Page 3597 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 25 August 2009
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existing class 1 buildings by 1 January 2010. Again, it is basically the same commitment but in this case six months earlier.
Thirdly, what is proposed for new class 2 buildings? The national commitment will phase out conventional hot-water heaters for all new class 2 buildings by mid-2012 in areas that have mains gas, and I would note that includes the majority of the ACT. The Greens party’s bill appears to be silent on the phase-out of conventional hot-water heaters for new class 2 buildings. As far as we could ascertain, that means that under the Greens’ bill there is no time frame for a phase-out of conventional hot-water heaters for new class 2 buildings.
There are, of course, a number of other technical and definitional issues within the Greens’ bill but they are not directly relevant to the questions I was asked on Thursday; so I will leave them for the moment.
Ms Hunter asked me about consultation the government has undertaken. Our feedback from consultation did touch on some of the points that I have explained earlier. Our consultation also included discussions about amendments proposed by the Liberal Party. I can state that should the Greens adopt any aspect of the amendments put forward by the Liberals, their bill would be further weakened. I think they acknowledge that point.
Let me give an example by revisiting our earlier comparisons on class 1 buildings. The national commitment commences a phase-out of conventional hot-water heaters for the majority of existing class 1 buildings by mid-2010. The Greens party’s bill, if amended by the Liberals, would not phase out conventional hot-water heaters for existing class 1 buildings at all. Ms Le Couteur raised a number of specific requests, about copies of representations I have received regarding the Greens party bill, details of advice received by me from ACTPLA regarding the Greens party bill and copies of the government’s submission to the Australian Building Codes Board’s draft changes to the Building Code for 2010.
Madam Assistant Speaker, I can now table correspondence to my office from Mr Stuart Collins of the Housing Industry Association, stating his concerns about the Greens’ bill, especially the lack of consultation undertaken by the Greens party in its development; a summary of the final advice received by me from ACTPLA regarding the Greens party bill in the form of the speech I delivered explaining its many shortcomings and flaws, and the ACT submission to Building Code of Australia 2010.
I table the following papers:
Energy efficient hot-water systems—Advice and correspondence to the Minister from HIA and ACTPLA.
Ms Hunter specifically asked me to “provide details of consultation the government undertook with the ACT solar industry in regard to changes made by ACTPLA that would require installation standards over and above the Australian standards”. The ACT’s solar installation standards are in fact national standards. The ACT does not have solar installation standards per se. It has the Australia-New Zealand standard 3000, also known as AS/NZS 3000 and commonly known as the Australian wiring
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