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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 4 Hansard (29 March) . . Page.. 1158 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

has already indicated to members of this place they think should be cut. So, to have good faith with the community and to engage in good faith with the community to now determine what this community wants to see as criteria that governs which trees should be listed as significant, you have to make the criteria wider rather than more narrow. For that reason the amendment that Mr Corbell is coming up with is a good amendment. I have worked with him on it and I support it. I hope other members will too because it is, as I said, basically the same debate we had yesterday in terms of a consultation process.

I also have concerns about one aspect of the regulations, and that is to do with the criteria that determine when the conservator can give an approval to undertake a tree damaging activity. The part I am concerned about says:

It is demonstrated that all reasonable alternative development options and design solutions have been considered to avoid the necessity for tree removal.

There are questions about that obviously because the conservator is not a planner, and this is a qualitative assessment on value of tree versus planning outcomes. I will talk to that more at the detail stage, I think, but it is something that I think we need to look at quite carefully. I have another minor amendment which, as I said, is being drafted but is not yet ready.

In conclusion I do thank the government for the chance to work with them and Labor on this. I think, apart from the difference of view on the criteria, and that is a very important aspect of this debate, we have been able to respond to a real concern in the community, which is that we are losing the character of the bush capital due to this really badly managed control of what trees can be cut and when.

MR RUGENDYKE (12.30): I will be brief. When I first looked at this piece of legislation that we are trying to rush through here today, for good reason, I wondered about the size of trees, one with a circumference of 2.5 metres and one with a circumference of 1.5 metes. I cannot remember my high school maths, but they would be pretty big trees, and I thought that in this interim period we ought to be carefully considering what trees are included and what trees are not.

I presumed that someone must have dreamed up these figures, 2.5 metres, and 1.5 metres, so I took the liberty of asking Mr Boden for his view on the appropriate circumferences for trees included in this interim piece of legislation. His view, and I am sure I am correct, is that the calculations that are included in the bill as it stands are the appropriate ones for this interim period. So, Mr Speaker, that is good enough for me. If we are not agreeing with Mr Boden, a highly respected arborist in this city, then I think that is wrong. I will be supporting the bill as it stands.

MR SMYTH (Minister for Urban Services, Minister for Business, Tourism and the Arts and Minister for Police and Emergency Services) (12.31), in reply: Mr Speaker, I thank members for their support to the in-principle stage, and I am sure we will take the debate a bit further when we get to amendments in the detail stage.

Question resolved in the affirmative.

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