Page 4553 - Week 15 - Tuesday, 6 December 1994
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MR CONNOLLY: Madam Speaker, I will look into that matter and report back to Mr Stevenson. I know that the papers and the various allegations were referred to the director of the Consumer Affairs Bureau. I believe that he was engaging in some discussions on the matter with the Director of Public Prosecutions, with a view to looking at whether the Fair Trading Act was breached. I will report back on where that matter has reached.
Starlight Drive-In Site - Redevelopment
MR MOORE: Madam Speaker, my question is to Mr Wood, the Minister for the Environment, Land and Planning. I did give Mr Wood notice of this question, because it is somewhat complicated. Minister, in response to my question on notice No. 1439, which referred to the Starlight Drive-In site, you indicated that the reason for not taking action for breach of lease since 1988 was:
Courts have in the past not supported compliance action by the Department in the circumstances where negotiations to resolve or vary a lease condition are in process.
You further stated:
No Design and Siting approvals or lease variation ... has been approved.
That was as at your answer on 10 November. The design and siting application, which you stated was lodged on 26 September, in fact was signed on 14 October. Something has been crossed out and changed there. It indicated a requirement for a lease change but sought approval for 330 residential units, contrary to the lease condition which states, at 3D, that the premises would be used only for the purpose of a tourist accommodation centre. My question is: Firstly, can you give specific examples of the courts actually not supporting compliance action where the department has fulfilled its responsibilities under the lease; and, secondly, has the prescribed period for approval of the design and siting application been exceeded, making this a deemed refusal?
MR WOOD: Madam Speaker, I thank Mr Moore for giving me notice of the question. It is a complicated one, and I was talking to his office just 10 minutes before question time to get some elaboration of the intent of the question. My advice remains that judicial reference has been made to the appropriateness of compliance action where a lease is to be varied. It may be deemed that orders would not be necessary if a variation would remedy any breach. The Land Act recognises this principle by providing that an order cannot be made where a current lease variation application, if approved, would remedy the subject of the order. In view of the time, Mr Moore, I will give you some further elaboration on that question later.
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