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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 8 Hansard (26 June) . . Page.. 2187 ..

MR MOORE (continuing):

Assembly, the committee has taken responsibility for the Auditor-General's report. I think that opens up another opportunity for somebody who disagrees with something that is in our report to raise that issue before us and for us to reconsider it should that be necessary. We welcome that opportunity.

We believe that the Government should make available to people an information package that includes such things as the Australian and New Zealand Guidelines for Assessment and Management of Contaminated Sites, the Government's strategic plan for contaminated sites management and the Auditor-General's report entitled "Management of Former Sheep Dip Sites". I think they would be particularly useful.

The committee recommendations continue, but I think the most important message coming through is that we need to make decisions quickly and we need to operate as quickly. We seek to have the Government make sure that they set in place a series of time mechanisms. I refer to recommendation 9, which states:

The committee recommends the Government urgently announce its specific remediation plans for contaminated land, identifying the mechanisms and the timetable for remediation as well as how contaminated soil is to be transported and stored. In the case of contaminated land in Theodore and Watson, the committee considers the Government's remediation plans should be announced during August 1996.

We have left the Government a fair bit of room to move on that, but we also believe that it is appropriate that they move as quickly as possible. It is also our view that the issue of remediation policies for naturally occurring arsenic, along with arsenic coming from former sheep dips, should be considered in exactly the same light for the time being until it is proven to be unwarranted. At this stage we must deal with the two of them as if they are the same. It may well be that in the future it becomes quite clear, for example, that the naturally occurring arsenic is bonded in such a way that it is not bio-available. If that becomes the case, then it will warrant change but for the time being the precautionary principle should apply, and the committee urges the Government to take that approach.

We also recommend that the Government continue its present practice of directly negotiating financial details of buyouts and/or remediation with affected residents rather than utilising the services of an independent arbitrator. The suggestion of an independent arbitrator was made to our committee. There was some disagreement on that between the residents who appeared before us, and we felt that the only time that the Government should really go to the use of an independent arbitrator was once the other method, the direct negotiation, had failed. We are aware that the Government has provided fees for solicitors to represent people in those negotiations, and it seems to us that that is a quite fair process that has been taking place. Mr Speaker, there are a number of other recommendations about ensuring that people who are in the unfortunate situation of having their houses effectively under threat are affected by the process for as short a time as possible; that their houses can be remediated, and they can be provided with a clearance certificate to show what has been done.

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