Mr BAYLEY (Clark) – Honourable Speaker, I rise tonight to talk about Kunanyi/Mt Wellington and express my disappointment at the planning assessment for a private commercial zip-line development on the mountain.
As we know and is widely accepted, Kunanyi is a cherished backdrop to our city and an incredibly valuable living natural and cultural landscape, including an Aboriginal cultural landscape. Connected by reserved land to the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area, it is truly remarkable to stand in the city, look at the Organ Pipes and recognise that they are part of a protected landscape, from Fern Tree all the way to the far south-west coast.
Kunanyi is a special place for the palawa – in the words of elder Theresa Sainty: ‘omnipresent in the landscape, described in the creation stories as a sacred place where the ancestor spirits are laid to rest’. Of course, in contemporary terms, it is a special place from a broader cultural perspective. It has colonial heritage dotted around with huts, aqueducts and other structures and ruins. Today, it is a highly cherished natural place where locals and visitors alike seek out exercise, amenity, connection and solace. Unique species iconic to Tassie call it home.
So many people love Kunanyi, such that they consistently stand up to defend it. As the Wellington Park Management Trust’s historical notes state, there have been eight cable car proposals for Kunanyi since the early 1900s, and I quote, ‘all have been strongly protested by the citizens of Hobart’. So it was, that more than 800 people made submissions to the City of Hobart planning assessment process into the zip-line proposal. In the words of the assessment report:
Council received 828 representations regarding the proposal. The representations received were almost exclusively opposed to the proposal. (tbc)
Let me take a moment at this point to acknowledge those representors and say thank you. Time and again, you step up to defend Kunanyi. Among those representors opposing the zipline were the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre, the Aboriginal Land Council of Tasmania, the Tasmanian National Parks Association and Respect the Mountain.
This brings me to the assessment report. Representors, including Aboriginal representatives, raised the issue that the Aboriginal heritage reports were not compliant with the government’s own guidelines. A local Aboriginal Heritage officer was not involved. He withdrew from the project. No consultation with Aboriginal people was carried out. Since the report was conducted following an onsite assessment, the actual location of the built structures has moved.
I have talked at length in this place, including yesterday, about the acknowledged failures of the Aboriginal Heritage Act. Government has long admitted that it does not work, including in this place in 2021, but it delays tabling a new bill to fix it. Meanwhile, developments like this one are assessed against the flawed act. Despite the fact that current protections are only afforded to archaeological objects under the footprint of the development, no assessment was carried out for the development’s new footprint.
I am appalled and ashamed. For all the talk in here every day acknowledging traditional owners and paying respect to Aboriginal people, Tasmania cannot even ensure that their ancestral heritage is properly assessed, let alone actually protected. Shame on us all.
Then there is the issue of use. This proposal, by its owner’s admission on the front page of the development application, is an adventure tourism development. According to the park management plan, these are prohibited in almost all cases in the Springs and the recreation zone, so the application passes itself off as a transport depot and distribution use. Despite not meeting the definition of ‘Forms of public transport that have the potential to effectively move large numbers of people’, the planning official has recommended approval, because it can be considered an aerial ropeway. This proposal will shift only 12 to 24 thrillseekers per hour, but it is allowed to be passed off as public transport. What a joke – not least when we have got a public transport system that itself cannot cope.
This is no way to assess private developments on a much‑loved public reserve. There is hope the council will reject the advice because it is wrong. They can vote to protect the integrity of the mountain. If they do not, as they feel constrained to accept poor advice, it is case in point as to why third‑party appeal rights to test the merits of a development assessment are so very important and need to be retained.
