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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 12 Hansard (13 November) . . Page.. 4201 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

Secondly, there is a suite of recommendations that relate to increasing public access to, and scrutiny of, decision-making. Thirdly, there was some concern from stakeholders and from the committee regarding the provisions governing deemed liability for corporate officers and the defence available to individuals and corporations. It was always our intention that people at board level be responsible for anything done by the company. On the other hand, employees or staff should be responsible only if they are in the direct chain of command for the matter concerned. The amendments aim to better reflect our intention. The same need for clarification was also pointed out by stakeholders and the committee in relation to the defence of due diligence. The amended provisions now provide clear guidance to the courts on how due diligence can be demonstrated.

Fourthly, there has been a reconsideration of the provisions relating to the powers of authorised officers. The Government has accepted the committee's recommendations to omit a clause which required authorised officers to act in a manner which minimises the disruption to a business or activity. The Government has accepted that in its original drafting the powers given to authorised officers were very broad and did not adequately differentiate between routine and urgent circumstances. The amendments now differentiate between powers which may be exercised during routine inspection and those which may be exercised only in urgent or serious circumstances.

Fifthly, the provisions in relation to injunctive orders have been refined to better reflect their nature as a last resort for individuals and the Environment Management Authority to take action to prevent significant environmental harm. The Government and the committee agree that it is important to have such a mechanism available, but there was concern that the existing provisions represented too great a hurdle for individuals to overcome. The proposed amendments better reflect the two fundamental requirements for injunction, namely, that the individual should first give the Environment Management Authority the opportunity to take action to address the circumstances that have generated the concern and, secondly, that the action is brought forward in the public interest. In making these changes, the Government and the committee were motivated to prevent these provisions from being used to further private or commercial interests.

Lastly, the concept of general environmental duty has been clarified to give stronger emphasis to the nature of the environmental harm potentially or actually caused. This amendment is entirely in keeping with the intention behind the general environmental duty which provides that everyone has a responsibility to take practical and reasonable steps to prevent or reduce environmental harm.

MR CORBELL (9.00): I want to speak very briefly on a particular amendment which is part of this package that the Minister is now putting forward. Amendment 17 amends clause 31 to provide for public consultation in accrediting codes of practice. This issue has been brought to my attention in the past day or so by representatives of the building industry, who are concerned about when the public consultation should occur. They have put it to me that the consultation with members of the community should occur when the Environment Management Authority is in the process of assisting in the preparation and the accreditation of a code of practice but before a draft code of practice has been put into place.

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