Page 4412 - Week 12 - Thursday, 26 October 2017
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enforcement and emergency services agencies to ensure that they are effectively resourced to meet the challenges ahead.
In respect of planning and land management, our first area of focus has been to bring people back into planning. The genuine engagement focus has continued to ensure that we do not undertake city planning simply for the sake of creating artistic street layouts. We plan ahead so that we have an optimum chance of meeting the future needs of the people who will live, work and play in our city.
Holding the role of minister for these portfolios from the start of the parliamentary term gives me an opportunity to continue to establish a strong direction, one that recognises that the needs of our city are changing. Consultation strategies that are implemented for major projects and proposals, including exploring innovative engagement tools and seeking input from as wide a range of people as possible, ensure that varied communities across Canberra are heard, including the previously unheard voices. The government strives to make it easier for the public to understand and to have an input into planning processes.
The approach to engagement builds on my work on the statement of planning intent in 2015. In developing my statement of planning intent I spent a lot of time attending community meetings and workshops with groups of all demographics, including our young professionals, and listening to the aspirations that Canberrans have for our city. Madam Speaker, this approach has become the default for talking about planning in Canberra. I continue to support the Chief Minister’s ambitions to develop more meaningful ways to engage with our community and to hear community views.
Earlier this year the government welcomed Ben Ponton as the ACT’s new chief planner. Mr Ponton has centred his work on quality engagement and has been working tirelessly to find more effective and innovative ways to engage with the community and industry. Mr Ponton has explored opportunities to embrace collaborative conversations and build trust to deliver better outcomes for our city. Mr Ponton’s recent work to develop pre-DA community consultation guidelines, which will be finalised and released to the community in the near future, echoes to the community that community engagement is an integral part of the design of major developments.
The government is also working hard to develop policies for housing choices. Affordable housing is an issue that is prevalent not just in Australia but internationally and it is closely linked to my planning portfolio, as many of the potential solutions lie within our planning framework. Madam Speaker, our work on housing choices will look at the issue of what we have been calling the missing middle. This is a particular problem in Canberra, where it sometimes feels like the options are either a stand-alone home or an apartment, with very few options in between. This needs to change and the government is keen to collaborate on options to encourage and deliver innovative, high-quality residential buildings.
There is another project that is a little further advanced, which is the establishment of the capital city design review panel, to be chaired by the ACT government architect, Catherine Townsend and, where appropriate, by the National Capital Authority as
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