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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 9 Hansard (7 September) . . Page.. 3064 ..

MR CORBELL (continuing):

act and the subordinate regulations to achieve the outcome that I have just put forward as the most desirable way of handling this.

Unfortunately, the minister left it all too late. I am not in a position to put forward a bill which will achieve that outcome. But the Labor Party is not prepared to accept 75 per cent across the board. The Labor Party would be prepared to accept a continuation of the sunset clause for a month or two in order to substantially debate the issues I have just raised. We are not prepared to accept 100 per cent becoming the status quo. Once 100 per cent becomes the status quo, we will be on the back foot. The government will come into this place and say, "You are trying to change the goal posts again." We are not prepared to play that game. We are prepared to implement some sensible policy that provides for remission in circumstances where we are achieving good planning and urban design outcomes, but we will not allow an across-the-board free-for-all.

The minister proposes an across-the-board subsidy free-for-all. We can liken this to the government saying that absolutely everyone in Australia should get unemployment benefit just to make sure we do not miss any of the unemployed. I thank my colleague Mr Quinlan for that analogy. It is a good way of describing what this government is proposing to do. This government says, "To make sure that we help those people who need help, we are going to give it to absolutely everyone who is developing anything and who requires a change to their lease." It is a nonsense proposition. It is a silly way to go, and we are not prepared to accept that the status quo should become 100 per cent.

The minister had a very long time between three months ago, when the Assembly made its decision on his 50 per cent bill, and last week. There was at least one other sitting week before last week, but he left it until the last minute to introduce legislation to return change of use charge to 75 per cent. That has left this Assembly with little choice but to reject his bill.

I foreshadow that if the minister's bill is agreed to in principle I will be moving an amendment to extend the period of the sunset clause to 1 November. That will at least give this Assembly time to talk about targeting remission of change of use charge, instead of just going for the blanket free-for-all the minister is proposing.

Let us reinforce some basic principles on this issue. Who owns the land in the ACT? The community, the people of the ACT, are entrusted with the ownership of the land on behalf of the people of Australia, through the Commonwealth government. It is not private freehold. It is a leasehold system. We own the land, we are responsible for the management of the land, and we are entitled to get a fair return on the land.

It is hard to imagine that any private landlord would say that their tenant should be entitled to 25 per cent of the rental return on a property. But that is exactly what the government is saying. They are saying that the tenant is entitled to 25 per cent of the value of the rent they pay. That is an enormous windfall gain to a small number of people in the ACT.

That is the basic principle we are still debating in this place. Unlike the Liberal Party, which is absolutely fixated by anything to reduce and give away that public asset, we are prepared to put forward serious proposals that allow for remission in specific circumstances that benefit the community overall.

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