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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 13 Hansard (21 November) . . Page.. 3950 ..

MRS DUNNE (continuing):

When we look at this legislation and drill down into the detail, there is much to be concerned about, and I propose to mention here some of my concerns. I have said in this place and elsewhere that the devil is in the detail. Mr Corbell has pooh-poohed me for saying this and has said that he has been entirely up front. But I submit that that devilish detail is still missing today, even as we debate this bill.

My greatest concern about this bill is the lack of transparency and the lack of information that has been made available to us. This minister, in this place and in the committee, has said that he has done more than most other people to be open and provide information about the impact of this legislation. Unfortunately, that is not the case. There are many precedents, as I have pointed out before, where much more information has been made available to this place before legislation as complex as this has passed.

I have raised in the past that we are still waiting to see the regulations on what might be considered by the Planning and Land Council. This is an essential element of the operation of the Planning and Land Council. Yet, although this bill was tabled on 27 June and since that time we have been asking both in this place and in the committee to see the regulations, we have seen nothing more than one sheet of paper that says, "This is what might be included in the regulations."

Then we move to the protocols. In his presentation speech the minister said:

It will be important for the authority and the Land Development Agency to communicate closely on policy matters. A series of statutory rules and protocols will underpin this working relationship as well as the various other relationships between the authority, council and the Land Development Agency.

The reasons for which these protocols are seen to be necessary, as well as the subject of the protocols, are still unspecified by this minister. We are now in the process of passing into legislation a whole new regulatory framework for planning, land management, land development, and consultation with the community, and one of the most important things that this minister said would underpin all this-a set of statutory rules and protocols-is still unavailable to this legislature.

You and I, Mr Speaker, can only guess-and I could hazard a guess-at what these arrangements might be. We have to wonder what the arrangements will be between the authority, the agency, and the council-

At 5.00 pm, in accordance with standing order 34, the debate was interrupted. The motion for the adjournment of the Assembly having been put and negatived, the debate was resumed.

MRS DUNNE: There are plenty of precedents in other jurisdictions. At the Commonwealth level there are all sorts of interagency agreements, which are sometimes grandly called memoranda of understanding-something that formalises how agencies will act with each other. But here we have nothing. Perhaps a clear case has been made that we need to have a protocol between the authority, the agency and the council relating to their performance and functions under this legislation and the land act, but so far we have not seen what it is.

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