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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 13 Hansard (3 December) . . Page.. 4425 ..

MS McRAE (continuing):

We have yet to see just what is involved in this nonsense of taking over extra land. All I can see is one major liability coming our way. What a wonderful proposal - "Give us all of this. Yes, we will take care of it". Where are the dollars that are going with it? Where is the responsibility to maintain it to a national level? Why should the ACT Government take on national level responsibilities without any guarantee of funding or protection or support, when the two governments have so spectacularly failed to even work in partnership? The local planning authority and the National Capital Authority could not even work together on a strategic plan. They could not even engage the Federal Government in a proper process to develop a much needed strategic plan for Canberra. That is just a plan, never mind the practicalities. They could not even meet on the basic ideas of the future of this city and how it should be dealt with. What faith do we have that they could do anything at all with all this land that Mrs Carnell suddenly has her sights on? I cannot help but concur with my colleagues' observation that, quite clearly, all they want it for is to sell it and to develop more, and make more money for the ACT, which is just a ridiculous proposal.

This Government has demonstrated its complete inability to understand people's right to be involved in planning decisions for the ACT. It has failed even to attempt to establish a working partnership with the NCA. It has failed to pay any attention to what this Assembly clearly wants, and it has flipped and flopped on its interpretation of those wishes of the Assembly as it suited it. Mr Humphries was the first to scuttle under a rock as soon as he thought that maybe nine votes were there against the Federal golf course application. He never put it to the test, never put it to debate, never put it out in the open. No, no; he just second-guessed. But with the real issues that have been put before the Assembly, when the nine votes were there when the establishment of a single planning authority was called for, or when the issue of 999-year leases was debated, no, no, no, Mr Humphries is deaf. That is the point at which he demonstrates his clear contempt both for the Assembly and for the people of the ACT.

When the clear wish of the Assembly is for different steps to be taken, for planning protocols to be established, for requirements to be put on the NCA to deal with planning issues and involve the people of the ACT, he has ducked every time. When it suits him to use the blanket of the Assembly and say, "Oh dear, I am not going to get Assembly support", that shield goes up and, boom, over goes some perfectly legitimate proposal that has been put before him.

I think it is timely to assess the activities of this Government over the last three years, in particular its incapacity even to begin to understand how to work with the Federal Government. It has demonstrated over the last three years its complete failure to work with the Federal Government and, worse than that, its complete failure to take into account the wishes of the people of the ACT, their rights as residents of the national capital, of which they are justly proud, and the combined needs of both the Federal Government and the ACT Government to work together, to live in this city together and to develop the city for the greater good of Australia and for the people of the ACT. The strategic plan was the most spectacular failure of this, but every other issue I have demonstrated just underlines the importance of my motion that this Assembly should condemn the Government for being unable to develop a working partnership with the Federal Government over planning in the ACT.

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