Page 4810 - Week 15 - Thursday, 8 December 1994
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MR STEFANIAK: Minister, given that the then head of the Pollution Control Authority was, at the material time, a resident of The Ridgeway area and did, I understand, disclose that to you, and despite your denials in the letter of 3 March 1993 in the Canberra Times that there was a conflict of interest arising from the assessment of noise levels from the Sutton Park and Fairbairn Park motor sport facilities, how can you otherwise explain the sudden change of noise measuring standards that you readily accepted and are obviously still persisting with?
MR WOOD: There are a couple of things wrong here. One is that this is a question from the shadow Minister for the Environment saying, "Do not take environmental issues to heart. Do not be serious about them. They are not important". That is what Mr Stefaniak is saying. One day he wants to protect the kangaroos. That was only a week or two after he said, "Get them off our roads. Shoot them. Do what you can with them". Now he is saying, "Do not worry about noise pollution". This is a strange position from the spokesperson for the Liberal Party, but we are accustomed to strange positions from those people.
The other factor that Mr Stefaniak clearly misunderstands - he would not follow my reasoning because he does not have this starting point - is my role in all this. My role from the day I became Minister for the Environment has been to establish the best possible environmental regime in the ACT. The advice I have been getting from my officers is based on that. My officers have been under constant pressure from me to bring down legislation to improve the measures on a whole range of environmental activities, including noise in urban areas as well as the race track a little further away. It has escaped the attention of Mr Stefaniak that yesterday I tabled a further discussion paper on pollution control, on means of being proactive in the way we deal with possible pollutants; not waiting until a problem emerges and then taking action, but establishing a process whereby we are ahead of the game. We establish the best possible standards. It escaped Mr Stefaniak yesterday. I have required of my officers that they provide for me the information I need, so that I can establish the highest possible environmental standards. That is what happened on this occasion.
Planning Authority
MR KAINE: Madam Speaker, I would like to address a question to Mr Wood as Minister for the Environment, Land and Planning. The report that was tabled yesterday from the Planning, Development and Infrastructure Committee suggested that the Planning Authority should be formally separated from the Department of the Environment, Land and Planning. Minister, do you support that proposal?
MR WOOD: Madam Speaker, I am going to be reading that report in greater detail than I have done to this date.
Mr De Domenico: Answer the question. Will you let Mr Lamont, should he win, be the Minister for Planning?
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