Page 2272 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 9 May 2012
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tabled—at present the minister is only required to respond to the state of the environment reports—and remove the option for the minister to respond with a statement of why a response has not been tabled after six months.
I understand that the reason given by Mr Rattenbury for having the commissioner’s reports tabled by the Speaker rather than the minister is largely driven by his interest in keeping the role of the commissioner independent. It is worth while to note that clause 13 of the bill sets out tabling arrangements that replicate the Auditor-General Act 1996, sections 17(4) and 17(5). There was also the incident involving the delay on the part of Minister Corbell, where he was provided with the latest state of the environment report last December, yet it was only last month that it was tabled in the Assembly.
It is perhaps worth while at this juncture to consider some of the findings in the latest state of the environment report. Canberra’s ecological footprint is 13 per cent above the Australian average, the second highest in the country, behind Perth. Canberrans are using 13 times the amount of land in the ACT to support their lifestyles. Greenhouse gas emissions have increased by eight per cent over the last five years. Waste generation is up 28 per cent faster than the rate of population growth. Green spaces have decreased by nine per cent over the last four years. And this is what the report had to say about green power:
While awareness of GreenPower in the ACT is 66%, the percentage of people who actually purchase GreenPower in the ACT is 4.9% indicating that awareness and action do not always correlate.
Mr Rattenbury’s position on this is quite clear. Here is what he said: “The Gallagher government’s policies were driving the territory in completely the wrong direction. The government’s ‘business as usual’ policies are driving the ACT in the wrong direction. The good news stories coming out of this report are almost all community-based actions, the failings are largely on the government’s end. The government’s inaction on sustainable transport, organic waste and protecting biodiversity are clear lowlights. What we need the government to do now is implement recommendations rather than write more strategy documents.”
There is more than a hint of irony in this. The state of the environment report is released every four years. We are in the fourth year of this Assembly with the ACT Labor-Greens government and they have just brought out one of the worst environmental report cards this city has ever seen. This is a tough hit to the Greens brand, and I can understand why Mr Rattenbury is particularly sensitive about it.
This is a Greens party which has the balance of power, which is part of a coalition. We expect the cost increases under the Greens. We expect the tax increases. But we would not think that even the environment would go backwards at a rate of knots where the Greens have the balance of power, where they control the fate of the government. It is in their hands. It is a big hit to the Greens brand, the one thing they had left, credibility on the environment. The state of the environment report says things have actually got worse, significantly worse, over the time of this Greens-Labor government.
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