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COMMITMENTS I TOOK TO THE 2024 ELECTION

Heading into the 2024 ACT election, all candidates running under the Independents for Canberra banner made clear the policy priorities we would take into negotiations if we achieved a balance-of-power position in the Assembly. These policies were shaped by input from our community and refined through extensive consultation with a wide range of stakeholders.

  • Introducing a Future Generations Act requiring the development of a community-led vision for the Canberra we want for generations to come, and establishing a Future Generations Commissioner tasked with ensuring government decisions align with that vision.
  • Respecting and protecting the rights of people of all cultures, races, ages, abilities, genders, and sexualities.
  • Taking no backward steps on climate action, voluntary-assisted dying, or abortion access.
  • Moving forward on reconciliation with First Nations communities and taking real action to Close the Gap.
  • Creating a social housing funding trigger, providing Housing ACT with guaranteed capital and recurrent funding sufficient to carry out a systematic transformation of our social housing system, putting us on a trajectory to reduce priority housing list wait times to an average of 30 days and high needs housing wait times to an average of 90 days by 2030.
  • Establishing a Strata Commissioner.
  • Clearing 75 per cent of the elective surgery waitlist within the first 12 months.
  • Funding the Strong Foundations education reform program sufficiently to ensure its full implementation within four years, while delivering a concurrent program to catch up the children who fell behind prior to the completion of the Inquiry into literacy and numeracy in ACT public schools.
  • Supporting our most vulnerable community members by closing the 30 per cent funding gap that has emerged across the community sector and pegging all future community sector contracts to population growth plus inflation.
  • Commissioning a comprehensive independent inquiry into the ACT’s criminal justice system to investigate rates of reoffending, youth offending and diversion, policing approaches and resources, justice reinvestment, bail, sentencing, corrections, the Alexander Maconochie Centre, and family, domestic and sexual violence.
  • Increasing dedicated housing options for women and children escaping violence.
  • Improving the ACT’s jurisdictional competitiveness for small businesses, including by tackling insurance costs.
  • Establishing a peak body to advocate for community sport, and funding a 10-year strategic plan for the maintenance, improvement, and expansion of community sport facilities.
  • Constructing a purpose-built multicultural centre that meets our multicultural community’s requirements.
  • Working with the private sector and local creative communities to deliver a new Canberra Festival.
  • Establishing a Night-Time Economy Commissioner tasked with reinvigorating Canberra’s nightlife.
  • Protecting the Western Edge from development, focusing instead on habitat preservation and biodiversity restoration opportunities to the west of our city’s current footprint.
  • Ensuring a separation of powers between the positions of Chief Minister and Treasurer.
  • Banning political donations from the gambling industry.
  • Carrying out a snap audit of all outstanding report recommendations agreed by the ACT Government, and taking immediate action on its findings.

COMMITMENTS I SECURED FROM THE CHIEF MINISTER

Despite not achieving a balance-of-power position, I was still able to secure a number of policy commitments from the incoming government following the election. The agreement details the terms of my support for a Labor-led minority government. A similar agreement signed by the ACT Greens gave Andrew Barr the numbers in the Assembly to be re-elected as Chief Minister.

The agreement requires that I support ACT Labor’s budget bills and oppose any no-confidence motions except in instances of corrupt, grossly negligent or reprehensible conduct.

Through an exchange of letters, I made clear to the Chief Minister in signing this agreement that the policy commitments it contained were not an exhaustive list of what I intended to pursue in the Assembly and that, as an independent crossbencher, I would continue driving action to address unmet community needs in a wide range of other portfolio areas.

The full agreement is available here.

  • Increasing public and community housing as a proportion of total ACT residential dwellings.
  • Examining new methods to reduce elective surgery wait times.
  • Recruiting 10 additional park rangers to work on environmental conservation and invasive species management.
  • Establishing a Strata Commissioner with retirement villages included in its remit.
  • Standing up a comprehensive inquiry, or series of inquiries, into the ACT’s criminal justice system to address high reoffending rates and other issues.
  • Delivering longer-term community sport infrastructure planning to maintain and improve facilities across the ACT.
  • Strengthening the role of our community services sector in supporting vulnerable community members by reviewing funding for the sector and ensuring funding provided accounts for growth in population, sector salaries, and complexity of client need.
  • Launching an inquiry into the insurance costs faced by small and medium-sized businesses in the ACT.
  • Collaborating with creative communities and venue managers to implement a night-time economy support package.
  • Providing for the introduction of, and an Assembly inquiry into, a Private Member’s Bill establishing a Future Generations Act to carry forward a community-led vision for the Canberra we want for generations to come.