Page 1198 - Week 05 - Thursday, 4 June 2020
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Under the terms of the agreement between UNSW and the ACT government, UNSW will develop the precinct over 15 years, over which time the campus is expected to be at full operational capacity. Restricting dealings on the land for a 20-year period is a prudent measure for the government to adopt, to protect the territory’s investment. Following the expiration of the initial 20-year period, all dealings with the lease must be approved by the planning and land authority.
Clause 8 of the bill also sets out the requirements which must be fulfilled before the planning and land authority can provide consent to any dealings with the lease. Firstly, all dealings with the UNSW campus leases will require approval from the executive. For all proposed transfers of land, UNSW may transfer the block only to another higher education provider, being a tertiary or vocational education institution. While this restriction does allow UNSW to transfer the block to another entity after the initial 20-year period has expired, this restriction locks the land into being an educational precinct until such time as the government changes policy to allow other uses of the land. This would require a future legislative amendment.
Clause 9 is a sunset clause which removes all the provisions in this bill from the act if UNSW decides not to go ahead with the proposal. This is a common-sense provision which will prevent the legislation from being unnecessarily cluttered with redundant provisions.
The final amendment to the act is a change to schedule 1, which is a list of all the decisions under the act which are reviewable by the ACT Civil and Administrative Tribunal. This amendment to schedule 1 excludes UNSW from being able to appeal any decision not to grant them a lease by direct sale. Given that leases granted to UNSW are subject to negotiations and informed by provisions in the precinct deed, which gives UNSW an entitlement to the grant of a lease if specific requirements are met, it is entirely appropriate that decisions on granting these leases are not reviewable.
Part 3 of the bill amends the Planning and Development Regulation. Clause 13 defines the meaning of the UNSW campus by identifying the location of the land by referring to the blocks designated in the precinct deed. Clause 14 of the bill creates a new subsection in section 105 of the regulation, which contains a list of prescribed leases which require direct sale approval from the minister. Clause 15 makes it clear that the usual criteria which apply for direct sales of non-government education facilities are not applicable to the crown leases which are proposed to be issued to UNSW.
In the place of the usual criteria, clause 16 sets out new criteria which will apply to the direct sale of land for the UNSW campus. Three important elements from these new criteria include having a master plan approved by the minister, a development proposal in accordance with the provisions of the precinct deed, and a works approval from the National Capital Authority which is consistent with the master plan and development proposal.
Clause 17 inserts a new section into the regulation which makes the leases for the land subject to certain provisions. The conditions which the leases will be subject to
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