Page 532 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 13 February 2013

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Add:

“(4) commends the ACT Parks and Conservation Service staff for the significant amount of bushfire preparation and infrastructure work completed since 2003, including extensive fire trail maintenance throughout Namadgi and recruitment and training programs to bolster the Service’s fire fighting capacity.”.

Amendment agreed to.

DR BOURKE (Ginninderra) (5.46): I thank members for their speeches and words of support for this motion. All of us agree, as has been said today, that we cannot fireproof our landscape. The experience of catastrophic bushfires is a real risk for us in Canberra. We all agree that we have learnt a tremendous amount from our experiences in 2003. We all agree that the hard work of the ESA staff, ACT Parks and Conservation staff and the volunteers is very worthy of our commendation.

Two things stand out for me from the most recent fire season, which the minister alluded to in his speech: firstly, the aggressive response to attack remote area lightning strikes—clearly a major change in our behaviour from 2003—and, secondly, the community communication and information plan, a plan to bring all communication staff and government together to work as one emergency services media team to provide a single point of truth communicating clearly with our community. I think these are two of the most important things that come out of what we learned in 2003. They have been highlighted in the minister’s speech and have stood us in good stead in this most recent fire season. I commend this motion to the Assembly.

Motion, as amended, agreed to.

Order of the day—postponement

Ordered that order of the day No 5 private members’ business be postponed until a later hour.

Roads—footpaths

MR WALL (Brindabella) (5.48): I move:

That this Assembly:

(1) notes:

(a) the significant number of footpaths and shared paths in disrepair across the ACT;

(b) the ACT Government’s failure to maintain footpaths and shared paths across the ACT; and


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