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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 6 Hansard (23 May) . . Page.. 1656 ..

MRS CARNELL (continuing):

I can also guarantee to this Assembly that we are having a total look at the contamination on the site. We were always going to, Mr Speaker. Unfortunately, when this Assembly passed that wonderful resolution from the Greens saying that we could not spend any money during the 12 months that it took this committee to report, it somewhat curtailed the capacity to go ahead with an investigation that will cost, I understand, somewhere in the vicinity of $100,000 to look at the contamination on the site. Mind you, Mr Speaker, a report has been put in place or has been done by the Australian Government Printer on their site, which was one of the sites that were regarded as having, or potentially having, some contamination. It has been found that the contamination on that site is really quite minimal.

Mr Wood made some comments about the powerhouse and asked how we could ever possibly afford to redevelop it.

Mr Wood: No, I did not say that. I said that it is going to cost a lot of money.

MRS CARNELL: Well, you said that it was far too expensive. Mr Speaker, I know that those opposite are a tiny bit behind the times, but I think that even in Russia now they would probably get the private sector to redevelop those sorts of sites. It seems that the only people on this planet now who perceive that the Government has to do absolutely everything are those opposite, and possibly those across there as well.

Mr Speaker, the only sensible approach with the Kingston foreshore site is to go ahead with a competition, as we announced right from the beginning; to go ahead with a competition to get some exciting, innovative and visionary approaches to what is a very large site. I think it is something like 32 hectares. Once we have those competition results - something that I believe will give a vision to that whole area for the future - we will then be able to determine just how we go ahead with that site, which bits we might determine to go with first, and so on. I personally would like to see the powerhouse as the centrepiece for the redevelopment generally, and I would like to see that part go ahead first; but it may or may not, depending on what the plan is.

Mr Speaker, on one side of this deal we have the Kingston foreshore development, a 30-plus hectare site and the capacity to start really using the lake and really enjoying the lake for the first time, getting people down there to this absolutely wonderful facility that we have in Lake Burley Griffin. On the other side of the deal we have the Acton Peninsula with, as Mr Berry said, rubble and the ugliest buildings he has ever seen on it and that really must be used as a site of national significance. The NCPA recognised that when they put a value of $1 on Acton Peninsula. Why did they put a value of $1 on the site? They put a value of $1 on the site because it could never be sold for any purpose other than a site of national significance. On the basis that you cannot sell it and you cannot use it for anything other than a site of national significance, which means that the Commonwealth Government will own it, then, obviously, it does not come with a sale value. They put a value of $1 on the site because I think they agreed with all of us here - well, at least most of us here - that it should not be used for other purposes. Kingston foreshore, though, can be used for all sorts of purposes, whether it be residential, commercial, recreational or leisure. Really, the sky is the limit, or imagination is the limit, Mr Speaker.

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