Page 4655 - Week 11 - Tuesday, 19 October 2010
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Waste is another area needing attention. Our waste production has increased, unfortunately, by 80 per cent since 1995. Most of our organic waste goes to the tip. We are responsible for the majority of greenhouse gas emissions from the waste sector. We have reached 2010 and we do not have no waste. What we need is a new waste strategy.
One of the positive things of this target is advancing a green economy in the ACT. We all know that eventually all the world is going to adopt stringent greenhouse gas reduction targets. If the ACT does it early, it gives us the chance to develop industries, ideas and skills that we can export. We could export the retrofitting house industry. We could export the green building industry, if we develop it here. We could export ideas like the world-class solar research that is being undertaken at the ANU.
Looking at another of my portfolios, arts, it is clear that arts is going to be part of a positive adaptation to climate change. The arts can show us the full impact of climate change in a way that we can understand. A picture of a totally dried-out piece of land is so much more moving than hearing or reading about it in the paper. There are stories of how it has impacted people. The arts can tell us what climate change really is. Arts can also guide our way in terms of how we are going to adapt to climate change, how we can move positively, how we can make our community stronger and closer, more vibrant, more enjoyable in the context of climate change.
I will finish by saying that we live on one world and we share the climate with all the other humans and all the other species on the world. We need to remember this. We need to act on the old saying “live simply so that all can simply live”.
MS GALLAGHER: (Molonglo—Deputy Chief Minister, Treasurer, Minister for Health and Minister for Industrial Relations) (5.15): I am very pleased to have the opportunity to speak in this debate on this very important piece of legislation before the Assembly. I think one of the previous speakers said that the commitment about achieving the 40 per cent target is important not in itself because of the target but because it has to shape all of government’s thinking in terms of how we provide services and how we provide infrastructure to the community.
I have to say, having been in this place nine years now, I am amazed at the speed with which this debate and community thinking has moved. I know that nine years ago, whilst issues of sustainability were around, they were not at the forefront of consideration in the community to the point that they are now, certainly here in the ACT. I know of the work and the thinking that is going on in my own agencies, and I am going to use ACT Health as a good example of an opportunity that exists in this space as we are setting these targets and developing our health system to be mindful of how we are developing it.
ACT Health and health services in general are a huge user of energy. I was lucky to see some of the developments overseas in Norway and Denmark where they have already begun this very important work around designing buildings for the future with a very strong focus on reducing energy consumption across health services. Indeed, that trip has informed the development of a sustainability strategy in health which has
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