Page 4997 - Week 12 - Tuesday, 26 October 2010
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action. If the government believes in the cost benefit of the environment—environmental benefits and the economic costs—it should have no problem whatsoever with making this information public as part of this statement.
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for the Environment, Climate Change and Water, Minister for Energy and Minister for Police and Emergency Services) (11.13): This is not about avoiding scrutiny of those costs; it is about at what point that occurs. This statement is, by necessity, a broad-brush statement. To underpin that, I draw the opposition’s attention to proposed clause 11A(2), which requires that the minister must, within six sitting days after receiving the ICRC report, present the statement to the Assembly setting out why the target was not met and what action will be taken. That is, by necessity, a broad-brush response, because the minister has only six sitting days to prepare it. I am sure that Mr Seselja and the opposition would want a much more detailed proposal about the cost and benefit of a range of measures to be put to the Assembly. If he seriously thinks that the government can do it within six sitting days of receiving the ICRC report, he is just plain wrong.
The appropriate place for the scrutiny in terms of cost and benefit is in the proposals that come forward through the budget process, where they can be subjected to detailed scrutiny through the estimates process and through this place during the budget debate itself. Or, if it is a legislative response in the debate that occurs on specific bills with specific proposals, that again can occur in this place. That is where that scrutiny and that assessment of the cost and benefit should occur. And the government agrees that that is where it should occur.
To suggest that it should occur at this point fails to have regard to the time frames that are set out in this proposed new clause and the fact that it would simply be impossible for the government to provide a detailed cost-benefit analysis within six sitting days of receiving a report from the ICRC in relation to a performance against certain targets. That is the reason the government does not agree to Mr Seselja’s amendment.
MRS DUNNE (Ginninderra) (11.15): The approach of the government and the Greens on this is a very disappointing one and goes to highlight the concerns that the Canberra Liberals have about some of the aspects of this legislation. This is an “all care and no responsibility” sort of bill. What will happen is that measures will be brought forward in the context that has been created as a result of the passage of this legislation. This legislation does not create a mechanism whereby the people of the ACT are informed about the impact of that legislation.
We all know—we all agree; we have signed on to the fact—that this will be expensive for the people of the ACT. What Mr Seselja’s amendment does is require that, step by step, phase by phase, as the individual components of that expense become known, they are reported, through the Assembly, to the people of the ACT, so that step by step, phase by phase, the people of the ACT know what impact that is going to have on their bottom lines, on their hip pockets.
It is not sufficient to say that this will be covered in the budget. The budget is a multitude of initiatives, and it takes a very long time for all of those to become
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