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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 14 Hansard (11 December) . . Page.. 4714 ..

MRS CARNELL (continuing):

That work was not done under the previous Government. It was put off and put off. And I can understand why, Mr Speaker - because it is a lot of money. We may determine that it is best to go down the path of spending that money, if no suitable other approach is put forward; but to not look for ideas out in the community, especially when we were going to go for expressions of interest in the QEII site anyway, would seem not to be a good approach for any government to take.

Mr Speaker, what we have to do, as a government - and, I would have thought, as an Assembly as well - is ensure that what community assets we have are appropriately used. Right at the moment, we know that the Health Building is not operating as well as it could. It does need significant money spent on it. If somebody can come forward with a smart way of doing that, which is not at a cost to taxpayers, then we should look at it. We should not necessarily accept it, but we should look at it. If somebody comes up with a really smart redevelopment for the QEII site and the Health Building site - again, a building that has never worked all that well - we should look at it.

Mr Berry: That is not true.

MRS CARNELL: I think that Mr Berry should go and talk to the unions involved in that building, because the reality is that they have continued to say that there are a number of problems with the building - the way it operates, the air-conditioning and other problems - which is the reason why the $9m price tag for redevelopment is there. It is not a new situation but one that has occurred for a long time.

Mr Speaker, there is no way that this Government is going to go ahead with a quick sale of this building. It simply cannot happen. QEII does not move until May-June next year. Equally, what we must not do is wait until the death knell, until we have an empty site in the middle of Civic, before we say, "Heavens! What are we going to do with it?". Then, of course, everybody in this place will say, "But you have not given us time for input". Everybody will say, "There has not been time for community consultation". I agree. What we are trying to do now is bring our processes forward, as Mr Moore's committee and others have spoken about in the past, so that there is a significant lead time to these situations; so that there is plenty of time to get expressions of interest, to have different ideas on the table, and for us all to be able to have an input into those ideas. So, Mr Moore's approach to this motion suits me fine. (Extension of time granted)

Mr Speaker, I sought a short extension to indicate that I will be moving an amendment that is very much in line with the point that Mr Moore made before. I move:

Paragraph (1), omit "withdraw any action aimed at the sale or disposal", substitute "not make a commitment to sell or dispose".

Mr Speaker, that amendment is very much in line with the comments that Mr Moore made earlier. There is no way that the Government is planning to sell or dispose of the health centre site or, for that matter, the QEII site without an appropriate approach. (Quorum formed) Mr Speaker, what this amendment does is basically put into words the comments that Mr Moore made earlier. Mr Moore said, and I think appropriately,

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