Page 4308 - Week 13 - Thursday, 4 December 2014
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There was also the issue for those people who do want to stay on their land or do want to purchase their block back. At this stage the government’s plan is essentially to scrape the whole block. What we heard in the committee report is that is not necessary. That is essentially a commercial decision so that the government can maximise the profit from the block. But we have seen in the media and we have heard many stories where home owners have got a big block. They have done amazing things with those gardens. It is their home and for many people their garden is as important as their house.
Let us not scrape that entire block. Let us scrape what needs to be scraped to get rid of the Mr Fluffy loose-fill asbestos but not destroy gardens so that these home owners who buy back their land, or hopefully can retain their properties, do not have a situation where they have to start from scratch. It is unnecessary, it is punitive and it is not fair.
There are also, as Mr Smyth said, home owners who are caught in a date trap. There is the example where someone bought a home in Wright in January not knowing anything about Mr Fluffy, never having heard of Mr Fluffy. They signed a deed; they had to buy that home. Then, all of a sudden, they found out about Mr Fluffy, and the house that they are due to sell plummeted in value because it is a Mr Fluffy home. But they had to sell. There are not many of them, but let us make sure that we give them fair compensation. I call on the government to do that.
There was also an issue, and Mr Coe will speak to this, about variation 306. This was canvassed in the Canberra Times, I think yesterday. Because of variation 306, the uplift that the government is looking to make—I certainly support that intent where people are happy to release their properties; it makes sense—will not work. But it is not going to work if variation 306 is applied. I say to the government: waive 306 for those properties where the government is trying to recoup that loss for the community.
As Mr Smyth said—again I note the very difficult job the task force has been doing; it is a very hard body of work and I recognise Mr Kefford and his staff here today—let us make sure that the task force is adequately resourced so that it can do its job, so that in this surge period it can make sure that the community of Mr Fluffy home owners are communicated with and that it is proactive, not necessarily reactive.
I turn to the issue of the crown lease. Under the government scheme, new crown leases will be issued. That is a great thing. But I would also say that those home owners, hopefully, will be given the option of staying, of retaining ownership. If we have eradicated Mr Fluffy, let us give them a new crown lease as well so that they do not have that stigma attached to that property, we can start the building file from scratch and they can move on with their lives.
For these home owners who feel that they have a gun to their head because they have got this threat of compulsory acquisition, the problem is that it is a threat. It is a veiled threat. They do not know what is going to happen. I call on the government as well to say: “If you do not engage in this scheme, this is what we will do. These will be the consequences.” This is the problem that many home owners have: they do not know. It is the fear of the unknown. At least if the government says, “If you don’t come
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