Page 3315 - Week 11 - Thursday, 22 September 1994
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MR WOOD: You quoted it, and let me quote it again:
... the ACT Government has taken a number of environmental initiatives ...
I will not read the next column that Mr Moore did not read and that indicates all the things that this Government has been doing in respect of the environment. It is there for you to read, on page 5 of the document. Just to confirm that, over the page, at the top of page 6, it says:
Clearly, the Government has identified a course of action which addresses major areas of environmental concern both for the present and for the period of at least to 2020.
So, we have an acknowledgment of what we have been doing - an enormous amount. To repeat what Mr Moore said about the monitoring, and I want to read this out and to read it into the record:
It is nevertheless appropriate to acknowledge that at this stage, ACT Government responsibility for, and monitoring of, the environment is diverse and not adequately coordinated.
I acknowledge that, and it is something that we will be attending to very rapidly. Throughout the report, there are two strong themes running. One is that there are not the benchmarks; there are not the standards that we in the ACT or governments across Australia can rely on to monitor progress. First of all, this report says, in each of the sections, we need those benchmarks. That is the responsibility of the Federal Government, the States and the ANZEC Council, of which I am a member. The Federal Government, at present, is preparing its own state of the environment report. As part of that and as part of a continuing process, there will be the establishment of benchmarks. We need to establish them in the ACT, and we will do that in cooperation with the Commonwealth and the States.
One of the difficulties that the commissioner points to in establishing this report is that there is a lack of background data of just what the condition of water or air ought to be. So, we will attend to that. We will see that we play our part in establishing those benchmarks and then, once that is done, along with that is the need for monitoring - the particular point that Mr Moore raised. There is absolute commitment on the part of the Government to that monitoring.
I can say this: Without wishing to pre-empt the full Government response that will come to this report, I acknowledge one area that the Government will improve. The Government will develop systems within our administration that will allow for ready assessment of the environment. This will involve improved monitoring and coordination between agencies and the further development of indicators to assist with identifying environmental change. We do need that background to assess how we are going. We have done a great deal. I want to be able to prove, as time goes by, that it is working. We will be taking action to ensure that that happens.
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