ACT government and Gungahlin residents, businesses call for an APS department

Gungahlin Community Council has long advocated for the town to host an APS department, boosting trade to local businesses and balancing out a residential boom.

The region houses about 19.6 per cent of Canberra's population but only offers 6.3 per cent of employment opportunities.

While the town centre does hold ACT government offices with a capacity for 841 public servants, defence housing offices and private businesses, the number of workers doesn't stack up against other centres such as Belconnen or Civic.

"What we see is a lot of the businesses that get established do struggle," Gungahlin Community Council president Peter Elford said.

"You think about all the businesses in Civic that support the office trade, not only in terms of coffees and lunches and all that sort of stuff, but the incidental retail that goes on around people's breaks during the day.

"All of that is missing in Gungahlin."

ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr earlier this year submitted a prospectus to the federal government advocating for an APS department or flexible work hub in the town centre.

The prospectus touts Gungahlin as a well-connected, cost-effective location for an APS department, with estimates that 10,000 federal public servants already live in the region.

The territory government has also committed to refurbishing part of its existing office space in Gungahlin into a so-called flexi hub.

Flexi hubs, which are currently being set up in Belconnen and Tuggeranong, are designed to allow public servants to travel to an office space closest to them rather than their directorate.

Mr Elford said the strain put on roads and public transport by APS workers transiting out of the town centre was also problematic.

"Because almost everyone if they're going to go to work ... will go out of Gungahlin, we ended up with a lot of stress being put on to our road system and public transport system."

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Tim Knights, who co-owns one of the town centre's cafes, said he would be keen to see the federal government set up shop in Gungahlin.

"It would be really helpful for small business having something out there, but also giving the people out in Gungahlin an easier option than having to travel all the way into the city or into Belconnen."

He has operated Atlas Cafe since the end of 2016, and said that trade has grown steadily with ACT public servants and private office workers.

The business is still struggling through the setbacks of COVID-19, but Mr Knights said there was a benefit to not relying on an APS hub, as private industry had tended to keep people working from the town centre.

Mr Elford said Gungahlin's growth had rendered the lack of an APS hub less of an issue over the years, but was still a setback compared to other regions of Canberra.

"The problem still remains that we don't seem to have the right mix. We don't have the same sort of mix of services in the Gungahlin town centre that you might see in a Belconnen, Civic, Tuggeranong or Woden."

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