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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 11 Hansard (4 November) . . Page.. 3522 ..

MR CORBELL (continuing):

Mr Speaker, I would like to thank the committee secretary, Ms Sandra MacDonald, for her assistance during the course of the inquiry. She produced in an incredibly short time an extremely comprehensive draft report which members found extremely useful in our considerations and deliberations. She is to be particularly commended for the amount of work she put in.

Mr Speaker, the challenge to the Government from this committee's report is to implement the recommendations in it. It is a unanimous report of this committee. Mrs Littlewood, my colleague on the committee, made the point when the report was released last week that this is an example of the Assembly members working together. I can only commend her on her comments. The Assembly members did, indeed, work together on this issue. The Labor Party, the Greens, Mr Moore - an Independent - and the Government - the Liberal Party - all cooperated in the development of a very comprehensive report. It is evidence that an effective committee system can make significant recommendations on the operation of a Bill and how it should be amended.

I put the challenge, though, to the Government. They really must accept very seriously each and every one of these recommendations. They must be prepared to implement them. Obviously, they have an opportunity not to do so, but I think it is quite clear from the force of the recommendations in this report that if they do not there is certainly very strong support from the Opposition and the crossbenches to ensure that the recommendations are put into place. Mr Speaker, I will leave my comments there. More detailed comments, perhaps, should be left for the debate on the Bill. I commend the report to the Assembly.

MS HORODNY (12.20): Mr Speaker, this is obviously a very important piece of legislation. It has been worked on for a very long time. I believe that the process was begun in the previous Assembly. I am very glad that it is being worked through now. Hopefully, it will be passed, with amendments, before the end of this year. I think everyone in this Assembly is committed to environmental protection legislation, although we all have different views on the right balance of carrots and sticks, as we have been calling the incentives and disincentives to environmental protection.

The committee was able to put together a report with the support of all members. I was very happy that the committee agreed to some of my suggestions, and I agreed to suggestions that other members of the committee put up as well. The thing that I think is very important in a piece of legislation like this is the strong public involvement in the whole process. I think it is very important that public involvement be encouraged in the environmental authorisations, but I also believe that there needs to be stronger public involvement in the agreements because they are a substitute for authorisations for all the activities other than those in Class A. So, given that the content of agreements is quite discretionary, I believe it is important that the public have the opportunity to challenge the stringency of these agreements.

I come from the view, Mr Speaker, that business need not fear this legislation. Indeed, the sooner that business embraces working with the Government and the community better to protect our environment, the sooner they can begin to reap the rewards. Clean, green business is the way of the future. It is an asset to any organisation

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