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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 3 Hansard (6 March) . . Page.. 569 ..

Leases (Commercial and Retail) Bill 2000 [No 2]

Detail stage

Debate resumed.

Clause 1 agreed to.

Clause 2.

MR STEFANIAK (Minister for Education and Attorney-General) (11.40): Pursuant to standing order 185, I move:

That consideration of clause 2 be postponed until after consideration of schedule 2 of the bill.

Question resolved in the affirmative.

Clauses 3 to 6, by leave, taken together and agreed to.

Clause 7.

MR STEFANIAK (Minister for Education and Attorney-General) (11.41): I move amendment No 1 circulated in my name on the purple sheet [see schedule 1 part 1 at page 679]. I also present the supplementary explanatory memorandum, which has been circulated.

Amendment agreed to.

MS TUCKER (11.42): I move amendment No 1 circulated in my name [see schedule 2 part 1 at page 690].

In speaking to this amendment I am also speaking to my second amendment, which would delete 7 (4), and amendment 17, which deletes schedule 1. Schedule 1 is a list of examples of commercial premises rather than retail operations. It excludes too many businesses which are self-evidently retail, either through the sale or hire of goods or the retail supply of services but which may need to occupy a large space. To give a couple of examples, this bill excludes operators of craft workshops, businesses providing health care services, businesses providing facilities for indoor sports, gymnasiums and night clubs.

Leases presently covered by the code have their rights and dispute resolution procedures protected. This act, through schedule 1, will retrospectively strip away the rights of those tenants so that when they seek to renew their lease they will lose the option of the five-year term, mediation provisions and market rent provisions. It will affect numerous existing businesses and every other essentially retail operation that needs more than 300 square metres. This clause would strip such tenants of the protection offered by the existing code and would, in effect, give them nothing. It offers them only chaos. It is an unnecessary and unfair definition and should be deleted.

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