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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 5 (Hansard) 16 May) . . Page.. 1381 ..

MR SPEAKER: I present, for the information of members, Auditor-General's Report No. 6 of 1996 entitled "Collection of Court Fines".

Motion (by Mr Humphries), by leave, agreed to:

That the Assembly authorises the publication of the Auditor-General's Report No. 6 of 1996.

MR DE DOMENICO (Minister for Urban Services): Mr Speaker, I ask for leave of the Assembly to make a ministerial statement on the Gungahlin Town Centre.

Leave granted.

MR DE DOMENICO: Mr Speaker, Gungahlin is Canberra's newest and fastest growing district. Approximately 12,000 people live in the four suburbs that have been developed since the first occupation in Palmerston in 1992. The provision of facilities for the residents of Gungahlin has been a high priority of the Government. The last 12 months have seen the opening of the Palmerston neighbourhood shopping centre, the Nicholls public and Catholic primary schools and the Ngunnawal local shopping centre. Later this year, Mr Speaker, a medical centre will be opening. Next year the Government will be opening Ngunnawal Primary School and will commence construction of Nicholls High School.

The Gungahlin Town Centre will be the first town centre to be developed by an ACT government and it will be very different from anything previously developed in Canberra, or probably elsewhere in Australia. The Government has committed funds in this year's capital works program for the construction of the first stage of the entrance road to the Gungahlin Town Centre. An early community facility in the town centre will be a joint emergency services centre which will provide the Gungahlin community with police, firefighting, ambulance and rescue. The Gungahlin emergency services centre to be constructed in 1997-98 is a new concept which will eliminate duplication and enhance service delivery to the community.

The proposed development has been the subject of the most extensive community consultation on a town centre in Canberra. In finalising the plan for the Gungahlin Town Centre, the Government responded to concerns that the habitats of the endangered Delma impar, more commonly known as the legless lizard, and the Synemon plana,

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