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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 3 Hansard (28 May) . . Page.. 773 ..

MR BERRY (continuing):

the matter is that they have made the decision before the consultant has dealt with the issue. I can tell you that, if the Government thinks that, just by carrying this motion, it is going to get away with moving to rural residential development in the ACT without a proper inquiry and a proper expose of the economic, environmental and social impacts of this sort of land development, they have another think coming.

Mr Speaker, I would like to foreshadow an amendment I intend to move after the amendment by Mr Humphries is dealt with. My amendment will require the Chief Minister to deliver to each member of the Assembly by the close of business tomorrow and to present at the next sitting the mutual agreement to which the Chief Minister referred in question time today, which terminated the exclusive preliminary agreement. I trust that this is not something that has been done over the phone. I trust that there is a document with the details of the mutual agreement set out in it, so that we can discover whether there is any more financial burden on the community of the ACT. Already we know that about $150,000 is committed to this process.

Ms Carnell: Who said $150,000?

MR BERRY: We still do not know what the inquiry into land development will turn up, although the Chief Minister seems to know. Maybe she issued the inquirer with instructions before he or she went away to do the inquiry. Mr Speaker, we will also be looking for any plan that exists of the blocks associated with the Hall/Kinlyside development, given the Government's intrinsic knowledge of the number of blocks and where they will be sited. We suspect that there is a plan for this which demonstrates that there is much more to be uncovered in relation to the matter. The mutual agreement is the one I want to see, because I think it is important that we know about and understand the obligations that the Government has committed the Territory taxpayer to in relation to this contract. Let us quit this business of calling it an exclusive preliminary agreement. It is a contract, and it is a contract that has already cost the ACT taxpayers. We want to find out how much more it is going to cost them.

Mr Corbell: Mr Speaker, should I close the debate at this stage?

MR SPEAKER: No.

Mr Corbell: I do not wish to speak to the amendment.

MR OSBORNE (5.50): I rise to move the amendment circulated in my name to Mr Humphries's proposed amendment. I move:

After paragraph (3), add the following new paragraph:

"(4) calls on the Government to develop publicly available guidelines under which it would consider dealing exclusively with a single developer in relation to joint ventures.".

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