Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .

Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 5 Hansard (9 May) . . Page.. 1269 ..

MR HIRD (continuing):

Finally, Mr Speaker, I should add that my colleagues and I enjoyed this inquiry. We learnt a lot. We took a great deal of evidence. We held four public hearings and received 30 submissions, and we appreciated the close interest by many in our community in this inquiry. On behalf of my colleagues, Mr Corbell and Mr Rugendyke, I would like to thank all the people who contributed to this report. I would also like to thank our secretary, Mr Rod Power. I commend the report to the house.

MR CORBELL (12.17): Mr Speaker, this is a very important report and again I join with my chairman, Mr Hird, and my colleague, Mr Rugendyke, in commending this report to the Assembly. It is a unanimous report and I think that underlines the importance of this issue and the extreme urgency with which this committee believes a range of issues needs to be addressed by the government in relation to tree management.

Mr Speaker, I was very pleased to propose to the committee at the end of 1998 that we undertake this inquiry and I was pleased that my colleagues agreed that that was appropriate. That coincided with the time at which the government released its draft inquiry into tree management and tree policy.

A number of issues have come out of the inquiry which I believe warrant particular attention. Mr Hird has mentioned some, but I would like to emphasise a number of others. The first relates to the development of a significant tree register. This is a very important step. It is a very important advance in the protection of Canberra's tree heritage and the tree asset. The significant tree register that the committee proposes would ensure that a range of trees are protected, both on territory land and on private leasehold land, and that amendments to the land act would be made to ensure that if these trees were to be altered or removed approval would have to be granted, similar to a development application under the land act as it currently stands.

The significant tree register the committee proposes is a considerable broadening of the current tree register that is in place in the ACT. We recommend that criteria be developed to identify those trees that warrant protection through a significant tree register. We believe that this should be done through a collaborative public consultation process because, clearly, the types and nature of trees and their contribution to the streetscape and amenity of suburbs will vary from area to area across Canberra.

Mr Speaker, we did feel it was important to emphasise that the type of significant tree register we were looking at was similar to the sorts of registers developed by a number of councils in New South Wales, including the North Sydney, Camden and Woollahra city councils. These tree registers do not just identify a small number of trees, as ours does in the ACT at the moment-virtually only a handful. These tree registers identify a broad range and variety of trees that warrant protection because they contribute to the amenity and the streetscape of an area and deserve to be protected. A similar process really should be developed here in the ACT. That is why we have recommended a significant tree register.

I should stress, too, Mr Speaker, that recommendation No 2 of the committee, which stresses that a blanket tree preservation order not be introduced at this stage, is the counterbalance to the development of a significant tree register. A significant tree register will protect a variety of trees based on a range of criteria which would include

Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .