Page 2480 - Week 08 - Thursday, 30 August 2007
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Is it the case that community consultation and participation is too time consuming to fit into the time frames for development approval demanded by developers? This budget does not make any serious inroads into the dependence on private car transport. While a commitment to pedestrian friendly suburbs has been expressed, the loss of community schools and associated community based economies outweighs any pedestrian friendly initiatives contained in this budget. Hopefully the next federal election will see the balance of power change in the Senate. An environmentally aware Rudd-led Labor Party might support the Greens in legislating for environmentally sustainable development policies, which may see an end to the uncoordinated and irresponsible developments on commonwealth land at airports.
Presumably ACTPLA and the LDA will play a major role in delivering on the government’s stated commitment to affordable housing and greenhouse gas reductions. I do not see anything like the commensurate allocation of resources needed to deliver on these commitments in this budget. Once again, I commend Professor Blaker’s solarisation proposal to the Assembly. While Mr Gentleman’s championing of solar feed-in laws is commendable, alone they will not deliver the necessary reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. They should be merely one component of a comprehensive scheme of reduction measures that complement each other and provide guidance and incentives to the community and to the business sector who have consistently said that they are wanting government leadership on this critically important issue.
I understand that the next episode in the EpiCentre debacle will see the ACT arguing against the NCA that the ACT government is the body empowered to interpret the territory plan. I did ask where the funds were in the budget to cover any costs of the current court action, especially in the event that the ACT loses. While I have a lot of sympathy with the ACT government’s position, I suspect that the government is throwing good money after bad. The quantum of damages that the ACT will be up for if or when the EpiCentre sales process is finally subjected to independent judicial scrutiny will be enormous. I have heard the figure of over $40 million being suggested by reputable commentators. Whether ACTPLA’s processes are found to be in breach of procedural fairness or not, I can only hope that future land sales will not involve questionable planning law interpretations and dispensing selective information to various commercial competitors. Playing favourites with developers is a serious departure from democratic values. I hope that, behind the complacent political facade, lessons have been learned from this experience.
On a positive note, I welcome the obvious enthusiasm that the executive of ACTPLA have for placing planning instruments and documents on line. This budget does not appear to contain sufficient dedicated allocations to fully implement this commitment to online access to relevant documents. This is an important initiative and will greatly complement the government’s new planning regime. Greater ease of access to accurate, up-to-date documents will more than pay for itself. (Second speaking period taken.) I would like to remind the house of some wisdom that was shared in this place by the former shadow minister for planning on 6 September 2000. He said:
Well, I think most people in Canberra would think that open space is currently being pretty efficiently utilised as open space. They think that is pretty good and
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