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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 3 Hansard (28 March) . . Page.. 830 ..

MR WOOD (continuing):

Members may recall that the impetus for the report ostensibly arose from consideration by the Assembly's Standing Committee on Planning and Environment of concern expressed about proposed developments at the Yowani golf course and the Watson drive-in. That committee sought this Stein inquiry; so it is appropriate, Minister, that you report back to the committee, as Mr Moore asks. There were public allegations at that time which have subsequently been shown to be quite unfounded, and we still wait to see what happens with Yowani and the Watson drive-in. I am not sure that those events - I think Mr Moore would agree with me - were really significant in setting up the Stein inquiry. I think they were the prompt.

Mr Moore: The catalyst.

MR WOOD: Well, the last thing. I think Mr Moore made it clear, and his actions make it clear, that after the election he intended to have an inquiry, no matter what, and he went to the Government and made that, I think, as I said before, a condition of his support.

Mr Moore: It is not true, Bill.

MR WOOD: Not true?

Mr Moore: It is not true. Thank you for getting that on the record.

MR WOOD: Well, it was certainly a very strong part of your agenda, Mr Moore, that there be an inquiry. We also had the move, that I did not agree with, to join the planning and environment committees together. I do not think that has proved to be a very sound move.

The commissioners were appointed. I claim again - I wait for Mr Moore to agree with me - that at least two of the commissioners were his names and therefore put that particular stamp on the report, for example, that we would never get recommendations against leasehold; but then the commissioners took the report, as they are entitled to do, very much in their own direction.

Mr Moore: I do not think Justice Stein is anybody's man, in any way, in any perception.

MR WOOD: That is right. There is no question about that. But you knew what his perceptions and his approaches were. There is no question about that.

While we now express some satisfaction with the outcome of the report, I think there is something of the revenge of the old guard against the new guard expressed through the report. The bureaucrats in recent years have had to deal with the planning situation and I think there was an element of bitchiness in the report that was unfortunate. Now we have the response that we look to. The Planning Committee will again assess that. I think we are now in a position where we can go forward and build on the good work that has been done over a long period in Canberra in planning, to see that our city remains the best planned in the Commonwealth, if not further afield.

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