Page 1786 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 5 May 2010
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rarely able to effectively replace habitats that are lost in urban expansion. On the second point, it is far harder and requires far more effort and resources to manage areas that are adjacent to urban areas, purely because of the impacts that we as humans have on our natural environment.
Putting aside reserve areas throughout the land release program is not the end of the story. In fact, the opposite is true, that management of those reserve areas needs to be more active than before the urban development started and a portion of the resources that we raise by selling the land must be allocated for protection of our parks and reserves that will surround our urban footprint. Too often the natural areas are left until the end and have to fight for resources, whereas in fact plans and funding should be built into the process and acted on.
I note that the ACT government will have some obligations out at Molonglo under the federal EPBC Act, though I appreciate they are not yet locked in. And it is precisely these kinds of obligations that the government should roll into their planning, not tacking it on at the end. The Kama woodland out at Molonglo, for example, was declared two years ago; yet the current proposal is that a management plan for Kama should not be required for at least another three years. And why would it not be undertaken now so that the woodland can be protected early and the management plan set in place before the development pressures increase?
Selling government assets is easy. What is more difficult is creating an economic environment that fosters growth in future sustainable industries that will support the underlying economic future of the ACT. Our economy must change. We must move away from such a heavy reliance on land release and the old carbon-intensive way of doing things. And we must move towards the green economy.
Low carbon is not part of the future economy. It is the future economy. Economic leaders the world over have acknowledged this fact and the sooner we act and take advantage of skills, the greater the benefits that will flow to the territory. It is interesting to note that Access Economics, if we go back to the quote that I noted earlier in this speech, praises us for acting early. And I hope we can learn the lesson that it does pay to act early.
There are significant challenges in front of us. Acknowledging and implementing measures that address climate change and an ageing population and move us to a more productive, green and sustainable economy are the most important issues for us to address now.
Through the discussion on a larger Canberra, I would also like to take the opportunity to reiterate the Greens’ commitment to public housing and to make the point that it is critical that the ACT government continue to consistently work towards public housing making up 10 per cent of housing stock in the ACT, as detailed in the ALP-Greens parliamentary agreement. The federal government’s stimulus housing package does make a significant contribution towards the ACT meeting this goal but it is also important that the ACT government back them up and sustain and build on these numbers.
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