Page 1269 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 23 August 1989
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applicable to any potential development or redevelopment site. The piecemeal development of Civic has seen windfall profits made by some developers because of the failure of the ACT Administration to levy a realistic betterment tax to cover the cost of additional public services like roads, sewerage and parking to support the new development. There has not been consistency in the assessment of betterment tax either.
Such mistakes of the past need not be repeated in the future, however, and the Government should ensure that this is so, otherwise ACT residents will continue to foot bills which should be a charge to the developer. Preventing the development itself, however, will not save the ACT community money; indeed it could deny it some savings through economies of sale in some central business district developments.
The Canberra Times site decision has had an inevitability about it. It was going to happen. It was only a matter of when and where. While we can sympathise with Concrete Constructions and trust it will find its way out of its expensive difficulty, it is nevertheless fortuitous that the issue has arisen now so it can be addressed now. As the Liberals said in our policy document during the Assembly election, predictability is one of the cornerstones of the Liberal's approach to planning, and it is never more in need than now, so that people know the rules and can play accordingly.
In summary, Mr Speaker, with the establishment of self-government and the concomitant change in land planning arrangements, wide-ranging changes need to be made to the processes of land planning and land use. This is crucial to our future well-being as a community. The necessary changes include, firstly, the development of comprehensive plans for the city area as a whole and for each existing or future redevelopment area including the city centre. Secondly, it needs the creation of a permanent territorial planning organisation, and that organisation must have its responsibilities, authority and role clearly defined; it must have a clear line of responsibility to a Minister of the ACT Executive; it must have unambiguous planning criteria; it must have internal delegation to ensure that development and redevelopment proposals are dealt with comprehensively at the lowest possible level; it must have an appeals process which is responsive, open and accessible, with the responsibility for consideration of, and decision on, appeals being vested in an appropriate tribunal - and I mean more administrative than judicial.
We, the Liberals, call upon the Government to implement these actions with emphasis and urgency on resolving the Canberra Times site problem and ensuring that other projects in abeyance can proceed. Both the short-term problem and the longer-term planning issues must be addressed urgently. Mr Speaker, I foreshadow that I will seek leave to move a motion calling upon the Government to take urgent action to
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