Page 2680 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 12 August 2015
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acknowledges and wishes to put on the public record this morning the importance of ongoing community-based not-for-profit childcare provision in Canberra. We are looking at a range of options, but the preferred option for a new larger replacement childcare centre for Mocca following further investigations, as I was asked to undertake and agreed to undertake, is the site in Griffith, section 78, which may be appropriate. Further work is needed on that site, and that process will take a number of years.
I want to be clear that if this amendment is accepted by the Assembly today, the land that has been identified as a potential new childcare site behind the Griffith shops will need to go through a further series of processes. The preliminary investigation indicates it would be feasible, but there is a long way to go on that journey if that land is to be made available for a new childcare centre. The advice I have is that that process will take some time—a number of years would be the expectation. It would then take a number of years to construct new facilities. It would be reasonable to conclude that, should this amendment pass this morning, Mocca, if it were to move at all, would not be moving until towards the end of this decade.
Conversations in relation to future development in Manuka are largely around what happens from the 2020s onwards. The process of community discussion with any changes to the territory plan and the like takes a number of years. Any development that might flow from those changes consequentially happen after any planning changes and, therefore, add further years to any process. In terms of any change to the built form in Manuka, we would be looking at probably 2020 and beyond before there would be any.
In relation to the Telopea Park School, particularly the tennis courts, I have received a number of representations—I acknowledge the strength and passion of those representations—for those tennis courts to be retained. I have also received a number of innovative representations—I thank people for bringing them forward—suggesting putting tennis courts on top of a childcare centre. That is an innovative response to the issue. I thank people for thinking laterally, but I am not necessarily sure that would be the best way forward in relation to this site.
I have also received numerous representations from people complaining that the tennis courts on that site are not publicly accessible and that there are locks on the gates. My determination and announcement today is that the locks come off those gates, that the tennis courts are retained for school and community use, and that these facilities will be available for the general public to utilise outside of school hours when the Telopea school does not require those facilities.
Most other tennis courts associated with public schools in this city are available for wider community use. I received numerous representations over the last few months calling on the government to do more to promote physical activity and community engagement in sport and recreation. A fair and reasonable position to take in relation to access to these facilities is that they be retained and their use be expanded to the entire community.
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