Page 439 - Week 02 - Thursday, 11 February 2021
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As a result of the election outcome, Labor and the Greens agreed to address these concerns through a parliamentary and governing agreement item in providing that “the government will seek advice on the best way to facilitate the outcomes contained in the government’s waste strategy to locate waste processing facilities in Hume”, which is in line with the government’s overall plan to see new waste facilities collocated in Hume, as detailed in the ACT government’s waste management strategy.
We understand the urgency to pass this bill today, given the situation whereby our industrial zoning and planning rules are out of step with our waste strategy as well as community expectations in relation to waste processing operations in Fyshwick, and that there are currently proposals on the table.
The Greens agree that the objections raised to the two proposed major waste treatment and disposal projects have merit. We believe that traffic flow, noise levels, dust and pollutants would seem to be incompatible with the differing needs and general amenity of nearby businesses and residential developments, both existing and planned. Despite the phenomenal detail and thought that have been put into the Territory Plan and its zoning over many years by successive governments of different stripes, there are times when things do not quite mesh, and this is one of those times.
This bill will mean that the CRS, or Capital Recycling Solutions, and the Hi-Qual, or Hi-Quality Group, proposals for major waste facilities in Fyshwick will not be able to proceed. It will also prevent existing businesses from expanding their operations, but, as Minister Gentleman laid out, the ban will not affect the continued operation of existing approved waste management facilities.
The Greens understand that the government is undertaking a policy review relating to planning and waste policy matters, which will include consideration of the territory’s waste infrastructure needs into the future, and available land. This review will also consider the compatibility of waste management activities with other land uses in Fyshwick and surrounds to determine whether it is appropriate for further waste facilities to be developed in Fyshwick in the future.
We understand that once the review is complete, the government will be able to provide more guidance to the waste industry on where future development proposals for waste facilities may be built, as well as what kinds of operations are appropriate in Fyshwick into the future. This will ensure that some types of smaller or low impact businesses can be exempt from the legislation that we are passing today. Thus, we support this bill today, and the processes being put in train that I have just outlined, but we still believe that there is more work to be done.
More broadly, the Greens are concerned that our current planning processes, combined with the absence of clear waste policy guidelines, are leading to a problem whereby major waste proposals are largely evaluated only by the ACT government via the planning system.
This means that waste proposals are not assessed on their waste policy outcomes, but only on their planning impacts, with pollution taken into account through an EPA
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