Page 3783 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 27 August 2008
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opinions and they speak up. But it is about government listening to them and making sure that they listen to them.
In terms of opportunity, it is also about building a future for the ACT. Dr Foskey raised it. We saw the incredulous reaction from the government benches as to what actually were sustainability industries—what they are and how we can work on them. The best example is the work of Dr Andrew Blakers at the ANU—some of the work that he is doing on solar cells. It is extraordinary work, amazing stuff, but most of it would appear to be destined to go elsewhere because the government did not have the foresight to try and keep the industry that that group has created, which has now gone to South Australia. South Australians and South Australian governments will benefit, but not our government.
If you are out there talking and working with the people of the ACT, you will see what is required. Indeed, with consultation, there is the big issue, the dam. We proposed a dam in February 2004. The Chief Minister said that we would not require it for 20 years, if ever—that we were never going to build a dam, not do it. We were out talking to people; we were out listening to people. We were out listening to the experts; we were out listening to ordinary people who simply wanted to water their gardens. The government refused to listen. Then it had to do the enormous backflip that we all know it did, and now we are enlarging the Cotter Dam. That will add to the water security of the ACT. But it is interesting how late the government came to the process. When I was the minister, we had started the mini hydro plants that are in Stromlo. We understood that that is what the community wanted. They told us; we listened to them and we heard what they had to say.
Much was done in the six years of the former Liberal government; very little has been done in the seven years under the Stanhope government. Quite frankly, the government was asleep at the wheel. I can remember the Chief Minister suddenly realising last year that the environment was an issue and making pronouncements in this place, talking about the greatest threat this century—you know, stentorian stuff. It was stirring; it was moving. But we have seen little action and we have lost many good people who have moved on. To give them their due, the Office of Sustainability was a great idea. Pity it has not worked. Pity there are not guidelines. Pity it is not influencing the way the government works across the board, because it will not even listen to its own bureaucrats.
This is a government that is so lofty and arrogant, so isolated and so cocksure of itself that it does not have to listen to anyone. We had the Chief Minister last year declaring that climate change was the biggest issue facing us this century, without having done anything for five years; and then, late last year, introducing his report, which, quite frankly, is an embarrassment in terms of what it is attempting to do. That shows that this is a government that is not interested in and does not understand the importance of working together to maintain a sustainable environment for the ACT.
We did hear that, and we saw it. That is why, in 1987, the former government signed up to Kyoto. We were ahead of the game. We were the first ones out with a draft greenhouse strategy; we were the first ones out with a greenhouse strategy. We started and implemented no waste by 2010. We had the bio-bin trial, which has languished. We put in place the firewood strategy. We had second-hand Sunday. We set up
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