Page 465 - Week 04 - Wednesday, 28 June 1989
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that legislation clearly demonstrates our commitment. It is one of our earliest pieces of legislation and I think it is important that - leaving aside the Supply Bill - of the two substantive Bills that came in, the first one which was passed by the house related to education and vocational training in employment and the second related to the environment. It is no accident that our emphasis as a party has been placed in this direction.
We have encouraged the Administration in the short time that we have been in government to give the maximum possible level of advice to the community on the question of energy conservation in housing and construction and an emphasis on pollution control in heating. I think that one of the most important points that has been made so far is the point made by my colleague Mr Wood when he said that we cannot force people in our free society to take every possible step to ensure that the environment is protected. It is quite clear that that would be harsh and unreasonable.
We can introduce laws and regulations which will tend to go in a particular direction, and that we will seek to do in consultation with the community. But as a final crunch, if people do wish to have an open fireplace I would hate to think that we had reached the stage where we banned totally the right of people to have an open fireplace. I would hate to think that we had reached the stage where we would seek to give government the right to enter private homes to measure emissions from other types of heating such as gas, oil or slow combustion wood fireplaces.
We also have to balance our concern for the environment with our concern for protecting civil liberties and the rights of individuals, and an important part of this process is education. We are committed through the various instrumentalities that we administer to ensuring that the maximum possible level of information is made available. I would commend to you the publications of the building control section in the ACT Administration, detailed documents on energy conservation in buildings which are distributed to potential homebuilders, and also to the publications of the former National Capital Development Commission on energy conservation in housing. It is through this process of awareness and education that I believe we will achieve more in the interests of the community than by harsh or repressive legislative controls.
DR KINLOCH (11.32): Of course, we all endorse the aims of legislation to improve our environment, especially in terms of proper and clean power supply, and may that be so. Given some of the points that the Deputy Chief Minister has raised, I think it proper to reply to them. I would like to reply to them in terms of the motion that Mr Moore has put forward and I would like to commend to you a very strong supporter of environmental matters, that is, Katharine West. I happen to be the chairman of the future
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