Page 4862 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 11 November 2009
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Environment. I see it in the determination by the Greens for there to be a full-scale inquiry by the Commissioner for Sustainability and the Environment on every aspect of tree management in the ACT. I see it in the concern now in relation to the moratorium which TAMS felt a need to impose in relation to those trees identified as dead, dying or dangerous.
It concerns me that I have staff now too nervous to remove trees that they have identified as dead or dangerous and have imposed a suspension of activity. I am worried about the duty of care. I need this resolved. So I am happy to receive and support an inquiry by the commissioner for sustainability into all of those aspects, in the hope that we can have a fresh start, that we can go forward, and that we can get some consensus even in this place, which would be useful, to go forward in relation to the urban tree program.
But there is no sense in going forward with it when we now have an active investigation by the commissioner. And if the commissioner is going to investigate this, I have asked her to have broad terms of reference so that we cover all of the issues, so that we can go forward confidently, so that TAMS rangers out there trying to do their job are not looking over their shoulder all the time in relation to trees which they have identified as dangerous or potentially dangerous. There are some basic issues of governance here and of municipal administration which we need some confidence to go forward on, and I need to give TAMS the capacity to do that in relation to their day-to-day responsibilities for protecting this community from dangerous trees. (Time expired.)
MR COE (Ginninderra) (4.16): This issue, I think, is an issue that we are just on the cusp of. I think this issue is going to grow and grow and affect more and more people as time goes on here in Canberra. You do not get the joys of living in the bush capital without having the costs of dealing with the trees, at planting, at management and at eventual removal of those trees; thus the cycle is starting again. So it is an important issue and it is an emotional issue for many people.
I know that, especially in the inner north and inner south, where you do have houses that are 80 or 90 years old and many houses that are in the 50 or so age bracket, all these suburbs almost exclusively have trees that were planted at the time of the gazettal of these suburbs. Here you have trees that are the exact same age as all the houses in the suburbs. The trees that exist in these suburbs are synonymous with the actual suburb itself, with the character of the suburb, with the community in that suburb. So it is a very emotional issue and something that I think it is important that we get right.
It is of course important that we do have this dialogue and have this conversation about how to manage it so that we can make sure that we are including everyone in this process. But I am a bit cautious about being too prescriptive on issues such as this. I do see merit in the commissioner for the environment looking at this issue—whether it is in the way that it has been conducted or whether it is in another way, I am not sure—but I think, if the environment commissioner is worth her weight in salt, then this is what she should be doing, looking at issues like this. So I think it is important.
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