Page 4296 - Week 13 - Thursday, 4 December 2014
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asbestos with them? We need to reconsider the issue of contamination. It is clear from the information the committee was provided with that the worst sources of cross-contamination are your washing machine, your dryer and your vacuum cleaner. You can wipe down the exterior, but you cannot wipe down the interior.
Yes, it comes at an added cost, but to have gone through what this community and what this Assembly will go through to make this happen and to leave remnant asbestos in the community being shuffled around the city is a mistake, and we need to work out whether we can afford to pay adequate compensation for those who, in some cases, may lose almost everything and those who will lose a little. But to have this haunt us for another 30 or 40 years is unacceptable.
The fairness test: a lot of people felt they took the advice of the task force to wait for the government’s response on 28 October and, quite frankly, they feel dudded. They thought they would have the option to get their block back in its entirety. We know under the current scheme the government will need the uplift from the development rights to help ameliorate the debt. Some will get full compensation for their house; their block will be remediated and they will get their full lease back. Others who wavered will not.
You have to apply the fairness test there, and fairness is not being applied in this case. That is unfortunate. I understand the timings and I understand the dilemmas. But there was a moment in the committee that I call The Castle moment where a young couple from Kambah came in. He was in his polo shirt and his work shorts; he had a couple of days’ growth and he just talked it straight. He said, “I just want to go home.” We as a community should attempt to allow them to go home, and that is why there are a number of recommendations about people not surrendering their leases and that the government simply, as they have done for others, allow the knock down, the remediation, they get their leases back and they have a rebuild.
Some asked to be able to handle the process themselves. There are some recommendations about time lines, and fairness will be affected by the time this takes, and that is beyond the control of all of us. This is a problem we have inherited, but if you surrender your block and it is knocked down and you need to go into the rental market, you may be there for up to five years, given the staggered time frame that the government has foreshadowed. It may be quicker; it may blow out; I do not know. But if you leave your block and you go somewhere else, you are not coming back after five years. If you attempt to come back after five years and repurchase part of your block with the uplift, the compensation you will receive when you leave some time in the coming year will not be adequate to cover that loss.
Some felt they would be better off if they could handle the process themselves, and the committee says that needs to be an option, with the appropriate safeguards. WorkSafe must do the validation that the block has been remediated properly and that it is safe to return to. That is what we believe should happen. There are a couple of options on the knock down, rebuild option that people have sought from us.
There are some issues about advice. Mr Kefford is with us today, and I acknowledge he has had dropped on his plate an enormous job. The Chief Minister has been good in ramping up the assistance to the task force, but there were a huge number of
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