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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 14 Hansard (11 December) . . Page.. 4307 ..

MR HARGREAVES (continuing):

overflow parking in their area from the Brindabella Business Park. How are they going to cope with having thousands of extra people working there?

Mr Speaker, these are important issues that cannot be ignored. The minister and the NCA seem happy to ignore them, though. I should point out again that the NCA is under a legal obligation to uphold the National Capital Plan, which provides for the maintenance of town centres and the decentralisation of Commonwealth employment. NCA spokespeople have no right to publicly undermine longstanding planning policies and to damage the interests of investors in the town centres. It is time to speak up. The Y-plan is the basis of our infrastructure investments. The town centres provide the economic activity that underpins those public investments.

Mr Speaker, the Commonwealth is responsible for allowing the creation of this state of affairs. The previous ACT government did not do anything to stop it. This Assembly should take a stand and seriously consider what action it can take to preserve the fundamentals of our planning system. Put bluntly, the 100,000 people in Tuggeranong need an injection of economic activity more than the burghers of Barton.

Mr Speaker, the major reason, I reiterate, for bringing this motion forward in the Assembly is not to belt the airport. I am quite happy to see aviation-centred industry being developed out there. The plea I am making to this Assembly is that places such as Tuggeranong and the budding town centre at Gungahlin not be ignored. Tuggeranong is a set of dormitory suburbs that people leave to go to work and they spend their money where they work. The town centre is struggling. An employment base is needed down there. The best way to create an employment base is to move the accommodation facilities for an employment base down there.

The industrial area of Tuggeranong is struggling. Members from Brindabella will see an array of vacant shops. We need strategies to bring employment to that town centre. Belconnen is a good example of how it can work. Phillip is a good example of how it can work. Tuggeranong is a good example of how it has not worked. I will stand up and fight for Tuggeranong to get its fair share of the employment cake in this town before Barton does and before we end up with more town centres being created outside the Y-plan.

Since I came here in 1968 the Y-plan has been the be-all and end-all of planning and I support that absolutely. If it is time for a review, let there be a review and let us talk to the people in this town in the contemplative stage. Let's not do so behind closed doors and then give out the result as a fait accompli. I make a plea for the businesses in Tuggeranong. I would like to see them grow. Having a de facto town centre at the airport and encouraging people to work in Barton is not the way to foster employment in my electorate.

MRS DUNNE (8.16): This motion is a thinly disguised attempt to cover the confusion of Mr Hargreaves because of his intemperate outbursts about the airport in an adjournment debate some months ago. At the time, he gave notice of a motion which, I am glad to say, he seems to have discharged from the notice paper because of its intemperate nature and substituted with something which comes close to the point.

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