happened when that Bill was introduced into the Assembly. They read:

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