Page 1464 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 6 June 2007
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institutions, whether it be in relation to the impact of level 4 restrictions on our construction industry, whether it be in relation to some of the potential health impacts that one might imagine might affect members of the community as a result of a prolonged period of dry weather or of a dry spell.
We take into account all of the possible impacts and we put in place and develop the responses that are needed to ensure that no part of our community life or of community activity is not considered and assessed in relation to the response which at the end of the day we as a community might need to make to extended level 4 restrictions.
So we are doing the work. Actew is doing the work. The ACT government is coordinating across all agencies a response to all of the perceived or imagined issues that might arise as a result of the continuation of the drought and we stand ready to respond to that consultation and that consideration. To the extent that there are economic impacts or costs, we will visit those and we will deal with those through the capacity most particularly that we now have to do that through a particularly strong budgetary position and balance sheet.
The community of Canberra is now in a very strong position financially to be able to respond to any risk, whether it be an externally applied risk that affects our economy through decisions that, say, the commonwealth government makes, by way of example, or whether it be as a result of something over which we have absolutely no control; for instance, the drought. We have done the work. We continue to do the work. We have adopted the same attitude in a budgetary sense as the commonwealth. To that extent I took some leave from Peter Costello and adopted the precise attitude—as I often do. I took some leave from Peter Costello in relation to this issue.
MR SPEAKER: Do you have a supplementary question, Mr Stefaniak?
MR STEFANIAK: Thank you, Mr Speaker. I thank the Chief Minister for that answer. Chief Minister, why are you assuming that the drought will break in your budget, given that the best modelling from the best scientists did not predict the record low inflows over the past 18 months? Does this effectively make your budget a “fingers crossed” budget?
MR STANHOPE: It is interesting—and the Leader of the Opposition is correct—that the advice on which Actew has acted and the advice on which Actew has relied in its advice to the ACT government in relation to long-term water security for the Australian Capital Territory did depend very extensively on expert advice from a range of scientists and experts, not just from within Canberra but also from across the nation, but most particularly from work commissioned by the CSIRO in relation to some of the anticipated effects of climate change and drought on our storage capacity and our water security.
The Leader of the Opposition is quite right: the experts that Actew relied on, and on which Actew relied in advising the government, did not predict inflows as low as seven per cent for the long-term average, although, to be fair to the CSIRO and those experts which the Leader of the Opposition just quotes, they did talk about long-term averages. They advised Actew, and Actew in its subsequent advice to the government
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