Page 1437 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 6 June 2007
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The records do not show community events that were held free of charge or events supported by Mr MacLachlan’s company, such as Sing Australia, Playgroups and the Strauss Ball, because there was no hiring charge. Without those events, the high point of community bookings was in 1997 and it was for just over 80 days. Under the current management arrangement, community groups have continued to enjoy access to the Albert Hall, even though there is no guaranteed time allocated to community use and community usage has declined.
The days available for community use include weekends, and in recent years bookings for community groups such as the Rotary antique fair, the Monaro Folk Society and Oxfam, to name a few, have been preserved. There is nothing in the existing contract that can guarantee any number at all for community access. You need to have that in the background.
Mr Pratt: Then rectify it.
MR HARGREAVES: That is exactly what we are doing: rectifying it. The tender process currently being undertaken by the government is intended to encourage growth in the use of the hall. The commercial hiring of the hall is regularly at or near the maximum of 110 days a year permitted by the national capital plan. The national capital plan limits the commercial hirings of it to 110 occasions a year, and that will not be allowed to increase. What will change will be having a vastly improved facility that may encourage more community users and community use.
The RFT released publicly through the BASIS website in April has a number of safeguards in it that improve the ad hoc arrangements that were put in place by another government 11 years ago. For example, there has been an outcry that the hall should be retained for community use, yet, as I said, the current management contract does not require that. The new contract will require the successful tenderer to actively promote opportunities for community and cultural use of the hall through a subsidised hire cost regime on not fewer than 50 days a year—not fewer than 50 days a year.
There is misinformation abroad that says that this is limited to the first year only. Mr Speaker, it is not. It is for the life of the contract. The only thing that is limited to the first 12 months is the hire charge. At the end of 12 months, the charges can only be changed with the consent of the government’s representative. That is a reasonable commercial arrangement common to many contracts.
Some may say that 50 days is not enough for community use. I say that it is 50 days more than the current contract and it is 25 days more than the actual community usage of the place last year. It is also said that the hall should not be used for commercial purposes. The permitted land uses are set out in the national capital plan, which permits ancillary short-term commercial retail activities limited to—this should be taken note of—a total of 110 days a year. Each retailer can only have four bookings a year and each booking is not to exceed seven days.
In addition, Mr Pratt calls for widespread community consultation. He makes a lot of moment about there being a lack of it. For the information of Mr Pratt and other members, there was widespread consultation throughout 2006 before the RFT was
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