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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 8 Hansard (27 June) . . Page.. 2314 ..

MR MOORE (3.31): I present Report No. 13 of the Standing Committee on Planning and Environment, titled "The Stein Report (Report into the Administration of the ACT Leasehold) and the Government's response to the report", together with extracts of the minutes of proceedings. I move:

That the report be noted.

It may be a sign, but Report No. 13 of the Standing Committee on Planning and Environment is the first report that records dissenting views. I think there are a number of issues on which the committee would suggest that the number 13 seems to have had its impact on this report. For my part, I wanted to look at the Government's response to the Stein report and see whether there were ways in which we could suggest improvements to the way that we deal with the leasehold system. Indeed, there are a number of issues upon which the committee is in agreement, and I would like to deal with those shortly.

Before I do, once again I would like to thank my colleagues on the committee. It was a difficult issue for us to deal with. I believe that the committee members have, once again, worked particularly hard to ensure that they got a fair outcome. There were quite a number of meetings with regard to this committee report which took place well outside our normal meeting times. It required work on weekends and evenings in order to get this report together and meet the timeframe that the Assembly had set us. In fact, Mr Speaker, you may well remember that even last week I put on the notice paper a motion to extend the time for the tabling of this report. I believed that we might not be able to have it together on time. I would also like to thank, of course, the support people who helped us to prepare this report, in particular Mr Rod Power, the secretary of the committee, who continues to work tirelessly. In relation to this particular report, I also thank Ms Anne Munns, who assisted with a great deal of the administrative work as well.

Let me focus on the positive outcomes or the agreed position of the committee, which will seek to modify the Government's response. I think the first issue is to do with the objectives of the leasehold system. The committee's view on recommendation 4 states:

The committee considers it is important to clearly state the guiding principles of the Land Act and the objectives of the leasehold system. While concerned about the Government's response, the committee notes that the public, and MLAs, will have further opportunity to comment when the Government releases its draft policy objectives for discussion.

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