Page 1482 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 7 May 2008
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whereby the return of an unbroken empty beverage container to a collection depot requires the collection depot to return the scheduled deposit. These deposits are recorded by the collection depot and reported to the minister. Based on the data provided to the minister, the collection depots are reimbursed from a beverage container deposit scheme central account.
In instances where beverage containers are not returned to a collection depot, unredeemed deposits will be applied and distributed to a variety of programs to support kerbside recycling, offset collection costs in the operation of the scheme and provide funds to drive product development in relation to recyclability and reusability. Dr Stuart White’s independent review of container deposit legislation in New South Wales of November 2001 suggested that the entire scheme would return a significant net operating profit for government. Even with our smaller economies of scale, I imagine that we could achieve the same outcome in the ACT.
Local kerbside recycling has been a success in engaging the public in recycling efforts, and the Greens have no wish to detract from kerbside schemes. The people of the ACT have made a substantial contribution to recycling via kerbside recycling. The issue is that kerbside recycling captures only a certain proportion of beverage container consumption and that away-from-home use of beverage containers could represent anywhere between 30 and 50 per cent of all beverage container use. This is a significant proportion of containers escaping from kerbside recycling schemes.
One notes that during community events the number of plastic and other beverage container bottles just thrown into our landfill, as we do not have recycling in Civic, our other town centres and places where people gather, is very, very significant, and I am fairly sure that most of that would go to landfill, though I certainly seek reassurance from the minister that this is not the case.
Also I note that the ACT is the jurisdiction with the very highest return of hard rubbish to landfill and certainly the greatest exponents of wasteful consumption through our household expenditure, while at the same time we also have among the highest participation rates in environmental and other organisations, which indicates that we have a resource here, a very large resource, and also a will on the part of much of our community to reduce our waste. The government is crucial to this. The government has to provide the mechanisms to make it possible for people to reduce the waste that their consumption generates, and this container deposit scheme will make a very significant contribution. It will also speed up and move along our no waste by 2010 strategy. We are looking at 2010 quite soon and have not seen any major initiatives to move it along. The container deposit legislation could be a godsend for the government to show that it is committed to making very strong attempts to reach that target.
I very much look forward to working with the government to make this scheme a reality and then to work with the New South Wales government to assist in making the scheme a reality there, because it does make a lot of sense to participate with our neighbours in Queanbeyan and elsewhere.
I do anticipate, however, that concerns may be raised about the operation or legality of the scheme, considering the effect of section 92 of the commonwealth constitution
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