Page 3268 - Week 09 - Tuesday, 18 August 2009
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because we have household disposable incomes of in the order of $1,000 a fortnight more than the rest of Australia. We spend more, we buy more, we generate more waste and we create an issue.
It is appropriate that we acknowledge where all this waste comes from and some of the numbers that Ms Le Couteur refers to in the context that this increase, this never-ending increase, in waste that is being generated here—and a government that has already invested heavily and is having to invest even more heavily to keep up with the fact that we, as residents of Australia, are generating waste at a far faster rate and higher rate than anywhere else in Australia.
The numbers I have are interesting. I am just trying to interpret them. As I have just said, there has been a significant and continuing increase in the amount of total waste generated in the ACT, representing an average increase of 5.7 per cent per annum—that is the increase per year—in the generation of waste, averaged over the last 10 years. That is the scenario that we are dealing with.
We have, and this is relevant, increased resource recovery and recycling levels from 184,000 tonnes, or 42 per cent of waste generated in 1995-96. This is the scale of the issue; this is the scale of the response. In 1995-96, we as a community were actually re-using or recovering 184,000 tonnes, or 42 per cent, of waste generated in the ACT. In 2007-08, that had increased from 184,000 tonnes to 590,000 tonnes, an increase of 400,000 tonnes in 14 years. That is a 300 per cent increase in waste recovery over 14 years, increasing from 42 per cent of waste to 74 and a bit per cent of waste.
That is the record; that is the record of achievement. There has been an increase in waste recovered from 184,000 to 590,000 tonnes, but in an environment where waste generated has increased by 5.7 per cent a year over the last 10 years, or 57 per cent—a 57 per cent increase in waste generated just in the last 10 years.
This is an issue the government take seriously. We take it deadly seriously. We are prepared to invest; we are prepared to be innovative; we are prepared to do what we can do; we are prepared to adopt best practice. And we will. We have made those commitments and we will carry them through.
We do have a target of zero waste. The comments that I have made in relation to no waste by 2010 were quite simple and, again, factual. It is 2010 next year. We have adopted, employed and pursued a no waste, or zero waste, policy in government for 2010.
What do we do in 2011 when everybody here knows that we will still be taking waste to landfill? Is it seriously being suggested by the Greens and the Liberals that we should have maintained as our slogan, as our aspiration, in 2011 a slogan of no waste by 2010? (Time expired.)
MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER: The discussion is concluded.
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