Canberra would still be a bush capital in 2020, the Chief Minister, Rosemary Follett, said yesterday.
At that time, Australia would be a republic and the states abolished, she said, partially tongue in cheek. In their place would be 25 regional governments, and this region would be a model for the rest of the country.
She stressed that if the region were to have a utopian future, it would have to be worked at; it would not just happen. She emphasised the region because Canberra would straddle the ACT border in the next century. (Indeed to some extent it does now.)
She issued a challenge to the passive and fatalistic view saying it as possible for Canberra to stay a bush capital while other cities struggled and endured the burden of environmental decay.
She was making the last in a series of addresses in the “”Canberra. Face of the Nation?” series sponsored by the Canberra Business Council, the University of Canberra, the National Capital Planning Authority and the ACT Government. The series culminates in a conference on September 24 at the university. (Inquires to 2050653.)
Ms Follett referred to the report of the Canberra in the Year 2020 reference group and the 2020 study which were tabled in the Legislative Assembly on Thursday. She said it was important that economic and population growth did not exceed the ecological and environmental capacity of the region.
She hoped the region would be an exporter of educational services to the world. There was a need to diversify the employment base.
She hoped Canberra would still be a garden city in 2020.
“”Canberra people love it the way it is and want to keep it like that,” she said.
The Government’s 50-50 greenfields-infill program was part of that hope. Other cities had decayed from the centre. In Canberra infill would offer housing choice without destroying the garden city. It would “”change the old never-ending urban sprawl which is expensive, unattractive and isolating”.
But she warned she was not confident about the continuation of the rule of law. It was challenged by cynicism and cynical disenchantment about the role of parliament as law-maker and the courts as law enforcer. It was the same for the police. She said it was crucial if the rule of law were to continue that these institutions re-examine and revitalise their role in society.
At present these institutions were seen as remote, inaccessible and lacking of the concerns of society. She promised her government would continue to reform the law to make it more accessible and understandable.
Ms Follett said her trip to Japan in October-November, at the urging of the private sector, would not be the last international visit. She agreed with a questioner that other Asian destinations such as China, Singapore, Taiwan and Korea were also important for the ACT in marketing its education and hi-tech potential.
The chair of the Canberra Business Council, George Snow, said it was important for the Government to concentrate on the efficiency of the city. That would help lead to greater prosperity which in turn would enable the community to be more compassionate to those less fortunate.
The Vice-Chancellor of the University of Canberra, Professor Don Aitkin, said Canberra wad entering its third stage. The first was that there should be a separate national capital. The second was the Federal-Government-dominated Menzies expansion in the 1950s. Now the city was entering a phase in which the desires of the residents had to take first place.
He said the planning processes, the 2020 project and the Face the Nation series showed “”we actually think in Canberra before we act. It’s a model for people elsewhere in Australia.”