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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1995 Week 11 Hansard (14 December) . . Page.. 3071 ..

MR WOOD (continuing):

Mr Speaker, another matter which received a great deal of attention is that of compliance with leases. At paragraph 17.175 the report states:

To a great extent the integrity of the leasehold system depends upon adherence to lease purposes clauses and other conditions or covenants of a lease ... The fundamental unity of the leasehold system can and will break down if there is no effective enforcement.

The board read Brennan's very valuable book, so the members knew that this problem emerged very soon after the sale of the first leases and has continued in the 71 years since. The board believed that there was a culture of non-enforcement. Do we have to go back to the days of not so long ago when there was a lease enforcement section and a band of 30 or so inspectors who poked into every nook and cranny of the Territory and sometimes took those who breached lease conditions to court, usually unsuccessfully? The report gets down to the detail of untidy backyards, home businesses and illegal flats - the sorts of thing that the enforcement squad used to attend to. Chief Minister, do you want to fund a new unit of that order? Do you have some money to spare? Perhaps you might as well. Has anyone yet costed what the acceptance of all the report's recommendations would add up to?

There are more serious aspects of lease compliance, and the report discusses them, with its major focus on Fyshwick. I, too, maintain the principle that the lease purpose clause is a primary planning instrument, and it is important that this principle is maintained. But this and earlier reports do not acknowledge the real problems behind lease compliance. Why was it that retailers - some 500 of them, on one report - were located in Fyshwick? "Do not let them" has been the simple answer, but the problem is not so much a lease problem as a planning problem. The structure of the town centres, with their emphasis on office buildings, simply forced many traders, including the family or small business type, to locate somewhere more affordable. As acknowledged, it is also the case that many lease clauses are too complex and ambiguous. In any event, the leases at Fyshwick have now been substantially amended and betterment paid.

At paragraph 15.1 the report acknowledges that the issue of betterment was one of the primary reasons for calling the present inquiry. The recommendations about the level of betterment are generally consistent with the decisions taken by me as Minister. Proposals that betterment be uniform across the ACT and the change in the remission rates will need to be assessed for their full impact. I do not believe that that impact will be great.

The recommendation concerning the development rights register is another matter. The principle behind it warrants examination, but the closest scrutiny must be given to the practicality of maintaining an up-to-date register for all leases in commercial and industrial centres and in residential areas to be controlled by development control plans. That will cover many thousands of leases and require a task that the ACT Treasurer will want to cost. For all the fuss that was made about betterment and its place as a catalyst for the inquiry, the report has devoted relatively little discussion to the issue. It had other targets.

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