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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 5 Hansard (8 May) . . Page.. 1687 ..

MR CORBELL (continuing):

The Planning and Land Act 2002 was passed by this Assembly on 12 December last year together with the Planning and Land (Consequential Amendments) Act 2002. In the course of discussing and debating those two important acts, I made well known my intention, and the government's intention, to present at a later date further legislation to repeal the acts that established the Kingston Foreshore Development Authority and the Gungahlin Development Authority.

It is necessary to repeal those acts to give proper effect to this core of the intent of the Planning and Land Act in establishing the Land Development Agency: that there will be a single public entity capable of conducting development on behalf of the territory, governed by one set of rules and operating under a consolidated management umbrella.

That is not to say, however, that this government does not have a high regard for the work and the objectives of the existing development authorities. On the contrary, the provisions of the Planning and Land Act have in part been modelled on the operation and experience of those authorities. It is proposed that the two existing authorities will merge smoothly into the new Land Development Agency through a process that ensures the effective conduct of existing projects. There will be a gradual transfer of those projects into the full management of the agency.

The planning and land task force, the Land Group, the Kingston Foreshore Development Authority and the Gungahlin Development Authority have been working for many months to set in place all of the arrangements for commencement of a single development agency on 1 July this year.

To that end it is necessary, as discussed in the Assembly last year, to repeal the Kingston Foreshore Development Act and the Gungahlin Development Authority Act. The Planning and Land Legislation Amendment Bill 2003 is the vehicle for those repeals. This bill effects a range of changes which I would summarise briefly as follows:

The principal purpose of the bill, which is to commence at the same time as the Planning and Land Act, is to repeal the Kingston Foreshore Development Authority Act and the Gungahlin Development Authority Act, and this occurs in part 3 of the bill at clause 5.

The larger part of this legislation is devoted to transitional provisions in connection with those repeals, which ensure the transfer of assets, rights and liabilities to the new Land Development Agency and the continuation of rights and responsibilities in any proceedings for or against a repealed authority.

Final reports and financial statements of the repealed authorities will be prepared and submitted by the outgoing chief executive officers of the authorities after 1 July 2003.

Transitional matters are often complex, and it is not uncommon for legislation to provide that outstanding transitional issues may be dealt with through regulations. For that reason, a provision to that effect is inserted into the Planning and Land Act. I should note, for members' information, that the transitional provisions are to expire after one year.

A number of provisions in the Land (Planning and Environment) Act 1991 are amended to change references to the Gungahlin Development Authority and to correct one typographical error. The amendment also includes a new provision to

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