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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 03 Hansard (Thursday, 11 March 2004) . . Page.. 1049 ..

of the fact that the Golf Club had previously been developed and there was a promise from the previous developers that there would be no further development.

I also remember that no mention was made by either [Mr] Corbell nor [other people at the meeting] of any promises made by either Wayne Berry or the Labor Party that there was a pre-election commitment to oppose any further development on the Golf Club.

On or about 9 December 2002, I provided Simon Corbell with further information regarding our proposal, but no response was received.

That is not unusual. The declaration goes on:

On about 6 March … I received a letter from Simon Corbell dated 4 March … in which he stated “whilst your proposal has considerable merit, in view of the broader planning issues, I cannot support it at this stage.”

Mr O’Keefe concludes:

Some of his concerns, I believe, related to safety and access as a result of the firestorm that swept Canberra’s western fringe on the 18 January … highlighting the need to design for multiple access and egress points.

Having read the letter that Mr Corbell wrote to Mr O’Keefe dated 4 March that is my recollection of what was there. Mr Corbell made the point that from the outset he was opposed to this proposal because of the commitment that you, Mr Speaker, had made. But Mr O’Keefe points out to me that that issue was raised with him not in any formal way, not by correspondence, not in a formal meeting with Mr Corbell, but at a function that Mr Corbell and me and other members of this place attended—the Housing Industry Awards in October 2003. I received a further statutory declaration from Mr O’Keefe, which states in part:

[Mr] Corbell approached me that evening making some comments about my presence at those meetings and said words to the effect of “what did you think about the meetings?”

These were meetings about aged care that were held by federal Labor members earlier in October. He went on:

… I said words to the effect of “it is obviously highlighting the significance of the issue to the ACT community particularly to our older citizens.”

I recall that some time later the same evening, after discussion on a number of issues in relation to the industry, I mentioned to Simon Corbell words to the effect of “I am somewhat frustrated by the intransigence of the planning authority with regards to our proposal at Holt.” [Mr] Corbell responded to that saying words to the effect of “It is not so much the planning authority; It is me who has problems with your proposal”.

I repeat that, “It is me who has problems with your proposal,” because it makes one question the whole notion that this minister touts of an independent Planning Authority.

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