Page 844 - Week 04 - Tuesday, 16 June 1992
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I think back to the old problem of the Federal Government's Medicare levy, a levy which no longer covers the cost of Medicare but does very much engender the impression among many Australians that by paying their 1 per cent Medicare levy they are actually paying for the cost of delivering Medicare - or, even worse, paying for the cost of delivering health services in this country. Of course that is not true, any more than it is true that by paying an environmental works levy to this Government, through ACTEW, we are somehow covering the cost of providing all the environmental works that need to be done in this Territory, or even the total cost of a specific item of environmental work, namely, the Lower Molonglo treatment works.
Madam Speaker, I am not convinced by that. I think the motion Mr Westende has put forward is an appropriate one. It is time we indicated very clearly that the sort of loose management which has become a hallmark of this Government should not be tolerated by this Assembly. We expect this Government to be addressing real, permanent and effective ways of reducing the cost of delivering services to the people of Canberra. I do not accept that an increase of this size is necessary in the coming financial year. I believe that, at the very least, considerably greater justification must be advanced by ACTEW before this Opposition will accept that such an increase is warranted. Until that justification comes forward, the Government will have to be content with the knowledge that this Opposition is going to argue strenuously against increases of this kind being imposed on the people of the Territory.
MR MOORE (5.01): Madam Speaker, I shall exercise my right of reply in relation to the amendment. During the debate Mr Connolly raised the issue of water supply and the fact that some of us would say that there should be an endless amount of water supplied. I think it is important to provide a background to water conservation environment issues. It is important to try to put our finger on what most environmentalists see as critical.
The most important issue for most is sustainability, and it is appropriate that we look for a moment at that. The most significant thing in terms of sustainability is to ensure that humans have a sustainable population, because the growth of that population is having a significant effect on the world environment. Population is putting things out of balance and bringing so many other things to a point where they are becoming unsustainable. Sustainability of population is a critical factor throughout the world. In Australia, population sustainability is closely linked with the water supply. If we had a sustainable population in the ACT, if we retained the current population, we would probably need to plan no further in terms of water conservation.
It may serve us well in comparative terms to look at environmental sustainability in the area of fossil fuels. It seems to most of us here and to most environmentalists that if we are to keep a sustainable environment we are going to have to move away from fossil fuels. Natural gas has, of course, provided an opportunity for us to be able to continue our current lifestyle while we explore the possibility of other sustainable fuels, and the most important of those in terms of sustainability seems to be getting energy from the sun. That is another issue that we may be able to deal with in our Conservation, Heritage and Environment Committee report.
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