The Gungahlin Community Council has objected to the proposal to auction a block behind The G shopping centre as a ‘club’ site. Irrespective of our concerns, the ACT ALP has pushed ahead with the proposal, and the rezoning application has been approved by ACTPLA. We will continue to combat this bad idea.

A concept plan from the DA, showing the potential land wasted on surface carparking:

The text of our submission to ACTPLA on the development application (DA) follows:

This site of approximately 8300 square metres is located at the current eastern end of the town centre. The current CZ1 zone sets a four-storey maximum, but the in-progress Town Centre Master Plan is likely to increase this height substantially.

According to the published planning study, a ‘club’ purchaser would likely develop a two-storey facility of 4000 to 6000 sq metres over some 25 to 35 per cent of the block - more than double the size of the currently underperforming Raiders Club. Surface car parking for 185 cars would consume much of the residual area, possibly with some basement parking. An increase in GFA is envisaged in the study, contingent on use of off-site parking. This reliance is unacceptable, and would likely result in unfair parking burdens on private car parking providers such as The G shopping centre, and potentially premature demand for paid parking introduction.

The land is zoned as Town Core, and as such, our town of a planned population of some 100,000 people deserve to know that town core land will not be underutilised, but will instead be used for the highest use possible, with the greatest potential for local employment generation. GCC has long campaigned for a halt to the absurd frittering away of land around our town centre to low-value low-density uses. Recently we had a win in getting almost 40 hectares of land the ACT Government had intended putting under more low-density townhouses instead preserved for high density employment uses. In the process, we delivered to the government a potential windfall of many many millions of dollars over the potential yield from previous intentions. The government must not allow this land to itself be frittered away through under-value uses.

The DA makes little mention of demonstrated need for a ‘club’ on this site, of consideration of other sites, or analysis of the social-economic impacts of introducing such a major increase in pokie machine gambling into our community. We recognise that much of the following discussion does not go to the rules of the Territory Plan, but in the absence of an adequate assessment of the societal impacts of additions clubs, this is our only venue to express these concerns.

However, in the lead-up to this proposal, GCC was approached by ACTPLA staff asking our opinions on expansion of additional ‘clubs’ into Gungahlin, based on stated interest by some unclarified clubs operating elsewhere in Canberra. At the time we informed ACTPLA that we did not believe Gungahlin residents wanted additional gambling venues, and we have had exactly zero demand for same.

We expressed that it may be appropriate for certain sports clubs (in the true sense of the word) to want to build and support future clubhouse facilities with dining, drink and other services - most likely based at the enclosed oval site at the other end of the town centre, or at the Throsby Playing Fields. We explained that we could support such direct links between sports and community clubs and the facilities they use. Conversely, we explained that additional free-standing "clubs" (such as for example Labor Clubs) would not be desirable and may indeed have detrimental social impacts through their concentration on stripping gambling takings from those often least able to afford it. We did however pass on strong and repeated community feedback we have received desiring non-membership based recreation facilities such as hotels and cinemas.

We also expressed concern that this push may be based more on either increasing government revenues through gambling taxes, or ALP revenues through expanding the Labor Club network.

We have recently learned that our advice was disregarded by ACTPLA and the ACT Government, which then conducted a survey to attempt to support an argument for proceeding. This survey covered 1000 people across Canberra, including just 108 in Gungahlin - something less than 0.3 per cent of the Gungahlin population! These surveys results, as supplied to us only after our prompting, are included below. No details of the answer continuum have been provided, but it is clear that the inclusion of responses of "somewhat favourable" as largely supportive is highly questionable.

What is clear from the survey, is that people in areas where clubs have existed for long periods are quite concerned about the impacts of gambling, alcohol and disorder related concerns. A point was made by ACTPLA that these concerns were a lot lower in Gungahlin. Putting aside the poor sample size, we say of course they were - Gungahlin has less prevalence of pokies, so the related problems are much lower. These are good things and we want to keep it that way.

We take issue with the claims made about our representations in dot point 3 below. Far from promoting our area as affluent and sophisticated, the point of concern for us is that many people in Gungahlin are actually struggling financially due to the extremely high cost of housing that has been created by the ACT Government's land supply drip-feed over many years. It is this situation that makes the temptation of gambling all the more undesirable.

What is clear to us as local residents is that Gungahlin has been starved of community infrastructure for so long that any surveying that proposes any community facilities is likely to get a positive response from Gungahlin people. Direct questioning about whether such a club includes gambling is a different proposition altogether. Our opinion is that informed respondents would have given quite different results.

In summary, GCC:
• opposes the use of this high-value site for a free-standing club, with no potential for a direct physical link to an existing or future local sports or community organisation
• opposes the introduction of a free-standing club at this location, which would undermine the potential for proper clubs at more appropriate locations such as the enclosed oval site or Throsby playing fields
• opposes any thoughts of increasing GFA (if the DA were approved) based on unreliable and potentially unlawful reliance on off-site car parking
• requests that before any further work is done on introducing more ‘clubs’ to Gungahlin, a comprehensive study is conducted on the social and economic impacts of additional gambling venues
• is offended at the misrepresentation and disregard of advice that was sought by ACTPLA from us
• believes the land in question, as critical core town centre land, should be preserved for the highest and best use possible, and not under-utilised on such short-sighted ventures.