CHAIR —We will get things started to receive our final witness today. I now welcome Dr Enrico Taglietti to today’s hearing. I have some formalities to go through and then I will invite Dr Taglietti to make an opening statement. Although the committee does not require you to give evidence on oath, Dr Taglietti, I should advise you that these hearings are legal proceedings of the parliament and therefore have the same standing as proceedings of the respective houses. We have received a written submission to this inquiry from you. Do you wish to present any additional submissions? If not, we can proceed to an opening statement.

Dr Taglietti —I would like to make a statement.

CHAIR —That is fine.

Dr Taglietti —In considering the terms of reference and the role of the National Capital Authority, I would like to put a premise that is in my mind. I would like to submit that the guardianship of the National Capital Plan should not be a responsibility of itinerant government and that it should be done by parliament, which means most probably a joint committee of parliament. The first term of reference emphasises the reduction of red tape and duplication of planning. I assume that by reduction of red tape one means reduction of time in obtaining planning approval and other administrative matters. I believe, though I am not sure, this is based on a very strong need for private development, but that should not be considered in the process of planning the national capital.

If instead of dual planning we have a single planning process—uniform regulation, I mean—we will not be able to serve the two purposes that require the high standard that is necessary for an area of national significance with less of a requirement for private developers. Therefore uniform regulation will result in either overall mediocrity of planning or in a too-high standard requirement that is not affordable, I suppose, for private developers. National significance building or planning should last for at least a couple of thousand years. Developers, most probably, are limited to 30 or 40 years.

The second term of reference refers to the balance between the independence of the NCA’s planning decisions and its accountability. I believe in the NCA’s planning independence and that it is, and should be, part and parcel of its function to advise parliament, which finally is the one that should be accountable for the acceptance of NCA planning proposals. It seems to me that the NCA should have total freedom in submitting their professional beliefs.

The third term of reference refers to the level of oversight to achieve higher standards in design for areas of national significance. I suggest that the NCA should never enter the field of architectural design. To achieve the highest design standard, parliament should always use architects, such architects being those who are, at the moment, of the best standing. It should also consider, and this is not really a function of the NCA, the appointment of a federal chief architect to advise in relation to architectural design.

I also suggest that areas of national significance should be broadened, never reduced nor used to bargain with ACT planners. My criticism in the past of the NCA has always been as to the lack of rationale in their proposals, their approach to design, and their perceived decisions favouring private developers. You will excuse me if I say that they have done quite a lot of things that they should not have done. It is not the NCA itself but the matter of design.

The fourth term of reference refers to opportunities to ensure cooperation with the ACT Planning and Land Authority and increased engagement with the Canberra community. Considering the inherent complexity of planning and the uniqueness of this capital, Canberra, which is unique in the world, I believe we should be pleased with the existing cooperation or nonconsideration of the two planners. I also believe that engagement with the Canberra community is mostly a requirement of the ACT planner. In my opinion, the NCA should be more concerned with all Australians and oblige the whole world—an activity broader in scope than most probably it has today.

The fifth term of reference is outside my expertise, except for the development of the distinctive character of the national capital. I could talk for 20 days about that, but in that regard I would like to conclude by again quoting Sir Herbert Read, who said:

CHAIR —Thank you very much. I will begin questions this afternoon by asking you to take perhaps just two minutes to discuss, in your words, that ‘distinctive character’ of Canberra and why it is unique in the world. We have had some evidence to this effect, but I think it would be a good addition to the body of evidence if you described to the committee some of those attributes.

Dr Taglietti —When we are talking about Canberra and its position in the world, I think it has achieved notoriety, if you want to call it that, but also a position within international thought. That was not produced by architecture but by planning. I always also criticised the effort of the National Capital Authority as it existed from the time they produced the Griffith Legacy. To me the Griffith Legacy is a very detrimental publication for the standing of the national capital. It is too fond of saying that they want vibrancy. What is vibrancy? I do not know. The Griffith Legacy is being introduced to produce little drawings showing tramlines. I am exaggerating a bit, and most probably I want to be a bit controversial, but it is not what one should do. A minister or parliament as a joint committee, which should be controlling or deciding the validity of changes within planning, should have a few basic rules to start with, but I do not think anyone has—or, rather, I do not think that you have or the minister has. It is a question of making the proper judgement.

I suggest, for example, that the first rule that you, or anyone who takes planning decisions regarding the national capital, should apply is to ask one question first: has it been done before? If it has been done before, it will have to be explained why we should do it, if we want to have uniqueness. I put forward just a minor example. When the Captain Cook Memorial Jet was inaugurated, the issue was that it had been done before and was being done like the one in Lake Geneva, but ours would go higher than the one in Lake Geneva. I think that is not a good idea. I think in that case one should say, ‘No, we don’t want that,’ and explain that it is not new. That is the major thing, I would say. If they have a proposal that they will talk about—and I am not talking about Constitution Avenue at the moment but, say, a boulevard and plans and other devices like that—one should definitely say: ‘No, this is not what we should have. We should have something unique to Canberra.’

Senator HOGG —Are you saying that it is the rural setting of Canberra as a national capital that makes it distinctive and different from other national capitals? Is that the argument you are trying to put forward? I am not saying you have to have bales of hay everywhere.

Dr Taglietti —Are you asking whether or not our ways are different?

Senator HOGG —That it is in a rural setting as opposed to being like downtown—

CHAIR —Melbourne.

Dr Taglietti —It is a lot more than that. That is not really it. We have to divide central Canberra, which I believe is the only existing Canberra. Belconnen, Tuggeranong and so on were never designed or proposed by the National Capital Development Commission as being part of Canberra. They were not suburbs but townships. I believe that that is a very important issue. Canberra should be considered as central Canberra, and it should be defined, or redefined if it needs to be, as a territory that could be, say, just a kilometre, two kilometres or 500 metres around the lake—all the hills around Canberra and something that cannot be retrieved in Capital Hill. That is what makes Canberra different from any other capital city, old or new. That would be Canberra, so it is not rural.

Architecture is also of enormous importance within that context. It is a question of maintaining the feeling of what I call emptiness, if you want to say that. There is no problem with having emptiness and no problem with having silence. There is no problem with dreaming, instead of thinking about population growth or market forces and so on, for an area of national significance.

I would say that is the most important thing—redefine. In actual fact I even proposed a long time ago that the main task for, say, the National Capital Authority in planning would be to adopt a totally different way of looking at things. The planner should create, call it an envelope, so if they are looking at City Hill or at the lake or at Parliament House, the parliamentary area or the triangle, they should look at not what the architecture is but what space, area, and external volume should be used and what volume should be left empty. As soon as one does that, it will be found that you will consider the sun, you will consider the view and you will consider the existing buildings. You will create an envelope and inside that envelope do whatever you want, with a question mark. Do architecture, make architecture, but externally to that envelope, do only landscaping or something which is external. If that were done, I am sure that Capital Hill would, to a certain extent, not have been sold—

CHAIR —City Hill?

Dr Taglietti —Yes, to private enterprise and so on. And also, the proposal of the National Capital Authority for City Hill should have been considered properly, with all the amount of money and the best time for that magnificent, let’s say, maquette that they have at Regatta Point, which looked to people quite reasonable. In fact, it was totally wrong because they should never have park architecture. They should have said, ‘Look, this area you cannot use, this area we can use,’ and then the minister at that time could have made a different judgement. There it seems that everything is following the same rule of any other city and you find at the centre, instead of it being an open space, it is the place where you have the tallest building. I mean, I think it is totally wrong.

CHAIR —It has been suggested by a number of witnesses that there should be a government architect. You suggest that the architect should advise government, or parliament, rather than the National Capital Authority. I just want to explore a bit further why the architect should be advising parliament and not the National Capital Authority.

Dr Taglietti —First of all, I believe in controlling or in having more than one checkpoint. That is why I am saying that single planning is not really a good thing to do. I would say that, if you want a chief architect, the function of the chief architect is not to check what the National Capital Authority would do but to help or aid parliament to understand what could be architecture. When, say, you are having a competition and you are producing a competition for Parliament House, which is a bit too late now, you should be able to have information like any head of department has. In that case it will be the head of a department informing in architecture. It seems today it is getting less. Architects seem to be losing not power but prestige in relation to those things. It seems that everyone thinks that architects are people that one can do without. It is not my opinion, obviously.

CHAIR —Thank you for that.

Senator HUMPHRIES —Dr Taglietti, can I clarify what you feel should be the appropriate approach to public consultation about planning issues in Canberra. You mentioned that you felt that engagement with the ACT community was the responsibility of the ACT Planning Authority.

Dr Taglietti —Yes.

Senator HUMPHRIES —But you said that the National Capital Authority should engage with the whole of Australia or the broader Australian community.

Dr Taglietti —Yes.

Senator HUMPHRIES —How does it do that in a way that it is not doing it at the moment?

Dr Taglietti —There is a certain dichotomy there. We have a democracy, and we are very happy with that democracy. The engagement with the community is part of the democratic process. Would you agree with that?

Senator HUMPHRIES —Yes.

Dr Taglietti —The function of a planning authority and a national capital authority, when you are referring to planning, is a bit like, say, the defence organisation. Would they be going and accepting that they should look for involvement with the community? I do not think they should. They do not do it, I am pretty sure, because it is government. At that time the government will take care of that, and it should. My feeling is that when the National Capital Authority obviously had an enormous argument with the community, and let’s say we had the other day at Albert Hall, it is good for the community to be able to say something, but they should not refer that to the National Capital Authority. They should refer it to you. It would be a lot better that the National Capital Authority, like the old-time Mandarins, should refer to government or to parliament with no fear of sometimes being controversial.

Let’s say I was with the National Capital Authority, which is an impossibility, having adopted my philosophy of, call it controversial, asking questions. It is not the answer that is important; it is the question. So I would go there and start afresh, as though nothing happened before me. So I would say: why do you use a ring wheel on a car? It seems to be obvious, because the square one did not work. But you should start from that point by asking questions which are not necessarily within the democratic process of things. It should be a bit isolated. They should be a bit independent, even from the point of being a bit dictatorial, if you like, because it is for you to detect that one. It is for you to find out why they are becoming dictatorial, why they do not ask questions and what questions they do ask. I believe it is definitely for you to do it.

Senator HUMPHRIES —But why does that principle not apply at the level of territory planning? Why shouldn’t the Territory Planning Authority, as it were, give controversial advice directly to the ACT government and ignore or not engage in public consultation with the ACT community, if it wants quality outcomes in planning?

Dr Taglietti —No, I do not think I meant that. Surely they would have consultation. They should have consultation with everyone; right?

Senator HUMPHRIES —The NCA should?

Dr Taglietti —But it should be consultation and not withdrawal from a decision that they have taken, if they have taken it correctly.

Senator HUMPHRIES —All right.

Dr Taglietti —Consultation should be before they take a decision and they submit the decision to you, not after. It is too late after. It has become an exercise in who is cleverer than the other is. That is my opinion. If you are my client, I will try to find out everything about you. I will try to inform myself at the end level, so I should almost become you; right?

Senator HUMPHRIES —Yes.

Dr Taglietti —At that moment, my design should reflect my expertise, my vision of the world, combined with yours. In actual fact, you should be very happy with what I am doing. If you are not happy, it means that I missed my position. After that, even the community should be happy, if you have consultation and if you are looking at and listening to that. If they are still not happy, they should refer it to somebody else. Am I confusing you? I am pretty sure that I am a bit confusing.

Senator HUMPHRIES —No, I understand what you are saying.

Dr Taglietti —Some time ago you asked about what I was saying about the height of a building and that it seems to have become such an important factor in planning. Nonsense. The rule that no building should be higher than a certain level and that level is Parliament House is not a valid argument. Why? Because Parliament House is not an ideal but a physical matter. Parliament is always higher than any other institution—it should be—but not the building. The building has nothing to do with it. In fact, this land has been excavated for the building to be placed lower.

Senator HUMPHRIES —Thank you.

CHAIR —In terms of the NCA’s conduct with respect to the Griffin Legacy, we have heard evidence of their efforts in consultation—depending on the witness—as being very good and very poor. I know that you were a participant in the roundtable that was conducted around the time of the Griffin Legacy.

Dr Taglietti —Yes.

CHAIR —As an observer of that process, how would you have preferred to see the NCA approach that consultation process, and, as an architect, how would you like to have been able to input into the decision making around that particular set of draft amendments?

Dr Taglietti —When the NCA started talking about the legacy, I had been provided with a draft copy and I put my considerations to the Royal Australian Institute of Architects, because I had received my draft through them. I am not suggesting for a moment that whatever I said should have been accepted, but I found that it should really have been considered, which it was not. I had two major issues there.

The consultation seems to go through other bodies, the Royal Australian Institute of Architects, the council or the developers and so on. Really they are bodies that have a set of requirements. The Royal Australian Institute of Architects, just to mention one, will say—I am sorry; I know I have immunity, but I do not want to say it—that whatever the National Capital Authority would put in place is good for the profession, but not good for Canberra necessarily, and is welcome.

I do not know what happened to the legacy after that. I thought that was practically a lost battle for the NCA, when suddenly I found it mentioned everywhere. I lost total track, and I do not think that is good consultation. I am sorry if I talk too much.

Another issue very recently came about when the National Museum of Australia was designed and built—and there is another issue that I will not even mention today—and there was a proposal to have an Immigration Bridge. I never heard anything until a few weeks ago, when I looked into the web. It seems that, through what I read on the web, the Immigration Bridge has almost been approved—everything from selling the presence of immigrants’ names in the handrail, although not for very much. I believe that Australia has some 25 million immigrants or a few less—being the Aboriginals, probably—and that seems to be not the right way of doing that.

In addition, the lake should be sacrosanct. Some time ago the National Capital Authority proposed to have racing boats or skiing on the lake. One should be clear on those things. Either we want to have another Lake Geneva, if you want to put it that way, or we want to have a unique lake—no boat, no noise, with people being able to look at the waves. I think I have lost track.

You were asking about consultation. Consultation should be done previously so that one will then be happy to say, ‘I suggest that having trams in Canberra is ridiculous’, and being answered with, ‘No, I don’t think it is ridiculous because of that, that, that and that.’

CHAIR —So you are looking for a higher quality of response to opinions presented to the NCA.

Dr Taglietti —Yes.

CHAIR —So it is a higher level of engagement with people who take the time to express an opinion through a consultation process?

Dr Taglietti —Yes. That is my thought, and it should be real consultation.

CHAIR —Yes.

Dr Taglietti —They are putting on workshops. I went to one workshop when I was a bit younger, but, you know, you go there and it is a waste of time.

CHAIR —It has certainly been reasonably common feedback that the consultation that the NCA has engaged in at times has felt like going through the motions rather than looking for ideas.

Dr Taglietti —Yes.

CHAIR —And looking for genuine feedback to absorb into their ideas.

Dr Taglietti —Yes.

CHAIR —You are certainly not alone in that observation of the NCA.

Dr Taglietti —Yes.

CHAIR —Dr Taglietti, thank you very much for your evidence. I think it is appropriate that I acknowledge on behalf of the committee that you are the recipient of the Royal Australian Institute of Architects Gold Medal Award 2007. That will be noted on the public record.

Senator HUMPHRIES —Hear, hear!

CHAIR —Hansard will be providing you with a transcript of your evidence, which you will be able to review and correct, if necessary. Thank you again for appearing before the committee.

Dr Taglietti —Thank you for listening to me.

CHAIR —I need a motion to be moved to authorise publication of the draft.

Resolved (on motion by Senator Hogg):