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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 14 Hansard (11 December) . . Page.. 5276 ..

MR STANHOPE (continuing):

parts of Namadgi; $250,000 extra for weed control, a total of $500,000 in that budget; $300,000 over two years to work with existing networks of catchment groups and community service organisations in planning and restoring the environment along the Murrumbidgee River corridor; and $200,000 for an environmental rural recovery program to protect streams and fencing off areas subject to erosion and for revegetation.

In the financial year 2003-04, the government, in collaboration with its community partners, has planted 100,000 trees to assist the natural regeneration process. This work will continue over a number of years to come. I am pleased to announce that the government has ordered one million trees for planting next autumn, 2004. The government will, through Environment ACT and ACT Forests, be planting a minimum of one million trees.

Following the bushfires, the government also moved quickly to conduct ecological surveys to assess the immediate impacts to natural systems, including threatened species. The results are documented in the report Wildfires in the ACT 2003: Report on initial impacts on natural ecosystems. Post-fire assessments identified sphagnum moss bogs as a priority for stabilisation, to prevent long-term damage to their ecological and water catchment values. The government is implementing a program to protect and stabilise the sphagnum bog communities. A captive husbandry program for the endangered northern corroboree frog, whose habitat has been severely burnt, was established immediately after the fires. Government wildlife ecologists collected some of the surviving eggs and there are now, I am very pleased to say, 295 very healthy corroboree frogs being reared in captivity for future breeding and release.

In addition to protecting threatened species within our woodlands and the corroboree frog in our alpine bogs the government also has as a key responsibility for the monitoring and management of threatened fish species such as the endangered trout cod. The government has established two new projects to conduct research into the trout cod. Three additional fisheries staff will be engaged for a three-year project, commenced on 1 July this year, to ensure that we manage the ecology so that the trout cod in the Murrumbidgee and Cotter rivers are protected.

Water resource management is another area of environmental management of which the ACT government is very proud. The ACT have been recognised for their urban water management for decades. We lead Australia in the sophistication of our sewage treatment system. We have been recognised as a model of best practice in stormwater management. The quality of water leaving the ACT meets the highest standards of any jurisdiction or any urban centre in Australia. Environmental flows in our streams are recognised in a way unmatched anywhere else in Australia and our water resource management and environment protection legislation is first class.

A significant scientific study is now taking place in the Cotter catchment which is providing much better knowledge about how to manage environmental flows. The results of this study and other relevant information will form the basis for a review of the environmental flow guidelines which will take place in 2004. This will lead, again, to the most up to date best practice management of environmental flows anywhere in Australia.

Streams and stream banks are vital parts of our environment. Poor management practices on the edge of streams can have devastating impacts on water quality, both where they

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