Page 4287 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 25 October 2017
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He says that it “manages poorly”. He continues:
It is unable to draw up master plans for the revival of the Woden Town Centre, nor for Civic, nor for Belconnen …
This is what he was going to say last night. The article reports that the former commissioner at the meeting last night was going to:
… point to the machinations of the LDA, the use of commercial in confidence arrangements to hide information and the alleged gaming of land release programs to maximise profits as examples of it not following due process.
There is much more I could read, Madam Speaker, but I think it illustrates some of the points I was trying to make today. This points to many of the comments that I have received from community members, who have said, for example, “The direction the panel was being taken by EPSDD has degenerated to a point where the whole process is a farce that is blatantly supporting the FGC proposal.” That is from a member of the community.
The proponent’s assertion that they could not afford any delays at the panel meant that the department was trying to push this through as quickly as possible in the view of some community members and groups. For example, while I was not there at the meeting I was told that the deputy director-general said, “This one will go on for four or five meetings if we are working well.”
Community members were surprised that their meetings were truncated at three. They thought they were working well and they were still awaiting responses from the department and the government on data and information that they had requested and that they had not yet received. They had every expectation that the panel would continue, not be stopped in what they believed was a way of pushing forward the proposal without due consideration of the community’s view.
It is not to say that if the process had continued and they had been provided with the answers they may well have supported a lot of the proposal in the end. But they feel like they were led down the garden path and left there at the bottom of the garden with no way back. They were not given the information to find their way back. They were not given the information on where they were going in the first place. They were just left there, left hanging. It was not what they expected of this process of community consultation and a community panel.
People have said to me that they feel this process pointed towards a fait accompli that the proposal would be approved. They felt they were being used to try to achieve that goal. When that was not going to happen necessarily, the process was truncated. “Thanks so much; see you later; off you go,” if you can get out through the locked door, of course.
Madam Speaker, we will not be supporting Mr Gentleman’s amendment. I do not believe that there is trust in the community to let the general process go forward. They have lost the trust of community members. We will not be supporting Mr Gentleman’s amendment.
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