Page 3861 - Week 12 - Thursday, 30 October 2014
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Protection Act to date, and while detailed analysis of individual cases may well show good reasons for that, we also know that, in the past, the EPA have been reluctant to take action where they could possibly have done so. I hope that with these new provisions there is a renewed vigour at the EPA to flex their muscles when they need to, for the sake of the environment and for the good of our community. I am pleased to support the bill today.
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for Police and Emergency Services, Minister for the Environment and Minister for Capital Metro) (12.11), in reply: I thank members for their support of this bill.
The territory is a unique jurisdiction comprising modern urban centres, suburban and rural living and infrastructure coupled with large areas of nature for the enjoyment of the community. We really are the bush capital. Modern, effective and efficient environmental laws, including those contained in the bill, aim to protect this environment for the benefit of all Canberrans and all Australians, who have a stake in the national capital.
The act and its regulation are an integrated legislative framework that protects the ACT’s environment by promoting environmental awareness, encouraging progressive environmental improvement, facilitating the implementation of environmental protection measures and providing a regulatory structure to help reduce and eliminate the discharges of pollutants into the air, land and water.
The bill proposes a number of amendments to the Environment Protection Act and its regulation. The proposed amendments may be characterised into three broad areas: firstly, major amendments to the act to implement the recommendations from the 2012-13 review of the territory’s environmental protection laws; secondly, specific activity-related reforms in response to operational experience on the part of the EPA; and, finally, minor and technical amendments to the act and regulation to improve their day-to-day operation.
These amendments will contemporise the act and will assist in its administration. Legislation in other jurisdictions, such as Victoria and Western Australia, also clearly distinguishes between the objects of the act and the principles to be applied to its implementation.
I would like to make a point in relation to the government amendments to the principles of the act in relation to the polluter-pays principle. It was through the scrutiny of bills process and investigation into enforceable undertakings that it became evident that this important principle had not been included in the objects as it should have been. The principle was omitted by error during the drafting stage of the bill. It is moved as a government amendment as it is both urgent and minor or technical in nature.
The polluter-pays principle is essential to the underlying premise of the bill—that is, that polluters should bear the appropriate share of the costs that arise from their activities. While this premise is actually implied and applied throughout the amendments proposed by this bill, it nevertheless needs to be explicitly stated. The amendment will achieve that.
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