Page 102 - Week 01 - Tuesday, 14 February 2012
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Molonglo. In both Molonglo and Gungahlin the ACT government had undertaken a massive amount of work prior to even considering the release of land for urban development. This work has been recognised by the commonwealth as robust and accurate, and the commonwealth has relied on it to a great extent. It provides a sound basis for preparing the additional material needed by the commonwealth in order to obtain environmental clearances under the EPBC act.
Further to this, the ACT and the commonwealth recognise the need to enter into a bilateral agreement about the way to handle future environmental clearances in the ACT, and we are operating under this agreement in relation to clearances in Gungahlin. It is in Gungahlin that the ACT has been particularly affected by the complexity of the commonwealth’s environmental clearance processes.
The ACT prepared an urban development plan for Gungahlin after extensive research into the environmental issues. This research led to a very large area of land being excised from the development zone and set aside as hills, ridges, buffers or as nature reserves or simply as non-urban land. The ACT has a clear time line and process for proceeding with Gungahlin’s development in line with the urban development plan as set out in the territory plan, which passed through all stages of the Legislative Assembly’s committee and deliberative systems.
However, the commonwealth’s EPBC act was passed by the federal government in the intervening period, and the ACT has ended up having to revisit many of the environmental matters we believed had already been resolved. This has caused delays to proposed land releases in Moncrieff, where the commonwealth government made the decision that Moncrieff would be subject to a bilateral assessment, whereas the ACT thought this would not be necessary given the extensive work already undertaken. The LDA is currently preparing the required documentation for submission for assessment.
In Lawson the LDA first lodged documentation with the commonwealth in June 2011. After commonwealth requests for further information, it is now anticipated the public notification will commence in February this year. This eight-month process has not helped the ACT government’s efforts to get land out to market. The ACT’s EPBC referral for Lawson is now with the commonwealth for consideration.
In Ngunnawal 2C, in accordance with the commonwealth’s EPBC decision, the ACT submitted a draft plan of management for management of the offset on 30 September, but, to date, it has not been advised by the commonwealth that that plan of management has been accepted.
In Throsby, despite extensive environmental research and clearance by past ACT and commonwealth governments of the ACT’s plans for urban development in east Gungahlin, the commonwealth has insisted that the Throsby school site be referred yet again. Once the further studies were completed the ACT government referred the matter back to the commonwealth in September last year. This reflected, I think, a fear from the commonwealth that the school site would not somehow be a beachhead for future development. We are, of course, in ongoing negotiation with the commonwealth, and I am meeting with the federal minister to discuss this in the very near future. (Time expired.)
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