Page 4190 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 23 October 2019
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depending on the size of the block. This means more trees, more green spaces and less concrete in our residential blocks.
Ms Le Couteur has asked this Assembly to note the Labor-Greens parliamentary agreement for the Seventh Assembly and particularly the inclusion of a third pipeline for non-potable water. As an update to this, I would like to advise that the third pipeline was investigated and found to be unnecessary because the ACT’s water treatment facilities already deal with sewage effectively, and a third pipeline would have been expensive to install with no net environmental or health benefit.
A lot has happened since the parliamentary agreement for the Seventh Assembly was signed by the parties to the agreement. We are making significant progress in terms of improving the quality of development in Canberra. We are always considering where and how our planning policies might need to change to improve our buildings and our green spaces. This reflection is why we have commenced a review of the entire planning system, to make sure that, across Canberra, we are seeing development that meets the expectations of the Canberra community.
While the government supports the proposal for a review to be undertaken, given ongoing review is a positive thing, it must be commissioned by the independent planning and land authority. This will come at a cost, but I am advised by the chief planner that funds would be redirected from the planning review to make sure that this work is completed within the time frames required by the Assembly.
In conclusion, the ACT government supports Ms Le Couteur’s motion today, although we would have preferred that the work to be commissioned was broader in scope. Sustainability is not limited to the Molonglo Valley; it is important to all of Canberra. Therefore, in scoping the required work, the planning and land authority may seek to broaden the scope so that we can guarantee that it is an effective input into the planning review.
MR PARTON (Brindabella) (10.48): What a fascinating motion from my Greens colleague Ms Le Couteur. We will be supporting this motion because we agree with most of it. It has been interesting to listen to both Ms Le Couteur and Mr Gentleman. One of the things that I get from Ms Le Couteur’s speech is that the compact city vision for Canberra is wonderful but it is so easy to get it terribly wrong.
Mr Gentleman spoke about the grand vision of sustainable development for Molonglo but conceded that the intentions of the planning guidelines for Molonglo have not delivered the desired results. I do not know if it is just me, but I cannot get away from the belief that from the planning minister we always seem to get great chunks of public service speak which are just about never supported by actual outcomes.
Mr Gentleman speaks of the focus on urban infill, but I am not sure that the community believes that this is going to deliver the sustainable development that Labor and the Greens trumpet. My first reading of the motion when it appeared in my inbox from Ms Le Couteur’s office was that Ms Le Couteur was saying that Labor and the Greens, in their parliamentary agreement for the Seventh Assembly, painted a picture of utopia for Molonglo, that they promised a planning paradise back then.
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