Page 3617 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 25 August 2009
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example of a flow of information between experts, politicians and the public that left us all better informed. This is vital work, of course, for MLAs who should always be open to the merits of opposing arguments.
The strength of a strong consultative process is that common ground and assets are able to be identified and the possibility of a way forward found. People are able to come to a shared understanding of the issues and each other’s perspectives. Most of all, when people are included in the process they feel valued and are therefore perhaps more willing to participate and accept the final decisions and outcomes.
I would like to move on in the last few minutes to look at regulatory impact statements. Today’s MPI provides an opportunity to discuss not only the manner in which the ACT government consults with the community but also how it reports on it. Sometimes after a government has conducted consultation, it provides a report on the feedback it received and tables it in the Assembly or makes it available on a department website. But something that is not often provided is the government’s regulatory impact statement which accompanies the legislation, something which the Minister for Planning espoused the importance of last week.
According to the 2007 ACT government legislation handbook, all policy and legislative proposals seeking cabinet consideration must be accompanied by one of these statements. Subordinate legislation only requires a regulatory impact statement if there is an appreciable cost to the community or part of the community. Unfortunately, the ACT government at this stage has not chosen a standard practice to make these statements available publicly as many other governments do.
Looking at the ACT legislation register, for example, regulatory impact statements are available for only a small number of regulations and determinations. Perhaps the ACT government does not have within itself a clear understanding of what the statement is or when it is required. Perhaps it does not actually require regulatory impact statements for cabinet as standard practice or perhaps cabinet has relaxed its internal decision-making processes and has not informed the public.
Madam Assistant Speaker, community consultation is high on the ACT Greens agenda. We ensured it was part of our agreement with the government and we will seek to ensure at all times that we are developing an inclusive community here in the ACT.
MS LE COUTEUR (Molonglo) (4.42): I welcome the opportunity to talk about community consultation today. Community consultation is a key part of ensuring that our communities are supportive—on side, whatever words we want to use—with the changes that are happening to our society and our built environment. It is an inevitable part of human nature that we are uncertain about change, but we all know that it is inevitable.
Today, as I am the Greens planning spokesperson, I will concentrate mainly on the built environment. There is an abundance of examples to talk about in the built environment. One of the main things I want to talk about is what we actually mean by consultation. One of the issues is: are we doing consultation or are we doing
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