Page 865 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 9 April 2014
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company? Did the EPA even notice that the company had not fulfilled its reporting time lines? And what were they able to do about this? What, in fact, did they do? For me, these are important questions. I think the question I am most interested in is: what is the best thing to do now? What are the best measures that this Assembly can take to ensure that we have a clear understanding of the current situation and ensure that there is no repeat of this sort of lack of scrutiny, this lack of oversight, when it comes to monitoring and enforcing environmental licences?
I think it is important that we acknowledge that this all occurred some time ago. It started way back in the late 90s, in fact, during the period of a previous government, and then has continued through a range of ministers and a range of staff at the EPA. What we also know is that Koppers is no longer operating on the site. While Canberra Hire appear to have inherited the legacy that was left, it is quite clear that Koppers is no longer generating the pollution. I think any issues around pollution run-off will be hard to detect. I imagine, from the research that I and my office have been able to do so far, it would be very difficult to mount a case against the company with any sort of prosecution.
The first question that I have out of all that then is: what do we need to know? Firstly, we need to know that there is no ongoing risk to the environment and to human health from any pollution on the site or that has run off the site. I requested in the discussion with Minister Corbell this morning that he ensure that we can be assured, and he agreed to undertake the independent review of testing and the independent assessment of the pollution and any impact on the site. That is contained in his amendment.
I welcome that because we have had reports from the work undertaken by Chris Knaus, the journalist from the Canberra Times, and then the responses from the EPA. In terms of us non-scientists in the room having a really clear sense of what the situation currently is, there is real benefit in having an independent environmental scientist look at the various pieces of analysis that have been done and then form a view on what the current environmental situation is and whether there is any risk to the environment and to human health on an ongoing basis from the pollution at the site.
I welcome the fact that Minister Corbell has agreed to this and I look forward to getting confirmation, on behalf of the community, that there are no further risks. The EPA have certainly indicated in their work and with their recent testing that they think there are not any ongoing risks, and I hope that that is the case. I think that members of the Assembly and the community will be able to more confidently rest assured if this has been evaluated by somebody that has not got skin in the game.
The second thing that we need to know is that such a situation will not occur again. Before we know that, we need to know what the EPA did in response to these circumstances. Were the problems that they faced in monitoring and enforcing this legislative or were they cultural? Was there a reluctance within the EPA to prosecute or did they simply not have the mechanisms and the tools available to them and the capability to enforce the environmental authorisations in a way that the community would expect?
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