Page 2260 - Week 07 - Thursday, 23 June 2005
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Mr Pratt comes up with these really wonderful ideas like storage tanks next to each school. He does not understand that he might be creating 150 to 200 little lakes around town and therefore preventing the water from going into the Murray-Darling Basin and being responsible for desecration at the mouth of the Murray. Oh no, we do not worry about that! He also does not understand that a lot of rainwater bounces off and goes onto the oval anyway. I have a great idea: I might race around there and paint all the ovals green. That has been done before, has it not? Dear me! Mrs Dunne thumps the desk. Good on you! That is Johnno one and Mrs Dunne nil. Mr Pratt says, “There was a sprinkler on in the rain!” How many times has my office advised him and his office that, from time to time, all sprinklers must have water go through them for maintenance purposes? That is what it is. Sometimes we get a bit exasperated.
He talks about car bodies and says that, on each and every arterial road, there is a car body—right next to that policeman, I suspect. There are so many of them in the town! Does he understand that there is a regime, and that all he has to do is report the things? He talks about car bodies being put onto other people’s private property and asks why we don’t get rid of them. They are not ours and it is not our property. That is a good start, I think. I am afraid Mr Pratt is trying to build a straw man and then tear it down; and it does not work, I am sorry. It is just not working.
Unlike trying to decry and talk down this town and trying to tell everybody what a filthy rat hole it is, I am proud of this town. I have been around the world in the past couple of years telling people, and showing people, what a wonderful town it is. I have been to a number of capital cities recently and travelled on their trains and their public transport. Guess what you have all the way down the train lines—it is pretty pathetic. From any of the suburbs in Melbourne through to the train line from Washington through New York, Philadelphia and all the way to Boston, the filth and garbage along there leaves our stuff paling into insignificance.
The government is keenly aware of the condition of Canberra but we have implemented a range of strategies to enhance the urban environment from both a social and environmental perspective. Actions relate to litter, graffiti, shopping centres, natural environments, streetscapes, landscape refurbishment and fire hazard reduction of sportsgrounds.
With regard to litter in general, the ACT government has initiated or supports several programs aimed at raising public awareness to address the issue of littering and pollution of waterways. These include land care, adopt a road, adopt a wetland, Clean Up Australia Day, a trial of the butt-free city campaign in conjunction with the Butt Littering Trust, the campaign targeting illegal dumping at charity collection bins, and litter and dumping in public laneways in Civic and main shopping centres, to name some of them. The government is also participating in the Keep Australia Beautiful sustainable cities program. The new Litter Act, introduced in September 2004, provides more effective legislation to prevent littering and supports these programs. Our urban rangers and police now have some teeth and can issue on-the-spot fines to offenders, ranging from $60 to $1,000. Mr Pratt asks, “Where are all of these penalties?” That is where they are.
The government has also been proactive in managing graffiti across the city through the implementation of the new ACT graffiti management strategy released in September
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