Page 2472 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 1 August 2018
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MR COE (Yerrabi—Leader of the Opposition) (10.05): I move:
That this bill be agreed to in principle.
I am pleased to present reasonable and practical legislation to force the government to publish its property deals. This bill introduces stronger and clearer reporting mechanisms to improve transparency, which I promised as one of my integrity measures in last year’s budget reply speech.
The purpose of this bill is to improve integrity in land acquisitions. We previously introduced the Lands Acquisition (Reporting Requirements) Amendment Bill 2018 earlier in the year to address this issue. Since that time the Liberals have consulted with the government, and we are hopeful that they will now support this bill.
There are too many government land deals that have gone under the radar. This integrity measure is necessary because of issues surrounding land acquisitions made by the territory and its entities.
The Auditor-General, in her 2016 report Certain Land Development Agency acquisitions, highlighted that acquisitions had been “undertaken without adequate transparency, accountability and rigour”. Since the release of this report, the Auditor-General has undertaken investigations into the purchases of rural land leases and land swap deals. Canberrans are familiar with these issues, and it is clear that action is required.
There is substantial public interest in implementing effective mechanisms to ensure that land acquisitions are undertaken with due diligence. It is also reasonable to expect that the information relied upon when making these acquisitions is available for public scrutiny and debate.
This bill aims to provide the requisite transparency, accountability and rigour to all land acquisitions made by territory entities. This is achieved through requiring quarterly reports to be presented to the Assembly as well as the public accounts committee for additional probity. This two-tier level of scrutiny seeks to eliminate the opaqueness surrounding land acquisitions and ensures that the necessary protocols are indeed followed.
The Lands Acquisition Act is the key piece of legislation that governs land acquisitions by the ACT government. The processes for acquisitions by agreement and compulsory acquisitions trigger certain notification procedures. However, a number of acquisitions undertaken by the territory fall within the exceptions, such as acquisitions by negotiation. There are no stringent legislative reporting or oversight conditions for these types of acquisitions. Most acquisitions by the government are not reported on.
It is important to note that this bill does not impede the government’s ability to purchase land. This bill is not unreasonable and it is not onerous. The bill simply
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