Page 985 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 21 March 2012
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commissioned by the proponents has so much commercial-in-confidence information implied in it that there has been no transparency and no way that ACTPLA and other businesses can work out whether or not it is correct.
One of the other problems with our current situation is: what is the trigger for when you need one? When is there going to be an impact on a small business? We need to do quite a bit more work on that.
What I have got in my amendment is a four-part process. The first is about establishing an independent assessment process. That is really what I have been talking about: it should be independent, not done by the proponent. The second is about investigating other impact assessment models. Clearly this is an area we are not doing very well in. I think that there is worth in looking at some other ways of how we model it. Do we look, for instance, at modelling for a bigger area? Currently we tend to model for one kilometre. Should we go to three? Should we go to five? How should we best do the modelling? The third is about establishing appropriate triggers. As I said, it is not really clear how big a development is needed before we look at the small business impacts. The fourth is about establishing an interdirectorate committee to work on this. This is because this clearly goes to a number of areas of government. We clearly have planning issues; we clearly have business issues here. We have got two directorates involved in this; they need to talk about it and get something worked out between the two of them.
I commend my amendments to the Assembly.
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for Police and Emergency Services and Minister for the Environment and Sustainable Development) (11.04): In speaking to Ms Le Couteur’s amendments, given that they deal with the operation of the planning system when it comes to the assessment of new developments and the impact on existing small business, the government and the Greens have been in discussion about the most appropriate way to address some of the issues that Ms Le Couteur and her colleagues have raised in relation to the operation of small business impact assessments.
My view is that at this point in time it is important to ensure that small business impact assessments are seen to be independent as well as actually be independent. The process that occurs currently is a process whereby the proponent for a development, where required, has to produce a small business impact assessment. That is obviously commissioned from a company or an individual who has the appropriate expertise and knowledge to do that assessment. The concern that Ms Le Couteur raises is, obviously, that that person or company has been commissioned by the proponent and the proponent is not going to commission an assessment which does not suit their proposal.
I think that view is, in some respects, accurate. In other respects it is not. Obviously a proponent is going to seek to procure an assessment which is favourable to their proposal. However, at the same time, a reasonable proponent, a responsible proponent, is also going to have regard to what an impact assessment says in terms of what they actually propose for the development. And equally the person or company preparing
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