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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 12 Hansard (13 November) . . Page.. 4163 ..

MR MOORE (continuing):

Members of the Assembly are aware that it is unusual for a petition to be referred to a committee and we wanted to be sure about the usefulness of the process. In the event, I think the process has considerable merit. The Assembly formally referred the petition to this committee on 25 September 1997. On 24 October the committee agreed to schedule a public hearing, which took place on 31 October. I am pleased to advise the Assembly that Ms Reilly attended the public hearing and asked many questions of the officials before us. These officials were the manager and the precinct coordinator of Canberra Places, which is the business unit within City Services which administers the precinct program.

The officials made these points: The Government's 1997 budget identified Curtin as one of three shopping precincts marked for the establishment of precinct community groups in 1997-98. The Minister directed that the process in Curtin be accelerated. Survey forms are going out to the Curtin community this month. These forms invite participation in the process and it is hoped to have a group of interested people in place by the end of this month. It will be up to the precinct committee to recommend specific works, such as landscaping, street furnishings, lighting and paving, and to allocate priorities among these items. In doing so, the precinct committee will be assisted by a design team from Canberra Places.

The officials pointed out that the money for the actual upgrading must await the Government's decision on next year's capital works program, which will not take place until early next year. But the officials expressed their confidence that there will be funds for design and construction in 1998-99 for the Curtin centre. The Planning and Environment Committee hope that this is the case. We note that the Government's draft capital works program will come before this committee for scrutiny. Of course, an election will take place between the time of this statement and the new Government's submission of its draft capital works program to the committee that succeeds this one in the Fourth Assembly. Members of this Assembly cannot commit a new Assembly, but we hope that the contents of the petition and of this statement will be carefully noted by the incoming government. The Planning and Environment Committee finalised the wording of this statement at our meeting on 12 November. I commend the statement to the house.

ELECTORAL (AMENDMENT) BILL (NO. 2) 1997

Debate resumed from 11 November 1997, on motion by Mr Humphries:

That this Bill be agreed to in principle.

MR BERRY (Leader of the Opposition) (7.40): Mr Speaker, the Labor Opposition will be agreeing to this Bill. I will not go through the process of rereading the Minister's speech or the explanatory memorandum to demonstrate how well I am across this issue, but one matter which is of concern in relation to the Bill is the issue of completing declaration certificates. We in the Opposition believe that that amendment ought not be

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