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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 14 Hansard (12 December) . . Page.. 4914 ..

MR MOORE (continuing):

Mr Speaker, unfortunately, this is one of the ones that I did not pick up - although I have been through the legislation quite a number of times - until fairly recently. I apologise to members for that. I did ask that we postpone this Bill for a while. At least, I think, now that we have seen it, we should deal with it.

MR HUMPHRIES (Attorney-General and Minister for the Environment, Land and Planning) (11.21): Mr Speaker, I think that there is agreement that there needs to be the capacity to depart from the terms of a lease in a class of situations across the Territory. The question is whether the circumstances where you can depart from those leases should be set out in legislation or regulations. That, I think, defines the difference between at least Mr Moore and me on this issue.

If someone turns a part of their house into a granny flat - which is, of course, inconsistent with the terms of a lease which may say that this is for a single residential dwelling, as you can argue that a granny flat makes it two residential dwellings - we could either require a person to make a separate application on that matter, which we do not presently do, or require that the circumstances governing such situations be set in legislation, which I suggest is not really appropriate either, since those are matters which are in the nature of land use and which, I would suggest, ought to be in some more subordinate piece of legislation such as the Territory Plan or regulations. If it is not in one of those two places, then the question is where it should most appropriately go.

I would argue that, if it is a situation that changes from time to time, if the policy calls for modification as the circumstances change - and granny flats may not be a good example in this case, but if some other land use could be viewed as being inconsistent with the leases in respect of that land but still in need of a flexible policy to meet emerging needs - then the regulations are the best place to make the changes. Mr Moore seemed to be saying that people do not pay as much attention to the regulations that we table in this place as they do to the legislation. I accept his view on that. When I was in opposition, I always read regulations in the areas for which I was responsible, and I would hope that members do so even now. I assume, in any case, that if there is any concern it will be raised and there will be a chance to debate those issues. I am not averse to having an issue which might slip through being brought back for debate in appropriate circumstances, if that is viewed by the Assembly as being necessary.

Putting this in legislation, Mr Speaker, is probably going to result in our needing to deal with Bills to amend the Land Act on a frequent basis - I assume that this is the Act in which Mr Moore wishes the laws to be amended - to reflect changing policy in respect of those exceptional uses of Territory leases. That, I think, is not necessarily in the best interests of giving people access fairly quickly to uses of their land which accord with what ought to be a policy made, in a sense, at an Executive level rather than at a legislative level.

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