Page 2505 - Week 09 - Tuesday, 23 August 1994
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
MR WOOD (Minister for Education and Training, Minister for the Arts and Heritage and Minister for the Environment, Land and Planning) (4.06): The Government has no opposition to the matter put by Mr Stevenson. It is eminently sensible and desirable. I believe that the Government has done all it can to meet the sentiments of this matter of public importance. For example, it was not very long ago that we made provision for a direct grant of land for recycling purposes - just one of the examples Mr Stevenson mentioned. We do not give out direct grants lightly; they have to fulfil specified conditions. Bear in mind that, when I say "direct grants", that does not mean giving something away; it means that we may deal with one industry and then sell at the valued price.
In relation to the Windjoy application, we have indicated that we will make a direct grant, such is our respect for the concept behind the proposal. Mr Stevenson said that it was first raised just a year ago. Indeed, in that year quite a deal has happened. We are closer, in respect of Windjoy, to settling all that we need to do; but it is not as simple as it might seem. Mr Stevenson said that some eight sites had been examined. I have not gone into the detail. I will accept that there were eight sites examined before finding the right site. The site that has been chosen as the best is in the Jerrabomberra area and, if we are not careful, it will feed into the river and Lake Burley Griffin. That tells us that we need to take some care with the environmental factors behind it, and that takes time. I understand that there was some cultural investigation, and it has been seen that it has some reference to Aboriginal heritage. That has been taken care of. We have to look at seepage and containment of water, and that takes time.
Once the site is settled and agreed upon, there is still a great deal of work to be done to ensure that it fits all the requirements we demand these days. It is a good thing for the environment to have recycling, but we must see that in its operation it does not do anything that would damage our environment. There are a lot of processes to work through, and we are getting through those as rapidly as we can. I understand that an application for this site, after all the pre-discussion on other sites, was made on some day in June and is now being attended to; but there are studies that still have to be done so that we can be sure that not only does it do good things environmentally but also in itself it is environmentally sound. When all that is done, we will see to it that we make that direct grant of the valued cost, and this business, which we do want to support, can get up and running. It is one of those things that are not as simple as they might appear to be.
Mr Stevenson mentioned the paper material project. It sounds fine to me. I have no background knowledge of that one, and I do not know what it is. Certainly, it is the case that we have been looking at and supporting moves for paper recycling. I think that in Wagga there is or is about to be established a newspaper recycling mill. We could perhaps have had that in Canberra. I do not think that in Wagga, as in Canberra, they would allow something to operate that would be a further pollutant. We have supported that. We have supported the concept of recycling paper, and Mr Lamont can go into a great deal of detail about recycling and the bins he will have out in the community some time this year to do that.
Mr Lamont: The Bill bin.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .