Page 726 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 5 July 1989
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been produced for action to commence. In fact, action is long overdue and is costing you and me as ratepayers some considerable sums of money, as I will now seek to demonstrate.
I will start by giving the Assembly an example as to why this is so. In one case an organisation was granted the lease of a block of land on which to build a church, a church hall and a manse. This lease was granted specifically for that purpose, as an examination of the lease clearly shows. All was well and the neighbours got on famously over the years as the church built its church hall; it was decided that a church was not needed and it was eventually decided to build a manse. The latter did cause some problems as the position of the manse seemed to residents to indicate that there was maybe another agenda for the rest of that particular block of land. In fact, it appears that a developer had heard of the interest and that he had suggested an option that would help the members of the church, parishioners, to leave their large houses and move to something a little smaller in a way which would keep them in their retirement.
That was perfectly acceptable and there were no problems with that at all. However, the lease did not strictly allow this type of development to take place. This meant a change in lease purpose which required consultation with nearby residents. The residents expressed some concern when they saw that the number of units proposed for the site was certainly far in excess of what was appropriate for that area and nowhere near appropriate to the particular idea that the NCDC had in mind for the original use of that land.
The residents decided to take the matter up with the court because they understood that this proposal was not in keeping with the original use of the land and was not good planning. They became even more concerned when they found out that despite the blocks being sold for $100,000 each on a loan, with the money being given back to the owners when they left, the church was able to have the lease purpose changed without having to pay a betterment charge that would normally apply.
Let me digress to talk about betterment charge. The Langmore report made a strong recommendation that the current betterment levy of 50 per cent be replaced by compensation to the lessee for the value of the leases that it was surrendering, including improvements and charges of the full premium value for the grant of a new lease, together with the cost of any necessary off-site services. That was recommendation 10. We now find, after inquiry, that the Minister had used a definition from the Aged or Disabled Persons Homes Act which defined the church as an eligible organisation under that Act and was able to have its lease changed without any payment of betterment, despite definite change in the lease purpose clause - in fact, the reissue of that particular lease for this totally new position.
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