Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .

Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 8 Hansard (19 August) . . Page.. 2858 ..


MR SPEAKER: Come back to the point at issue, Mrs Dunne.

MRS DUNNE: I am, but before that I was verballed by the Minister for Planning. Yes, verballed by you as well.

Mr Quinlan: You've been Gary-ed.

MRS DUNNE: No, this was pure verballing, in the Bill sense: "Right, we've got you, sunshine."The minister came in here today and started his speech by saying, "Mrs Dunne has just come in here and said we need to have more developments, that we should have more dual occupancies and that they should occur wherever we want to."He went on and on like this, and I thought, "Hang on, that's not the speech I gave. Which planet, which alternative universe, was this minister in when I made my speech?"I realised that he wasn't. He came in here today and he had a set-piece speech and he didn't even bother to listen to what people said. He didn't even bother to listen to what people said before he came along to make his argument.

Mr Speaker, he went on to verbal the Property Council. I sat here and listened to him. He said, "The Downer Residents Association think we should pass draft variation 200."Then he said, "And the Property Council agree with me."I actually thought, "Perhaps I'm in an alternative universe. Or do my ears deceive me?"I went outside and rang Norm. I said, "Did you hear that?" He said, "Yes, I did."I said, "Can you talk to the Property Council?"

Anyhow, the message came back from the Property Council that they have never said that they would support the draft variation; that they had consistently said that draft variation 200 should not be implemented; that they are implacably opposed to draft variation 200. I would call on this minister to stand up and withdraw the statement that the Property Council has supported draft variation 200.

Mr Corbell: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: yes, I'm quite happy to apologise and announce it wasn't the Property Council. That was an error. It was the MBA.

MR SPEAKER: Order, that's not a point of order.

MRS DUNNE: Well, in that case, he's verballed the MBA now. Well, again he's in an alternative universe, because the MBA that I was talking to today do not back the introduction of draft variation 200.

This is what we have: we have a minister out of control. He is entirely out of control. He has no control over his department or the people who write his speeches. He seems to have no control over implementing a satisfactory planning process. He came in here, as I predicted he would, and said, "We have a direct mandate from the people"-not from some watery tart or anything like that; a direct mandate from the people-"to protect the garden city suburbs."

We agree that this is the case, that something should be done to protect the garden city suburbs, but the members of the Planning and Environment Committee suggest that this is not the way to do it. Members of the community, by and large, said this is not the way to do it. Mr Corbell comes in here and says, "Well, you can't possibly marry


Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .