Page 3491 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 19 September 1990
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PLANNING, DEVELOPMENT AND INFRASTRUCTURE - STANDING COMMITTEE
Report on the Redevelopment of the Former Canberra Times Site
Debate resumed from 5 June 1990, on motion by Mr Collaery:
That the Assembly takes note of the report.
MR JENSEN (4.43): Mr Speaker, as is well known, the Government decided to approve the redevelopment of the former Canberra Times site and to proceed by way of a surrender of the existing leases and a regrant of the new lease, which incorporated a suitable purpose clause to allow the building of an office development on the Canberra Times site. That course of action was within the power of the ACT Government under the City Area Leases Act and was consistent with the report of the Standing Committee on Planning, Development and Infrastructure that we are discussing today.
The development that has been approved by the Government is identical with the proposed development that was considered by the standing committee. It is worthwhile recalling that the standing committee recommended that certain safeguards be undertaken if the Government was prepared to allow the development to proceed. On the committee's recommendation the Government introduced parking restrictions in Reid, Braddon and Turner to lessen the likely problem of parking in residential streets within walking distance of Civic and the Canberra Times site. I know Mr Moore has appreciated this action on the part of the Government.
Prior to the Government making its decision, Concrete Constructions had already published the results of its assessment of the impact of the redevelopment on traffic, parking, public transport and pollution levels consistent with the Civic Centre Policy Plan. The Interim Territory Planning Authority also conducted an assessment and also published the results from its continuous environmental monitoring in respect of Civic. All three assessments were published by the Government prior to making a final decision. Each assessment concluded that there would be no negative impact from the development and no adverse comment was received on those findings. There has, however, been some public comment that by surrendering and regranting the lease there is an appearance that the Government has, in fact, disregarded the decisions of the Supreme and Federal Courts, respectively. I think my colleague Mr Collaery may have some comments to make on that issue.
Let me now turn to the effect of the proposed new legislation brought down in draft form by the Government on this issue. The problems with the Canberra Times site are symptomatic of the failures of past Federal and ACT Labor governments to address the issues of lease administration. This is despite a very detailed commentary on the problem by one of their own Federal members, Mr John Langmore. I refer, of course, to the Langmore report on the Canberra
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