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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 9 Hansard (3 September) . . Page.. 2835 ..
MR STEFANIAK (continuing):
It is, I think, a most worthwhile group of people who bring a lot of expertise to their task from all parts of the housing sector. I think the advice it will be giving government will be very important, very timely and of great assistance in terms of all housing - not only public housing but housing generally - as we rapidly move towards the twenty-first century.
MS REILLY: I have a supplementary question. Obviously, a number of people in this place are uncertain about the membership of this committee; so, Minister, can you provide a list of who the members are? Can you tell us their criteria for appointment and what were the arrangements for their appointment? Are these members representatives of housing organisations that have specialised knowledge of young people's housing, aged persons' housing, public and private tenants or people from non-English-speaking backgrounds? Can you also provide the terms of reference for the operation of this committee? There seems to be a lack of knowledge around about it.
MR STEFANIAK: I am certainly happy to provide details of the people on the committee and the groups they represent, Ms Reilly. One thing you mentioned there was the young. John Gregg, who represents youth in Canberra in many aspects, is one of the members of the committee. I am happy to provide that, together with the terms of reference of the committee. I am quite happy to provide that to you and the Assembly.
Mrs Carnell: I ask that any further questions be placed on the notice paper.
MR KAINE: Yesterday, Ms Horodny asked me a question about the dumping of clean fill and why the Government had not considered establishing a separate area for stockpiling clean fill for earthworks and landscaping. I will answer the second part first because it is by far the most significant part of it. In fact, the operation of all recycling facilities provided by the ACT Government, including organic garden wastes, oils, metals, paper, glass and plastics, is undertaken by commercial enterprises with particular expertise in the marketing of these particular resources. In association with the introduction of commercial tip fees in 1993, sites were provided for commercial soil exchange operations. As an example, Canberra Concrete Recyclers at Pialligo accepts clean fill at a rate of $5 a tonne. Anybody with large quantities of fill would be encouraged to go there so that it can be recycled, because the current disposal rate at landfills is $24 a tonne. So, they can dump it in landfill and we charge them $24 a tonne to do so, or they can take it out to organisations like Canberra Concrete Recyclers at a cost of $5 a tonne.
A key action of the Government's waste management strategy is the development of an action plan to rationalise the solid waste management system in Canberra. We are still working on the problem. We do not think that all of the problems have been resolved. A submission is currently being prepared within my department for the establishment of resource recovery facilities at Mitchell and in the vicinity of the Mugga landfill, to recover reusable materials from the waste stream. I should say "further reusable materials", because we are already recovering quite a lot. Further opportunities for recycling clean fill and demolition waste will be addressed in this submission, which will be considered by the Government over the coming weeks.
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