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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 5 Hansard (11 May) . . Page.. 1515 ..

MR HIRD (continuing):

Mr Speaker, Report No 45 of the Standing Committee on Planning and Urban Services deals with an important issue, namely, the appropriate planning cleaning policy for a prestigious part of Canberra. The report is a majority report of Mr Rugendyke and myself, with our colleague Mr Corbell dissenting. As indicated, the dissenting report is attached. The majority report has concluded that the draft variation, somewhat modified during the committee's inquiry, should go ahead for several reasons. It will reduce the present planning and legal uncertainties affecting this precinct. It greatly clarifies the interim heritage citation for the precinct. It restricts future development to just two dwellings per existing block, and it sets a limit on the gross floor area of the new dwellings.

The modified draft variation steers a middle path between two distinct views. One view would restrict development to one dwelling per existing block. The other view would open up the area to multiunit development. The committee received evidence advocating both viewpoints. We are aware of the strong feelings relating to the issue, and hope that our report will go some way towards facilitating a resolution of the existing problems affecting the area and its residents.

I also would like to take the opportunity to thank all those who gave evidence before the committee, and in particular, the Minister for Urban Services, for making his staff available to assist us in our deliberations. I would also like to thank my two colleagues, Mr Corbell and Mr Rugendyke, and our secretary, Rod Power. I commend the report to the house.

MR CORBELL (5.13): As Mr Hird points out, I have appended a dissenting report to this report of the Standing Committee on Planning and Urban Services. First of all I should stress that this committee has produced the majority of this report in a unanimous fashion, but from time to time I have found the need to dissent from the reports that the committee has considered and the majority have accepted. This is one of those occasions and the reason, Mr Speaker, is that the contentious issue of dual occupancy development in the Old Red Hill precinct is one which, I believe, could significantly undermine the heritage character of the precinct and could significantly undermine the whole reason for including the precinct in the Territory Plan as a heritage area.

The area known as Old Red Hill is a highly significant element of Canberra's planning heritage. It contains areas of semirural residential estate and a significant area, often cited as the "dress circle" along Mugga Way, as well as a more conventional prestige suburb area. Its areas of semirural residential estate and the Mugga Way dress circle are in the garden city tradition, of which we are all so proud in our city, but they are also unique in Australia. They have direct associations with the work of Walter Burley Griffin, and with Sir John Sulman, who was the chairman of the Federal Capital Advisory Committee at the time of the suburb's development.

The evidence that was presented to the committee, which I believe was of significant to this issue, has been ignored in the majority report. Members may read in my dissent that I refer to the evidence presented to the committee's hearings by Professor James

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