Crispin Hull

ACT residents need have no fear about their residential or commercial leases being claimed under indigenous title, the ACT Attorney-General, Terry Connolly, said yesterday.

He was responding to statements by his Opposition counterpart, Gary Humphries, and the Queensland Premier, Wayne Goss, about the consequences of a claim by the Wik people in Cape York.

The Wik people have asserted that the Queensland Government is in breach of trust under a common law made clear in an English case in 1977 that said governments could be liable for breaches of duty to indigenous people if they were obliged to act on behalf of or in their interests.
Continue reading “1993_08_august_maboact”

The general-manger of Instant of Furniture, John Louttit, is to move from the position at the end of September.

Mr Louttit came to the job 2 (2 and a half) years ago when Lou Westende got control back of the public company which he had lost earlier. Mr Westende is a Liberal MLA.

Mr Louttit has been president of the Canberra Chamber of Commerce since June 1992. In that capacity he is to go to Japan in a delegation with the Labor Chief Minister, Rosemary Follett, in October. The chamber and private industry generally have supported the trip. Liberal Party MLAs have strongly attacked the cost of the trip, $180,000, in the Assembly and elsewhere.
Continue reading “1993_08_august_louttit”

THE first comparative report on the performance of government trading enterprises published last week is welcome and necessary. It compares the performance state-by-state of such things as urban transport, ports, water, gas and electricity.

Formally called the report on the Monitoring of Government Trading Enterprises, it was prepared by the Steering Committee of National Performance which was set up at the Special Premiers Conference in 1991. The report will become an annual event.

Unlike private enterprise whose performance can be measured through the rigours of the share-market and the threat of going broke, public enterprises can at best on only compare themselves against their own performance in previous years. Before the report, government enterprises could wallow in the glory of, say a 2 per cent, improvement on last year, but that is of small joy to the taxpayers if all it means is that the enterprise has only improved from worse to bad. Now, comparisons can be made across the states on indicators like hours of electricity disconnection, transport boardings per employee, number of employees per household served and so on.
Continue reading “1993_08_august_leader23”

ONCE again the desires of the fledgling self-governing ACT have come in conflict with national concerns. This time it is the proposal to build houses on the vacant land between the edge of Duffy and Holder and the Cotter Road. The proposal, if it goes ahead, will jeopardise the functioning of Mount Stromlo astronomical observatory because of extra night lights.

Before this is portrayed as a winner-take-all conflict of the dimensions of the Tasmanian-dams cases, some ought to be made clear. The ACT is not absolutely committed to the project. The position of Mount Stromlo as an optical observatory in the middle of a city has been precarious for perhaps 20 years. It’s relocation is inevitable; it is not a question of if but when.
Continue reading “1993_08_august_leader13”

THE Leader of the Opposition, Kate Carnell, has tapped in to an obvious sense of community dissatisfaction with government in the ACT. She has floated the idea of doing away with the Westminster structure of the ACT Legislative Assembly and replacing it with a collegiate or committee system. Under her idea, rather than having individual Ministers administering portfolios, each portfolio area would be administered by a committee of, say three, MLAs.

There is only one meritorious element in her statements so far about the issue: that she is floating it as an idea rather than as a definite policy position. Mercifully, this means the thing can be quietly forgotten. The episode shows that Ms Carnell is refreshingly inexperienced in the wily ways of politicians. It is usual for them to float ideas by getting someone else to send the balloon up or to hold the kite string, or to allow it to float anonymously as “”an Opposition source”. If everyone says what a wonderful balloon the politician claims it; if the balloon is seen as a fizzer it is forgotten. At least Ms Carnell did not stoop to that sort of gutless hypocrisy. Politicians should not be condemned for floating ideas; nor should Ms Carnell. For too long Australian politics has been straight-jacketed by fear of new ideas. However, that does not mean the idea itself cannot be pulled apart, and pulled apart with some vigour.
Continue reading “1993_08_august_leader4”

A Canberra couple has been hit with a full year’s land tax after an ordinary residential sell-and-buy which happened to span the new financial year. Patricia and Tony Tart wanted to upgrade from their house in Fisher to a house in Waramanga.

They put their Fisher house on the market in April. In May they found the house they wanted in Waramanga before the Fisher house was sold, so they bought it using bridging finance pending the sale of the Fisher house.

They then sold the Fisher house, with settlement expected on June 30. Alas, through no fault of theirs, settlement was delayed until July 7. It was empty up to that time.
Continue reading “1993_08_august_landtax”

The formation of a new “”apolitical” ratepayers’ association was announced yesterday (sun aug15).

It comes after a separate group resolved at a public meeting at Hughes Community Centre last week to form a similar body.

The president of the new ACT Ratepayers’ Association of the ACT, Peter Jansen, said his group had reserved the name quite some time ago and had filed for incorporation under the Associations Incorporation Act. He said yesterday that after incorporation membership will be open to ratepayers.
Continue reading “1993_08_august_jansen”

You can almost feel sorry for Bill Wood. Indeed, if I were Bill Wood, I would be thinking about wandering around to Rosemary Follett’s office asking for a Cabinet reshuffle, so I could get out of the hot seat.

No, hot seat is the wrong cliche _ hot seats would be more correct. I’d only be thinking about it, because there would be dangers, as we shall see.

One of the difficulties with ACT politics is that only four Ministers have to share the whole range of portfolios that come with the ACT Self-Government Act’s requirement to provide for the “”peace, order and good government of the ACT”.
Continue reading “1993_07_july_wood”

The High Court’s Mabo decision was not a judicial decision at all, but a usurpation of the powers of the people and Australian Parliament, according to a Queensland professor of law.

Professor Geoffrey Walker, of the University of Queensland, said yesterday that the decision was right according to the facts as they applied on Murray Island in the Torres Strait, but the judges had gone well beyond their judicial function because it was “‘a sweeping change of policy” requiring legislative implementation rather than a judicial settlement of one claim applying the law only to the case at hand.
Continue reading “1993_07_july_walker”

The use of the term “”minimalist” should be abandoned, the chair of the Republic Advisory Committee, Malcolm Turnbull, urged yesterday.

It meant different things to different people.

He said also that Australians wanted a popularly elected president, but wanted a non-politician, according a large body of opinion expressed to the committee.

Mr Turnbull said, however, that the two views were inconsistent.
Continue reading “1993_07_july_turnbull”