Commonwealth Government response to the Productivity Commission Inquiry into the Conservation of Australia's Historic Heritage Places
Australian Government response to the Productivity Commission's report
August, 2007
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About this publication
Minister for the Environment and Water Resources, the Hon Malcolm Turnbull MP, tabled in Parliament the Australian Government's response to the Productivity Commission's Conservation of Australia's Historic Heritage Places report on 22 May 2007.
The Australian Government is committed to conserving Australia's historic heritage places and supports a number of the recommendations outlined by the Productivity Commission.
The Productivity Commission's Final Report draws attention to the importance of balancing social, economic and heritage considerations, including a key recommendation that private owners be able to appeal heritage listing of their properties on the basis of unreasonable cost.
The Australian Government recognises that this is a fundamental issue and agrees that private owners should generally not have unreasonable costs imposed upon them by heritage listing. However, it is important that a range of potential solutions are sought.
Therefore, this issue will now be referred to the Environment Protection and Heritage Council (EPHC) for further consideration by state and territory Ministers, in order to develop a national approach and coordinate activity across all Australian jurisdictions.
The Commission's Inquiry into the framework for conserving and protecting our nation's historic heritage places has generated an important public debate on how we define heritage and how our heritage places can become more sustainable in the future.
It is important that we as Australians work together to protect our important heritage places, and help conserve these for future generations.
Many of the activities recommended by the Inquiry are already taking place, such as the Commission's recommendation that all governments improve the data they collect on the state of historic heritage places. This is already being done through the Cooperative National Heritage Agenda, which the EPHC agreed to in 2006.
Also consistent with the Inquiry's recommendations is the five-year transition period for state and territory governments to transfer places on the Register of the National Estate to the relevant state list.
The Productivity Commission's Conservation of Australia's Historic Heritage Places report is available at http://www.pc.gov.au/inquiry/heritage/docs/finalreport
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