Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .

None . . Page.. 1536 ..

watches the very significant changes taking place to the configuration of main road access to the Parliamentary Triangle. I think the NCPA has acted fairly unilaterally about Russell Hill. If the initial proposals prepared by the NCPA are accepted, they will have enormous implications for Canberra's metropolitan planning and major costs for the ACT Government with respect to transport and community facilities. Again, it may be that at the end of the day there is no avoiding those issues. It is a matter of concern to me, as Planning Minister, and I hope to all of us, that we face that problem of an authority acting very much outside our sphere of control or influence and making decisions that will have significant dollar implications for us.

Harcourt Hill was a proposal where the NCPA required quite stringent setback conditions that cost the Territory about $500,000 in land sales. Again, perhaps with its interest in major means of ingress and egress to the Territory, the NCPA had a right to insist on that setback; but, again, that has an implication for us which perhaps has not been properly factored into their equation. Very simply, the changes in some planning guidelines established by the NCPA for the Barton office precinct, which is being developed around the back of York Park and the new Foreign Affairs headquarters, have had quite significant costs for the ACT Government and for the lessees of that area. They are, of course, picking up the tab for major new car parking requirements in those areas.

We do have a number of issues, and I happen to think it would be fanciful to imagine that those are the end of the issues that we will have to deal with in a dual planning system. The issue is not just one of inconvenience. We have, on one side, a government having to accommodate the awkward and difficult considerations of an agency of another government. The issue is really about the disjointed planning considerations that ultimately flow for the whole city of Canberra. You could say that those considerations are based, to some extent, on principles of jealousy and institutionalised conflict.

I think there would be a major benefit in establishing what, perhaps, is a unique example of intergovernmental cooperation for ongoing planning of a particular area of land. I am not aware of any precedent for two governments at different levels - the national government and a State government, in this case - being actively involved in the ongoing planning of a major city or a major area in this country. It may be that the multifunction polis proposal in Adelaide has some of those features, but I am not aware of that. It may or may not be the case. I think that level of challenge is appropriate, because I think it is, again, almost axiomatic that governments at all levels would have to engender a higher degree of cooperation than they have so far been able to achieve; and this is a very good case of where we should be starting to get the ball rolling.

I might say that raising this issue has had some benefits already. I have perceived a very much more cooperative approach on the part of the National Capital Planning Authority, even in the last few weeks. The Chief Minister and I were invited to have lunch with the board of the NCPA. I do not know whether that was a courtesy that was extended to the previous Government or not, but I would like to think that they are paying a little more attention than they were before. I might say that I think it is extremely important.

Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .