Page 3291 - Week 10 - Thursday, 25 September 2014

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site, integrating any existing buildings and working with those characteristics. This is something that I hope the government will look at undertaking.

As MLAs, we are all aware of community concerns about suburbs changing. The Greens believe that a proactive plan to engage with our community and to determine at an early stage what parts of our heritage we want to protect is long overdue. It is concerning to see in the report that there is a lack of understanding about what heritage is, both across government directorates and I think in the wider community. This probably shows the need to make the ACT heritage processes more transparent, so that both the community and government understand our heritage system better and also to help the community understand what heritage values are and therefore what sites warrant further protection.

The Greens also believe that the Heritage Council needs to be well resourced so that it can fulfil its obligations and strategic directions, including considering nominations in a timely manner. At present, I think we are all in agreement that the Heritage Council is simply not able to cope with the number of nominations coming before it.

There are a range of other matters. I think there are areas for improvement that were identified in the Marshall report, including having an improved capability for people to access some sort of online portal where heritage listings can be viewed, where people again can improve their understanding of heritage in the territory.

In conclusion, now that the call-in power has, thankfully, been removed from this bill, through the government’s amendments tabled today, the Greens will be supporting the bill.

Motion (by Mr Coe) proposed:

That the debate be adjourned.

Question put.

The Assembly voted—

Ayes 7

Noes 8

Mr Coe

Mrs Jones

Mr Barr

Mr Corbell

Mr Doszpot

Ms Lawder

Ms Berry

Ms Gallagher

Mrs Dunne

Mr Wall

Dr Bourke

Ms Porter

Mr Hanson

Ms Burch

Mr Rattenbury

Question so resolved in the negative.

MR COE (Ginninderra) (5.23): The opposition is very disappointed with the process that the government have put in place for the Heritage Legislation Amendment Bill 2013. Even today, key stakeholders were completely unaware that this bill was coming on for debate. Some of those stakeholders were even unaware that there were amendments put forward for discussion and that were being voted on today. I think it is extremely disappointing that, given the amount of time the government have had to properly consult on this bill, they still have not got it right.

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