Page 4159 - Week 13 - Thursday, 25 November 1993
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This note clearly shows that ACTEW had suspected that the sewerage leak was the source in September, not October, as Mr Connolly claimed. Minister, were the scientists right in September or were you right in October, and why did ACTEW not pass on their suspicions to the Office of the Environment one month earlier?
MR CONNOLLY: Madam Speaker, there is one journalist who believes this nonsense and Mrs Carnell is peddling his story for him. I suggested in a letter I wrote to Mrs Carnell that she should be cautious about peddling people's lines and should look at the issues themselves. I provided a raft of documents to Mrs Carnell and I think I offered a briefing. I am not sure whether that offer of a briefing was taken up.
Mrs Carnell: Next week.
MR CONNOLLY: Next week. Exactly. Go on the attack. The Opposition strategy is to pass sentence and then consider the evidence.
Mr De Domenico: Be careful.
Mrs Carnell: Do not get carried away.
MR CONNOLLY: These juvenile little people opposite who are getting terribly agitated are getting agitated about a briefing note to a journalist which was - - -
Mrs Carnell: No, it was signed by the Deputy General Manager, Operations.
MR CONNOLLY: A signed briefing note to the Canberra Times which was written in order to give the Canberra Times some background to what had happened. They are treating that as though it is inconsistent with all the other documentary material which they have. Mrs Carnell, who understands scientific method, one would have thought, would have understood this.
The situation is that high levels of nutrient were detected in the lake - nutrient, but not bacteria. The evidence and the information which you have been offered on the briefing - you say, "I have not had the briefing yet; I will get that next week" - would put all this into context. High levels of nutrient were detected during routine sampling. ACTEW did further sampling and located a source at which this material seemed to be at its highest. All of this is in the briefing which Mrs Carnell has been offered and has not accepted but has gone on the attack over. The high level of the nutrient was sourced to a point where there was a large quantum of cow poo - not Opposition questions, but cow poo; they are closely related. It was detected by the lake. That gave ACTEW the indication that that was probably the source.
ACTEW advised the EPS of that in a document which is in the material which Mrs Carnell has or is being offered. The note to EPS said, in effect, "This is what we think it is; we think it is the cow dung, but there could be other reasons including" - and I think it says "seepage (?)". So the note to the EPS on a date in September indicated the most likely source and the possibility of an alternative. ACTEW, being a very responsible environmental organisation, did not sit there. They conducted further and further testing and eventually discovered that there was some seepage from a pipe - not raw sewage, but material that is pumped onto the golf course at Duntroon. It is treated water with a level of dry effluent
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