Page 2811 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 16 August 2017
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There is also the ongoing saga of the maintenance at Canberra Hospital. The minister likes to say that there is money in the budget and we are acting on it. But the glacial pace at which we have approached these issues, and the issues especially around the switchboard, show that we are not really engaged with them. The contradictory information that this Assembly has received through answers to questions on notice and even today in the chamber show that this minister is not across her brief and is a bit complacent about the fact that she is not across her brief. She does not even seem to be concerned that incoming government briefs did not tell her the things that they should have told her, and she does not seem to have done anything about it. They are the issues in the health system.
I want to highlight some local issues that as a member for Ginninderra have occupied a lot of my time. I think Ms Lawder was hoping that there would be something other than planning issues. I am sorry; these are planning issues as well. One of them is the proliferation of multi-unit developments in Kinleyside Crescent, Weetangera, in my electorate of Ginninderra. Kinleyside Crescent is within the RZ2 zone. There are provisions, which are perfectly legal, that allow people to build increasing density in those areas. But the level of cooperation with neighbours and the quality and the density that has been allowed really cause concern for the neighbourhood. There is also increasing concern for those people who are going to be squeezed out by multi-unit residential developments.
There was a development application lodged for a development in Kinleyside Street in Weetangera on 21 May 2015. The government said that it sent out letters to neighbouring and opposite residents about this development application on 25 May 2015. It is strange that the government thought it was appropriate that only seven residents should be identified and have letters sent to them, but at least three of those never got the letter that the government claimed they sent. The government did not seem to think that mattered. They really seemed to think that a sign put on the front of the property stating that the DA was available online and an advertisement in the paper were sufficient. That provided, they thought, plenty of opportunities for residents to find out about the development and to take action. That might be fair enough, except if you are an affected resident who happens to back on to that block and you may not drive past the front of the block and see the sign in the street.
Two objections were submitted, but the government decided there was no need for the development application to be amended. It did impose some conditions, but none of the conditions addressed the residents’ concern about privacy or solar access for neighbours. Some residents have been quite adversely impacted by this development, specifically because the land at the back of the block falls away quite significantly. The residents have told me about, and I have seen, the extent to which fill was brought in to address this. There are places where about 1.5 metres of fill was brought in. If you run a string line from the ground floor to the 1.8-metre back fence of the block, they are almost on the same level because the area has been built up so much.
This means that because the blocks fall away, the back porches of people who have now bought into this multi-unit development essentially look over the back fences at
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