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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 3 Hansard (27 May) . . Page.. 607 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

While I acknowledge that the amount of construction waste being dumped in the ACT is falling, we still have around 60,000 tonnes that must be recycled if we are to achieve no waste by 2010 in this area of activity. This obviously also excludes any illegal or legal dumping that is occurring outside the ACT's borders. Getting waste management plans into place is, therefore, very significant. It was in fact my colleague in the last Assembly, Ms Horodny, who began work on this legislation. She initiated this legislation after discovering a number of illegal rubbish dumps in New South Wales. At the time, Ms Horodny estimated that up to 10,000 tonnes of ACT building waste was being dumped outside the ACT each year. While this might help us meet no waste by the year 2010 in the ACT, it most certainly runs counter to the overall principle of that strategy of reducing the amount of waste generated by the ACT.

As a society, we simply cannot continue to think that resources are infinite. We have to become creative about how we use and reuse resources. This legislation is an important part of that process. Mr Speaker, one of the key objectives of the legislation is to provide a stimulus to the recycling industry in the ACT. The ACT has a real opportunity to become a centre of excellence in waste management, and this is now well recognised from many quarters. This legislation, if passed, will have significant flowthrough effects throughout the construction and waste management industries. It is also important to back it up with other strategies to boost recycling industries and encourage the use of recycled material for construction activity. There are already recycling activities that operate in Canberra on a commercial scale for materials such as concrete, timber and roof tiles. Revolve also sell a lot of recycled building materials, and their supplies often fall short of demand. Despite these activities, the infrastructure for large-scale recycling of construction and demolition material is still limited. For example, metal and glass are stockpiled and transported to Sydney.

It is very pleasing to see that there is growing interest from the building industry in recycling building waste, and hopefully the long-awaited resource recovery and recycling estate at Mitchell will be up and running in the near future. I look forward to hearing about progress on that. The Master Builders Association recently released a report titled "Recycling Buildings in Canberra: a draft recycling strategy for construction & demolition material". The strategy has many objectives, including minimising waste, creating new employment opportunities in the recycling industry, maximising opportunities for the recycling of construction and demolition material, generating viable markets for the use of recycled products within the region, promoting the practice and use of recycled products, reducing demand on landfill sites and reducing pressure on the use of new natural resources, and so on. Interestingly, as well as the obvious environmental benefits from recycling material and waste from building demolition, benefits cited in the MBA report include job generation, the lower production cost of recycled products compared with products from raw material and the potential to decrease disposal costs for demolition contractors.

Mr Speaker, this legislation is a very good example of an initiative that has a win-win outcome for the environment and for industry through creation of new jobs and cost savings. An example of cost savings that is cited in the MBA report is the redevelopment of Holsworthy Hospital project. During the project 80 per cent of waste material was reused or recycled, with an associated reduction in disposal cost from $23,000 to $13,000.

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