Page 4088 - Week 11 - Thursday, 21 September 2017
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I will start with government office buildings. There are, of course, times when government office buildings do need to be sold—for example, basically when the government no longer needs them. The ACT government is selling Macarthur House at this moment, and I am told by somebody who has worked in it that it very much falls into the category of old and no longer suitable.
But at other times we have seen government offices sold, by federal Liberal governments in particular, for ideological reasons, regardless of whether it makes financial sense or not. I well remember the Howard government selling off all our overseas embassies. What were we going to do: give up having overseas representation? It was one of the more stupid things that the Howard government did. Many of us have heard stories about agencies that have had their buildings sold and ended up paying very high rents that meant the whole exercise in fact cost the federal government money.
The evolution of office arrangements to agencies has also seen agencies lease very plush new office buildings, sometimes at considerable expense. It has also meant that Canberra’s town centres lose out, as agencies have relocated to central areas that suit the secretary’s wish to be as close as possible to Parliament House, with no thought about the impact on local businesses or staff in the town centres. This has had a negative impact on Woden town centre in my electorate. Ms Cheyne talked about it yesterday with respect to the Belconnen town centre.
Another area that shows the issues that can come from privatisation is energy. I could talk for hours on this, but I will not. The whole electricity industry, however, was government owned in the 1990s. We are now 20 years into a gradual privatisation and deregulation. Possibly with the federal government’s intervention we might be having a re-regulation of the energy industry. But I think we are all very aware that this one has not worked out well at all.
I am very pleased that Ms Lawder and Mr Barr both focused a lot on heritage in their talk. Obviously, not all heritage places need to be government owned. There are many private owners who love heritage and look after heritage places well. But, unfortunately, there are also some who do not. And how well private ownership works depends on the type of heritage place and the strength of the heritage protections. The problem with the parliamentary precinct is that, while East Block and West Block do individually have heritage protection, there is not enough integrated protection at a broader level for the whole precinct. That means that a proposal could be approved that protects the existing buildings but nonetheless is completely inappropriate for the parliamentary precinct. This is an issue that many interested in Canberra’s heritage are concerned about.
There have been several proposals put to the federal government for the inclusion of the central national area and inner hills in the national heritage list. So far there has been no progress. Unfortunately, while this is a federal government decision, it is pretty clear from the annual reports hearings in March that the ACT government does not support the listing. Their concern is that it would be too restrictive. However, I do
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