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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 09 Hansard (Tuesday, 17 August 2004) . . Page.. 3681 ..

officials that this is a very valuable piece of land and some day we may want to do something. But it is a very constrained piece of land. As Ms Dundas has said, at some stage it is highly likely that it will have on it an ACTEW substation, which will impede access to the block. I cannot see in any way that this could ever become a suburban paradise of condominiums and villas, because of the constraints upon the block. I dispute publicly on the record the value of this block for anything other than broad acre. I put on the record the wish of the Liberal opposition that the leaseholders not be constrained by having a ridiculously short lease on their land.

MR QUINLAN (Treasurer, Minister for Economic Development, Business and Tourism, Minister for Sport, Racing and Gaming, and Acting Minister for Planning) (11.14): I still believe that the initial decision of the Assembly was a wrong-headed decision taken for the wrong reasons, but it is a decision of the Assembly. The government is working on an appropriate solution to a problem with a very valuable piece of land, a very obvious piece of land, on the corner of Hindmarsh Drive and Monaro Highway, to become a petting zoo. It is possible that this could have been handled better some time ago, yet I recall the petting zoo was quite intractable about where else it might go, where there were probably more appropriate pieces of land for what it is doing.

I assure the Assembly that the government will pursue resolution of this matter within the framework of the recommendations of the committee. At one stage this issue became somewhat emotional, and a matter of who in this Assembly cared most. There needs to be some common sense in the solution and some restrictions on how the land might be used next, and the lease conditions will protect the territory from inappropriate use of that block of land in the long term.

Question resolved in the affirmative.

Legal Affairs—Standing Committee

Scrutiny report 55

MR STEFANIAK (11.17): I present the following report:

Legal Affairs—Standing Committee (performing the duties of a Scrutiny of Bills and Subordinate Legislation Committee)—Scrutiny Report 55, dated 17 August 2004, together with the relevant minutes of proceedings.

I seek leave to move a motion authorising the report for publication.

Leave granted.

MR STEFANIAK: I move:

That the report be authorised for publication.

Question resolved in the affirmative.

MR STEFANIAK: I seek leave to make a brief statement.

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