Page 1179 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 24 June 1992
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If you are a jogger in Tuggeranong, or other parts of Canberra, and you do your jogging in the hours of dusk, you would certainly notice that. We get many complaints from people who are asthmatics or who are simply bothered by the smoke. It is a more significant problem, I believe, than many people realise. Education does not seem to be working, or it is working very slowly. We are trying that course. We do not really want to go down the path of regulation. That is a course that is not satisfactory. I doubt that we could go down the path of prohibition. So it does rely very much on education, on people doing the correct things with their stoves.
I will not go through the processes that people in Canberra need to follow. I think they have been fairly widely advertised and we will continue to do that; but, Ms Ellis, it is a problem. We are encouraging our inspectors to be attentive to it. I had cause only yesterday to send out an inspector to a particularly difficult chimney, as I was advised, in Tuggeranong. But we cannot tell that home owner to turn it off; we can only advise them. It is up to all citizens of Canberra with this facility in their home to take note of the problem and be very careful about how they use their stove.
Sutton Park Driver Training Complex
MR MOORE: My question is also to Mr Wood and it deals with an environmental matter. Recognising the importance of being good neighbours and the great care with which we must continue dealing with the people of Queanbeyan, will the Minister confirm whether or not the Sutton Park driver training track is to be approved for motor racing?
MR WOOD: Madam Speaker, this is one I can neither confirm nor deny. I have been following that closely in recent months. My department is at present working on a submission which will come to Cabinet in due course. Cabinet will be making a decision on the Sutton Park complex. That decision will be around the options of whether it becomes a road racing circuit, or is used as a driver education circuit, or whatever else may be explored. I do not think it will be too long before I will be able to advise you and the people in Queanbeyan who have contacted you, and other interested people, of what the outcome will be.
MR MOORE: I have a supplementary question, Madam Speaker. I presume, therefore, that before any such decision is made you will, in accordance with your normal policy, consult with people in Queanbeyan, particularly those at the Ridgeway. Are you aware that accepted noise formula calculations indicate that a racing venue should be at least four kilometres from the nearest houses, if the noise at the houses is to be limited to no more than five decibels above the background?
MR WOOD: Certainly, "consultation" is the operative word. I can assure the questioner, Madam Speaker, that residents of the Ridgeway keep in close and constant touch with us. Their views are very well known. I might say that they are very well respected. They are quite meticulous in the way they do it. I freely concede that there are no better people - they have the technical qualifications and interest - to advise us on the level of sound pollution. I accept that. We are attending very closely to what they say. I can let you be confident that the submission will reflect their views. Whether we accept all that they say is another matter.
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