Page 676 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 24 February 2010
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But back to the focus of this motion today, the home insulation program: first officially announced on 3 February 2009, it commenced on 1 July that year and was intended to last 2½ years. The original intention of the program was to provide $2.7 billion worth of insulation across 2.2 million homes, providing rebates of up to $1,600. In anyone’s lexicon it was definitely a big rollout.
It would be fair to say that the federal government’s main agenda here may not have been the effective rollout of energy efficiency programs but, rather, the injection of the stimulus into the economy. While the Greens support the intention of this program—to insulate the nation’s homes—there is no doubt in anyone’s mind now that this program has not been well managed.
There was inadequate training of insulation installers and clearly a perception that work would not be audited—leading to poor workmanship and instances where insulation was not installed at all. Poorly installed insulation has resulted in fires. I think the problems with installation of foil have been well discussed in the media.
The other fault identified in the program was the impact of price gouging—charging the government for jobs at the maximum rate of $1,600, even though the true cost was frequently much less.
But, as we have heard over and over, the main problem for the federal environment minister was that he failed to pay enough heed to the warnings that the implementation of the program was too rushed, including that this would result in a high risk of fires and of rorting. But the environment minister was one cog in a systemic-wide failure. The government has rushed out too many one-off programs in a boom and bust cycle—too many quick fixes, too many rushed media conferences and too many small programs for a few hundred thousand houses; programs that drive business interest and that are wound back without notice.
So what responsibility did the ACT government have in the middle of all of this? The ACT government has revealed that, despite ACTPLA officials attending a conference call with state and commonwealth colleagues that raised safety concerns in April, the Office of Regulatory Services did not issue a formal hazard alert until November. Furthermore, a number of questions remain as to what proactive measures the government took to ensure that safety standards were upheld, beyond issuing a hazard alert five months after becoming aware of potential dangers. Whilst we acknowledge that WorkCover is currently undergoing a review of operations, it would appear that the government has again taken a hands-off approach, waiting until problems are reported rather than taking a proactive approach of inspection and prevention.
Moreover, where a government official has been part of a conversation which specifically warned about the dangers of the rollout of the insulation program, it is wholly inadequate for the government to sit back and say, “There have been no complaints.” The Attorney-General, quite disingenuously in my view, claimed that the warning issued in February last year, which was prior to the insulation rollout being announced, was sufficient warning to the public for a major insulation rollout that the government was aware had particular potential for danger. The government had the
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