Page 2756 - Week 07 - Tuesday, 29 June 2010
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One further concern that I would raise is that in the same answer the minister said:
The responsibility for evaluation reporting on consultation processes is the responsibility of individual agencies.
The Greens’ view is that there should be some sort of oversight evaluative role to ensure that agencies are fulfilling their responsibilities correctly and being given constructive feedback where appropriate to ensure that the best engagement does happen. It is also around being able to support other agencies, other departments, with tools and, I guess, suggestions and assistance to be able to carry out appropriate community engagement. As we know, different situations require different types of engagements.
On the centenary, I would echo Mr Smyth’s words and my words last year—that is, I find it very disappointing that the federal government has again neglected and overlooked the fact that we will be celebrating 100 years in Canberra in 2013. Still no announcement or no commitment to allocate funds for this event for the ACT has been made by the federal government. This, I believe, is something that needs to be rectified. I know it is something that we will continue to push for. We will also continue to encourage the Chief Minister to take up this issue at the federal level.
I find it interesting—or pleasing, rather—that the Canberra Liberals are so supportive now of the centenary and are pushing that case along. In last year’s budget reply I noted that the proposed cuts that the Canberra Liberals were going to make to the ACT budget—this was when they were out there campaigning—were actually to the centenary budget. I remember saying last year that they wanted the centenary to be more like a sausage sizzle in Zed Seselja’s backyard. I am very pleased that they have now come on board, so much so that Mr Smyth used his study leave to go to Florence to give a paper on the centenary of Canberra at a centenary conference. I think that just goes to show the real commitment that is being made by the Canberra Liberals to the centenary and their support for the centenary. But of course we would like to see more commitment from the federal government and I encourage the Chief Minister to continue that.
Just to conclude, I have put forward a series of reasons and some concerns around this particular output. With all of that in mind, the Greens support the appropriation for the Chief Minister’s Department.
MRS DUNNE (Ginninderra) (4.49): The rather pressing issue of artsACT’s governance requirements for the boards of key arts organisations continues to be of concern to our community’s arts organisations.
Last year, this ACT Labor government placed two funding conditions on key arts organisations. The first required that persons receiving remuneration from organisations must not be members of the board, and the second was that board members must not receive a benefit from the organisation’s activities. To his credit, the Chief Minister undertook to review the policy before the end of 2009, following the recommendations of the estimates committee last year.
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