Page 1631 - Week 06 - Thursday, 7 June 2007
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
meet somebody from Australia who was involved in the Murray-Darling Basin Commission, let alone somebody who was a minister sitting on the council.
It was with things like that in mind that, when we were in office, we had a strong water agenda. In late 1998, I was quite delighted to put in place the ACT’s first water legislation. Until then it was absolutely unfettered. We did not know what stock we had. We did not know where the water came from. We did no monitoring. Things were done through ad hoc arrangements. Thankfully, we had the Water Resources Bill 1998, which in the main was passed with the full support of the Assembly, though there were some attempts at amendments. That was a good thing. The previous Liberal government got a full seat on the Murray-Darling Basin Commission. In 2000, I think, we put in place a levy for a potential dam. In terms of rehabilitating rivers, there was a strong program for putting in groynes to create a better environment for native fish. We restocked with native fish. We started monitoring. We started studies. We put in place the Stromlo mini hydro.
That sort of commitment should have been kept going but, unfortunately for the ACT, this government basically ignored water—as it ignored greenhouse gas issues, as it ignored climate change—for the majority of its term until only the last couple of years. Credit where credit is due: pipes and pumping systems have been put in place to adequately use the facilities that we have got. Credit has to be given there. But legislation will not guard against lack of attention or just poor judgment. We have to make sure that we constantly monitor that most precious resource that is water, particularly as we do not know how long this drought will go.
I can remember when I was the minister back in 1998 and the long-term forecast being that drought would last for something like 20 years. The forecast now is that it may break, but we are yet to see that. It is not uncommon for this country to have 20 to 50-year droughts. Work that has been done studying coral reefs off Queensland indicate that when Captain Cook arrived in 1770 Australia was at the end of something like a 30-year drought. It is something that we should be aware of. It is something that we know about. It is something that we have to work at to make sure that we minimise the impact on the way we live by understanding our water better.
It is good that, nine years after the first bill was put in place, it is modernised. I welcome the majority of what the Chief Minister has put in place. My colleagues have raised some concerns, but I suspect that the major change in position for the Labor party is—to quote from the Chief Minister’s speech—that they now actively encourage the development of a market for all users who will be required to purchase trading rights. The whole issue of water trading was quite a stir back in 1998—in particular for Mr Corbell, who basically said that over his dead body would we have water trading of the ACT’s most precious resource.
It is interesting to see how a couple of years in government and a small drought change your opinion. It is interesting to read some of the things that Mr Corbell said. On 26 November 1998, on page 3090 of Hansard, he said:
However, the other side of this Bill has bigger questions to be dealt with, and it is there that the Labor Opposition has some difficulty. I draw the Assembly’s attention to the issue of water allocations. Obviously we will deal with this in
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .