Page 3106 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 17 October 2006
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• the draft bill be amended to enable the Legislative Assembly to extend the time available to an Assembly committee for inquiry and report on a draft plan variation beyond six months;
• other short time frames highlighted by the committee be reconsidered in view of the ACT government’s community engagement manual, which include the minimum 15-day public inspection period for draft variations of the territory plan and background papers, subject to possible extension;
• the three-month limitation period for legal challenges on territory plan matters;
• the two-week minimum period for persons who made a representation to the authority to make a further representation on a new application;
• the 20 working days given to the authority to make a substitute decision or confirm a decision following a request for reconsideration, after which time the authority is taken to have confirmed the original decision;
• the 20-working-day time limit for comment on a draft scope for an environmental impact study;
• the minimum 15-working-day period for the provision of written representations about a draft plan of management for an area of public land; and
• the five-working-day period within which persons can be required to undertake rectification work.
The committee thanks the Minister for Planning, Mr Simon Corbell, and the senior ACT planning officials and stakeholders who assisted the committee during the course of this inquiry. The committee appreciates the substantial amounts of time and effort that were expended to produce detailed submissions within a short period of time. The committee derived considerable assistance from the high-quality submissions.
It should be noted, though, that due to the short time available for this inquiry this report only discusses selected issues and does not summarise all of the provisions of the proposed legislation, nor all of the issues raised in exhibits. It does, however, respond to most of the issues raised in submissions to the committee.
Other inquiries have examined and will be examining some of the issues that arose in this inquiry and may arise in the future. These include the Standing Committee on Legal Affairs inquiry into strict liability offences in the ACT; the review of the Planning and Development Bill 2006 by the Standing Committee on Legal Affairs, performing the duties of a scrutiny of bills and subordinate legislation committee, after the bill has been introduced to the Assembly, which is expected to be in November 2006; the ACT Auditor-General’s 2005 report on the development application and approval process; and the ACT Legislative Assembly public accounts committee’s review of the Auditor-General’s report.
I will now raise some points to address some of the main objectives of the bill. The report examines the main objective of the draft bill and the functions and powers of the main institutions of governance that will administer the planning and development regime. It includes a review of the main planning instruments and processes administered by the ACT government entities and includes a chapter on the management of public
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