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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 06 Hansard (Thursday, 24 June 2004) . . Page.. 2734 ..

He has so little to say he has to repeat everything at various stages. I like this one. Mr Sartor also said:

We do know what we're doing.

It's going well.

We've got a plan, we've got a long-term plan.

Does that remind you of anybody? I think that the local minister for the environment and water is taking a leaf out of the Frank Sartor book. The trouble is that the Frank Sartor book has one problem, which even he admits. He says:

There is one piece of uncertainty and that's climate and weather and we'll keep monitoring that to see if we have to do more.

I think it is very important, on this vital issue, that the ACT adopt the very serious approach of Dr Gallop and admit that we do have a long-term problem; that we plan for the worst case scenario and not be reckless, rather than adopting the pollyanna approach of just having a long-term plan but not doing very much about it. Water is our most precious natural resource. While there is a certain amount of will to improve the situation, that will is not backed up by action. Unfortunately, I do not think there is enough action being taken in this territory to show leadership in this particularly important area.

I hope that, through negotiations and discussions at COAG, we can see what other people are doing and perhaps the government will redouble its efforts to do something about the vital issue of water. We often say that we should lead by example but I think that, in this debate, we are following along behind. I think it is unfortunate. It does not do service to the people of Canberra or to the people of Australia.

Statements in Legislative Assembly

MS MacDONALD: I am not reflecting on a vote. A lot was said this evening and earlier today about misleading the place, et cetera, withdrawing things and correcting the record. When we got to the end of the discussion tonight I remembered an issue that happened earlier in the year during the Karralika debate. If members go to page 178 of the Fifth Assembly Hansard for 2004 they will see that, in that debate, Mr Smyth said, “Then we get to the role of Mr Hargreaves and Ms MacDonald…”

It continues:

There was a rash of press releases faxed to the media at half past 5 on a Friday night. Ms MacDonald arrived at a resident’s house and said, “It’s all okay, the development is off. We’re going to pull it and it will go through the proper process.” It was not until the press release arrived from the minister’s office, of which a copy was made available to the community, that you found in paragraph 5 the words, “But I’ll call it in.” Ms MacDonald was not telling the residents it was going to be called in.

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