Page 2703 - Week 08 - Thursday, 24 August 2006
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DR FOSKEY: There is no point asking the minister for the environment because there is no such position. We are alone among Australian jurisdictions in not having a minister with portfolio responsibility for the environment. This would not be such a big issue if the ministers who now have responsibility for various components of the portfolio were keen, committed and had clout. Unfortunately, the environment portfolio is a little more than a rump within the Department of Territory and Municipal Services. This represents more than just a reorganisation. It represents a definite downgrading of the status and importance placed on the portfolio. Things like destroying morale and slashing staff numbers in the parks and conservation service, thereby increasing the damage done by feral pigs, feral four-wheel drivers and mountain bike riders, goats, cats, dogs and invasive plants and killing off the no waste strategy are issues that should be vigorously resisted by the minister responsible for the environment. If he does not champion those issues, who within cabinet will?
Instead, we heard the minister talk about building fire trails and reducing fuel loads for public safety purposes. The rationale behind those decisions and programs has nothing to do with environmental concerns. They are public safety concerns. They impact on the environment as they can result in increased soil erosion and fragmentation of habitats and gene pools for many small marsupials. Such programs do not really belong in the environment budget. To dress them up as environmental spending and evidence of environmental concern is misleading at best. The role of an environment minister and department should be to stand up for native species and ecological interests in forums where fire trail building and fuel load reduction burning are being discussed.
I know that ecological issues can get a bit blurry around the edges, but not at their roots. They are crystal clear. Air quality, water quality and biodiversity are at their core. The minister was obstructive and evasive at estimates hearings. That is his style. Unfortunately, voters, community groups, staff and MLAs are left to hunt through the detail of other portfolio programs looking for how this government will undertake its environmental responsibilities.
Yesterday the minister thanked me for mentioning Mulligans Flat nature reserve. I am not surprised. It is one of the few concrete environmental measures in this current budget. Do not get me wrong. I think it is great that the government has seen fit to commit some funding to fencing in the reserve to protect it from stray and feral cats and dogs. But when a fence around a city nature reserve becomes the showpiece of this territory’s environmental program, you know that something has gone wrong. Where is the action to back up the Chief Minister’s apparently heartfelt concern and embarrassment about Canberra’s disproportionate ecological footprint?
Where are the solarisation initiatives? Where are the grey water subsidies, the rebates for water tanks used for human consumption, and the differential registration and sales tax incentives to encourage fuel-efficient cars? Where are the environmental purchasing guidelines for the Shared Services Centre staff? Where are the programs to use our superannuation to improve our quality life and minimise adverse environmental impacts? They are not here in this budget. Where are the commitments to improving and expanding public transport; to setting benchmarks for the health of the ACT’s various ecosystems; to monitoring indicator species and to monitoring the levels of heavy metals and other contaminants in our urban lakes? There are no public recycling facilities in the
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