Page 3164 - Week 07 - Thursday, 30 June 2011
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outcomes for the people of Canberra. I would suggest the government give the recommendations of the Loxton report relating to the Cultural Facilities Corporation a very wide berth indeed.
The people of Canberra can be rightly very proud of its Cultural Facilities Corporation. It provides a valuable and valued service to our community on a broad range of fronts. Indeed, as its purpose states, it enriches the cultural life of the people living in and visiting the ACT.
Proposed expenditure agreed to.
Proposed expenditure—Part 1.22—Exhibition Park Corporation—$387,000 (net cost of outputs) and $3,491,000 (capital injection), totalling $3,878,000.
MR SMYTH (Brindabella) (1.58 am): It is good to see the overall management of the corporation settling down after some years of turmoil, given former Chief Minister Stanhope’s indifference to the corporation and, indeed, Mr Barr’s ill-fated attempt to drag Exhibition Park into TAMS and his equally flawed attempt to then stack the board of the corporation with public servants.
Despite his academic qualifications, he was not able to count how many people should have been appointed to that board. But we seem to have got over that. EPIC has survived, which is a good thing, despite the mismanagement of this government. It is indeed a good thing that we are now going to get a strategy. We were looking for a master plan. We were looking for a—
Mr Barr: We need a plan and a strategy because the world isn’t complete for you without a plan or a strategy, is it?
MR SMYTH: It is your government that has promised a master plan for five or six years. It is my job to ensure that you deliver it. Of course, it has not been delivered. The Assembly has not seen a master plan for EPIC. Apparently under this government it will never see a master plan for EPIC, because we are in fact going to have a rejuvenation program.
I am not sure what a rejuvenation program is as opposed to a master plan, but that is what the government has decided. There is another broken promise from the Labor government that we would have a master plan that has never appeared. I am pleased that the committee recommended we actually see that rejuvenation plan, and I note the one-word government response: agreed.
I guess the question is: when will we see the rejuvenation plan and, indeed, what will be in it? But we live in hope that the government might take their duty seriously here. We have had these long delays. The government’s consideration of the master plan has now morphed into the rejuvenation plan. We have wait and see.
I do know the recent advertisement relating to the corporation gaining access to block 799 through direct sale. That has also had a tortuous process to this point, because of course it was tied up in the master plan. Goodness knows when the
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