Page 3268 - Week 11 - Wednesday, 21 September 1994
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If we wanted to be really concerned about undue hardship we would be looking at legislation that carries that through to the financiers, rather than saying, "Okay, it is undue hardship, so we are going to leave the tenants and the undue hardship grounds again". They are the ones that lose every single time and they are the ones that are going to lose by this Labor backdown - by this Labor letting down once again of small business people in the ACT.
It has clearly been the case that the landlords have had the power in most of the agreements that have been made till now. That is why there is the need for the legislation and that is why it is such a disappointing thing to see these amendments about ratchet clauses and key money not being available to be considered as part of a dispute. We are not saying that you cannot have them; we are not interfering with the piece of legislation. But what we are doing is saying to both the landlord and the tenant, "Under these circumstances, if you have a dispute it can go through the process".
I would think it would be an ideal opportunity for the Liberals to say to Labor, "No, we are not going to allow you a backdown". That would show that in fact Labor is out of touch with small business and the Liberals are more in tune with small business. I would hope that Mr Stevenson would also support me in voting against these amendments that are presented in supplementary B.
MS SZUTY (4.56): I was just wondering whether Mr Humphries also wanted to speak to these particular amendments. I, too, like Mr Moore, am disappointed that we have had some last minute negotiations occur between the Government and owners. I think it is regrettable that tenant groups have obviously not had the opportunity to respond to this most recent change. That, for me, is a very disappointing part of the whole consultation and negotiation process. At the end of the day, there has been one major issue which has been presented to this Assembly that tenant groups obviously have not had the opportunity to respond to. The Attorney-General talked about an attempt to balance the interests, and I really wonder what balancing the interests with regard to this particular matter is indeed all about. On the one hand, we have negotiations with owners; but, on the other hand, we have not had negotiations with tenants. I do see that situation as entirely regrettable.
Mr Moore talked about the question of retrospectivity and talked about this Bill setting a new standard and putting in place a new dispute mechanism. Indeed, again from my speech during the in-principle stage, I believe very strongly in what this Bill is trying to do. It is creating a very new and different regime in the ACT, which is new and different from every other jurisdiction in Australia. I think we will actually be the envy of every State and Territory in Australia in terms of the dispute mechanisms that we are going to put in place in the Territory. I do find it unfortunate that at the last stage we have had negotiations which have occurred with one particular group and not the other in relation to such an important issue.
Mr Moore talked about Mr Connolly's arguments in terms of the hardship for owners in relation to ratchet clauses in particular, and said that it would just be too difficult for small owners to come to any other arrangement in the short term. I agree with Mr Moore that the hardship again falls back on tenants. I had some experience with the operation of ratchet clauses in my time as director of the Weston Creek Community Service when
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