Page 2065 - Week 07 - Tuesday, 21 June 2005
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The proposed variation to the territory plan, DV 236, has various objectives, with the overarching objective being to contribute to the revitalisation of Civic. Some of the other important objectives of DV 236 are to enable the implementation of the City West master plan, which aims to better integrate the ANU with the social and cultural life of the city. This has been taken into account with the allocation of $6 million in the 2005-06 budget to allow for the implementation of new street furniture, streetscape redesign and the redevelopment of Childers Street.
With the encouragement of new cultural facilities, it allows the opportunity for more cultural activities such as circus acts and dance and performing arts for young people. There is also the chance for new eat, meet and drink establishments to be part of the new City West redevelopment. The committee agrees with the government’s view to help encourage affordable student accommodation in the city precinct and also the opportunity to facilitate a vibrant, robust and culturally stimulating environment.
Committee members recommended that the membership board of the City West precinct committee should be broadened to include a representative of community organisations and other existing occupants. In broadening this membership, the ACT government’s target of 50 per cent for female appointees to committees and boards should also be applied. As committee chair, I would like to thank all those involved in the consultation process and in particular the committee office and secretary Hannah Jaireth.
DR FOSKEY (Molonglo) (11.56): I was pleased to read the key recommendations of the report of the Standing Committee on Planning and Environment into the draft variation of the territory plan No 236, commonly known as the City West redevelopment.
I was very pleased because community organisations are scared that they are being run out of town, or Civic at least, because, as our Treasurer recently commented during the estimates process, they might be more appropriately accommodated in areas that are not considered highly valued real estate. Such a comment from our government is dismissive of the role played by community organisations and the needs of the people that access them. Our community organisations provide invaluable services to the ACT people and we must ensure that they are supported in Canberra’s planning and development or the community that they serve will suffer.
In this instance, government must include community organisations in the Civic west planning process. The degree of uncertainty regarding the government’s plans for their accommodation and their exclusion from the detailed planning process is unacceptable. As it currently stands, community organisations do not know what their future holds in the Civic west district. The City West master plan and the ACT government and ANU deed of agreement, which set out the future with broad brush stokes for Civic west, lack definition and a commitment to the future for community organisations.
We have called on the government many times to make the ANU deed of agreement public, to assist in quelling the anxiety of community organisations about their future, but the government has not yet done so. I take this opportunity to call on the Treasurer and the Chief Minister to table that document in the Assembly today. One important factor that has contributed to this anxiety is finding the right minister to deal with in
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