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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 05 Hansard (Thursday, 13 May 2004) . . Page.. 1850 ..

specifically exempts development in a designated area and, in particular “(a) the construction, alteration or demolition of a public road in a designated area; or (b) any works in a designated area related to the construction, alteration or demolition of a public road; or (c) any other development in a designated area that requires approval under the Commonwealth Act, section 12 (Works in Designated Areas to be subject to Plan and approval by the Authority).” This addresses the finding by Justice Crispin in the Supreme Court. Justice Crispin’s scrutiny of the law was an opportunity for, at the very least, a conversation to be had about ACT control over areas in the ACT, but instead the same government, who want to limit the designated areas to the parliamentary triangle and claim back planning control to the territory, have quickly created a regulation to hand back responsibility for decisions in this area.

Do we not want to have a say in developments in the territory? Do we really trust the NCA to do the right thing? Is it not the NCA who gave the big go-ahead to developments at the airport that we all complained were undermining the development of Gungahlin and other areas of the ACT? It seems to me that this has been a lost opportunity, despite the complaints that have come over the years about the current planning arrangements and two planning authorities. Instead of taking this opportunity from Crispin’s finding to actually work to find a more workable solution, we see what the government has done.

I turn now to the amendment removing regulation 41 (3). This regulation limited the exemption to the notification requirement conferred by 41 (1) and 41 (2). Regulation 42 is re-titled from “Exclusion of appeals by applicants—Act, s 275” to “Exclusion of appeals—general”. Section 275 of the act provides for appeal to the AAT for some of the decisions made under the act. By this amendment, the GDE is specifically exempt from scrutiny in the AAT, joining appeal by applicants on decisions related to a development in relation to unleased territory land, one which is to be decided by the minister under the act, section 229B (6) (c)—that is, a call-in development, a variation of a lease to increase the area of land comprised in the lease or a development on unleased territory land.

So to the prevention of appeals by applicants, we are adding the prevention of appeals by anyone in relation to this one specific development—a development in which the details of licences and so on have been questioned because the extension runs through a nature reserve. The amendment to regulation 43 is to exclude appeals by objectors and third parties in relation to the construction of the Gungahlin Drive extension. The government is saying in these amendments that it believes that it should not have to answer for its decisions on specific approvals and specific work on the GDE.

Our system of governance relies on separate arms, judiciary, executive and parliament and on scrutiny and oversight to ensure that decisions made on behalf of the executive by the public service can be scrutinised for the adequacy of a decision in the independent forum—the judiciary. Without that scrutiny, we are at risk of dictatorship. Although the AAT process and the court challenges in general will not last forever, they may just have raised some useful information that has been missed. So far the AAT, looking at the quality of the decisions made, has set aside the approvals of vegetation clearing and suspended the operation of licences to kill native animals and take protected plants. If there are problems with the process or with the content of these decisions, then that is exactly what this system of scrutiny is designed to pick up.

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