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Canberra Times . . Page.. 649 ..

national parks, recognition of special environments, applications for World Heritage listings, and World Environment Day. It is particularly apt that discussion of a threat to our national park, Namadgi National Park, should take place in the sitting week before World Environment Day. As we get ready to celebrate World Environment Day, we are reminded of just how vulnerable our environment can be. When the environmental vandals, if I may describe them as that, get their hands on things, it seems that our national parks are up for grabs.

How has the issue of Namadgi come up in this Assembly? First we heard that the Liberal Government were going to give half of the Australian Capital Territory to New South Wales. At this point, Mr Speaker, I would like to mention a letter from a Garran resident which was in the Canberra Times today. Under the heading “Crazy Namadgi proposal” it states:

Let the NSW Government manage Namadgi, a third of the ACT? Good idea, Garry, it might save a few dollars.

Then it goes on to make a few unkind remarks about the Assembly:

A better money-raiser would be to sell Murdoch the pay-TV rights to the Assembly proceedings. Question is, which channel would it be shown on? Would it be “tragedy” or “farce”?

I think that both would apply in relation to the Government's attitude on Namadgi in the first place. The letter goes on to say:

The Namadgi proposal follows hard on the heels of the corporatisation of ACTEW.

It finishes by saying:

If the Liberals aren't interested in governing the ACT, why did they stand?

That gets us to the real issue. If everything is going to be handed over to somebody else, what are we here for? That is very important when we look at the hills, the fauna, the flora, important Aboriginal sites, the air around us, our water catchment areas - the lot, really. The Liberals, and Mr Humphries in particular, were going to abrogate their responsibilities to manage the ACT and hand half of it over to New South Wales - provided, of course, that they did not charge us much. But they really floated this idea without knowing what it was all about. It seemed to be a little bit of a disease that was caught from some of Mrs Carnell's attitudes about the health system.

The economic rationalist approach to environmental management just does not work. Do not count the assets; do not count the benefits; do not count the impact of the loss. It is a little bit like the presentation that was made to the Planning and Environment Committee about the value of Acton Peninsula. We were told that it was not worth anything; that it was valueless. Indeed, quite the opposite applies. It is priceless because

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