Is the government capable of developing a planning strategy based on analysis rather than platitudes, wonders letter writer MIKE QUIRK, of Garran.

CANBERRA’S district planning strategies and population projections are on the shaky foundations of the 2018 Planning Strategy. 

The platitudinous Strategy did not analyse the social, environmental or economic consequences of alternative population and employment distributions, housing preferences, strategies to reduce travel by influencing employment location, justify its 70 per cent renewal target, investigate infrastructure capacity or costs or the financial, housing affordability and environmental implications of under-supplying sites for detached housing.

The Strategy provides the assumptions in the suburban projections that there be no development in Kowen or west Murrumbidgee and extensive redevelopment in inner areas such as North Canberra where the population is projected to increase from 62,045 in 2022 to 85,920 in 2033. 

The assumptions should be justified and discussed with the community in the context of possible urban futures.

Despite the impression in some media reports, projections are not set in stone and are subject to considerable uncertainty. Future uncertainties include possible pandemics, decentralisation of the public service, remote work, changes to migration and fertility and the adequacy of water resources. 

The 2003 projections based on growth expectations of the time, projected the population of Canberra would peak at 388,000 in 2031. Its adoption contributed to school closures. 

In the absence of a sound planning strategy, the Missing Middle Canberra Group is able to claim up-zoning will overcome a shortage of land, inadequate social housing, homelessness, car dependence, increase walking and cycling, reduce McMansion development, enliven urban areas, create stronger communities, better connect people with each other, with jobs, transport and services and is asserted to be the fairest, cheapest and most effective way to build homes close to jobs and amenities. What next, up-zoning as a solution to the common cold?

The hyperbole of the Group needs to be replaced with the missing strategic and site-specific analysis including impact on privacy, congestion, tree cover and solar access.

The decline in strategic land use and transport analysis is also apparent in Minister Steel’s claim, without justification, light rail is necessary for Canberra to maintain its status as one of the world’s most liveable cities and to avoid crippling congestion. 

He is yet to demonstrate light rail is superior to Bus Rapid Transit in performing the mass-transit task or land-value capture between the town centres. It is unclear why he has dismissed the opportunity costs of light rail or the potential impact of employment dispersal, improving electric bus technology and increased working from home on the need for light rail.

The lack of critical evaluation of issues by the media (except “CityNews”), the government and the Planning Authority is detrimental to Canberra becoming a more liveable, financially, socially and environmentally sustainable city. 

Is the government capable of developing a planning strategy based on analysis rather than platitudes?

Mike Quirk, Garran

Let’s talk planning before it’s too late

IN relation to Sue Dyer’s letter (“Angst and frustration at corruption of consultation”, CN March 2), I would like to endorse her sentiments as this has also been my experience over many years of dealing with the ACT government. 

They seem to have a mantra of “do have your say”, which I have done many times but to no avail. 

Many people I talk to are just so fed up with the process of community involvement ACT-style that we feel what is the point? 

Many hours spent doing submissions and attending meetings have come to zero change. I even wonder if the submissions are read. 

It seems their minds are already made up and this process is just so they can say they tried to do some sort of consultation. 

Please let’s have an open and transparent discussion about planning in Canberra before it is too late.

Penny Moyes, Hughes

Why the GST isn’t rolled out to control inflation 

COLUMNIST Michael Moore and a letter writer must have been channelling each other (CN February 23) on fighting inflation by letting the Reserve Bank vary the GST. 

Having long had a low inflation and interest rate environment, we have forgotten what it is like when both are not low. 

The Reserve Bank is an independent agency and is tasked with managing monetary issues (banking and inflation) and its primary tools are interest rates and money supply. 

The GST is not within its control, and nor should it be. The GST is a tax imposed by the government to fund government services. The suggestion of increasing the GST would actually add to inflation by increasing prices, not reduce inflation. Reducing the GST would reduce prices slightly but at the cost of reducing revenue. 

Short term fiddles of GST rates or the like are usually resisted by businesses and government bureaucracies for good reason, as they create more problems and complexities to be unwound down the track. The current federal government made certain noises in opposition and now sings a slightly different tune in government about budgets, deficits, costs, and they have barely started on initiatives they wanted to pursue. They need more money and there is one reliable source – they are called taxpayers. 

Martin Gordon, Dunlop 

Daughter felt unsafe in gender-neutral toilet

I WAS at the Canberra United game at McKellar Park on February 24. My 12-year-old daughter went to use the toilets and they all had signs on them saying they were gender neutral. 

She felt unsafe and waited until we got home. 

As a parent I find this disturbing that my daughter could potentially be in the same bathroom as an adult male and I don’t understand what point was trying to be made. 

There were port-a-loos there that could have been designated gender neutral without anybody being discriminated against.

Pete Locke, Macgregor

Look at the land from Majura to Tralee

FOR the truly sustainable population growth of Canberra-Queanbeyan to over 800,000, without relying on demeaning “densification” (including rubbish high-rise), the airport and RAAF facilities should move, to say, out along the Barton Highway. 

The extensive swathe of land extending south from Majura to Tralee, already has vibrant adjacent commercial facilities (Fyshwick, Hume, and in Queanbeyan itself), excellent road connectivity, rail corridors, potential for a lake (with an Olympic-standard rowing course) on Jerrabomberra Creek, conservation and semi-rural areas including parts of Majura, the Molonglo River Reserve, Pialligo, wetlands, and the Mugga Lane and Campbell Park ridges. 

Other sustainable growth areas in the ACT include West Greenway in Tuggeranong, Kowen, and Ginninderry (if it gets a proper town centre, and the ACT boundary is extended).

Jack Kershaw, Kambah

Better still, how about electric buses?

BEATRICE Bodart-Bailey is right again: the Rattenbury-Barr government’s pet light rail project is no better than 19th-century technology (“As the world changes, the tram pushes blindly on”, CN March 2). 

Canberra should follow the examples of London, Paris and Berlin and move the “tram” with its ugly “mess of wires” underground; or, even better, use a much more practical and flexible network of electric buses or multi-carriage electric trams.

Dr Douglas Mackenzie, Deakin

Since when did Access Canberra not take cash?

A FEW days ago, I went to Access Canberra to pay for a registration on a secondhand car I had bought. As the rego had expired, I was issued with a seven-day permit to drive the car while I took it for a roadworthiness test. This cost me $48.

I was vexed and annoyed to find that they wouldn’t accept cash, but only a card payment. Since when has this complacent local government we have in the ACT decided not to accept cash, which is a legal tender? 

Is this government in bed with the global elites that want to make everything digital to pave the way for an ID card with every personal detail of its citizens?

Vivien Munoz, via email

The mental health system needs treatment

BILL Bush (Letters, CN February 23) criticises opposition leader Elizabeth Lee because the Liberals do not support decriminalisation of illegal, mind-altering drugs. 

I wonder if Bill has ever seen (or treated, as I have) the mental health problems and brain damage as a result of the consumption of these products. The completely inadequate mental health facilities in the ACT to treat such victims is the main problem.

Dr Alan Shroot, Forrest

How about a real light rail timetable?

IS it too much to ask for a real light rail timetable?

Light rail “timetables” tell us only how frequently trams are due to depart from Alinga Street or Gungahlin Place. They don’t tell us when trams are due to depart from other stops, or when they are due to arrive anywhere. 

Too often I get to watch a tram depart without me, after I have walked for five minutes from home towards my local light rail station. 

If I miss one tram, I have to wait up to 15 minutes for the next. In that time, my ancient legs and my almost-as-ancient, two-speed bicycle can take me all the way from home to Civic.

Leon Arundell, Downer

No case for pity due to ignorance

CATE Faehrmann, Greens MP and drug law reform spokesperson, has launched the Greens’ plan to legalise and regulate recreational cannabis in NSW. 

Those supporting such a plan try to make drugs look like a disability that they couldn’t avoid, and they expect the same treatment as for someone who has a disability that was unavoidable. 

And then there are the health issues people have where they didn’t know what the impact of poor choices would bring.  

In the case of drugs, everyone knows beforehand what they bring – there is simply no case for pity due to ignorance – only another dive into community compassion.

Colliss Parrett, Barton 

The priority is to protect citizens

THIS letter is to all of those readers who believe that the science is “in” on climate change. I have news for you – the same science says that Australia could disappear off the map tomorrow and it would not make an iota of difference to global warming let alone to climate change. Given that slow global warming is occurring, whatever the drivers may be, Australia’s priority is to protect its citizens from the possible consequences, not to pursue needless emissions-reduction policies that risk destroying our economy for absolutely zero effect. 

We need to control bushfire fuel loads, stop people living among the gumtrees and save every drop of water that falls on the country, while pursuing water conservation in homes, agriculture and industry. 

Then we need to look to nuclear energy for electricity production before the unsustainable renewables policy sends us broke while disfiguring the countryside.

Max Flint, via email

But what do you really think, Jenny?

I RATE the ACT Greenslabor government as complacent, farcical, arrogant, deceptive, dishonest, cynical, and diabolical.

“Have Your Say” is the most blatant mechanism for deception and corruption that any government has exercised for so long. 

It doesn’t seem to matter what we writers to the editor of “CityNews” say about the government, they still take no notice!

Let’s hope that they sit up in shock in 2024.

Jenny Holmes, Weston

Why does directorate operate without scrutiny?

IN May, the Greens/Labor government will undertake its 15th annual cull of Eastern Grey Kangaroos.

About 29,000 kangaroos and between 7000 to 9000 joeys have been killed to date in an immensely cruel manner that most Canberrans would find unacceptable.

Supposedly the “conservation cull” will protect endangered species.

However in 2014 a CSIRO report commissioned by the government found that there was no basis to claim that kangaroos damaged the grassy layer on which the threatened species depend.

Despite this finding, the cull has continued and this year another 1500 to 2000 animals will be killed needlessly.

The government has ignored calls for an independent review, presumably because it is not interested in being told that it is wrong.

The Environment Directorate operates without any external scrutiny and is effectively allowed to mark its own homework.

As public servants, many Canberrans are well aware that external review of programs is standard practice and must be undertaken on a regular basis.

Canberrans should be asking the government, “Why is the Environment Directorate allowed to operate without any external scrutiny?”

And: “Why are our rates being used to kill our wildlife at a time where they are already facing multiple threats such as habitat loss and the impact of climate change?”

Rebecca Marks via email

The Voice / Too late for the voters to do anything

ERIC Hunter (Voice Letters, CN February 23) claims he has seen no objection to the Voice backed by authoritative evidence. My question is, have we seen any support for the Voice backed by authoritative evidence? 

It does not matter how many questions are thrown at the “yes” camp, we do not get any answers. 

Question is, if they cannot or will not provide authoritative evidence in support of the Voice, why not. Have they got something to hide?

Mr Hunter states: “All eligible Australians have the right to vote in a referendum and that’s the only vote we’ll have to consider. The operational details of the Voice, Makarrata and treaty will fall to the parliament.” Unfortunately this is the problem. If the referendum votes “yes” to the Voice and it is enshrined in the Constitution, the government can do whatever it wants and it will be too late for the voters to do anything.

Indigenous people already have a higher per-capita say in parliament than the rest of the population because their proportion is higher (ie, there are 11 Aboriginal politicians in parliament). 

Also, there are over a hundred advisory bodies for their benefit. If the advisory bodies are not doing their job, putting anything in the Constitution is not going to change that. The Voice would just divide the nation not unite it. Having a separate body would be racism.

Most Australians are descendants of the original inhabitants or the first fleet or both, so we all have equal rights, so why divide us now?

 Vi Evans, via email