Page 902 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 9 March 2016
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With regard to Mr Barr, he seemed to have an argument that “This was all well before my time. I was in high school or primary school when this all happened. Nothing to do with me, guv.” That is not quite true. There are many matters related to Mr Fluffy that happened in Mr Barr’s time. In fact, Mr Berry, a previous Labor leader, in 2004, when he was a minister, said on 25 August 2004:
In the ACT, as a result of the Mr Fluffy efforts, there were, I think it has been said here, about 1,000 houses where asbestos had to be removed. All of the houses were identified and samples were taken from, I think, all ACT residences at the time. I am not quite sure of the detail of that, but there was a massive amount of information collected in relation to those houses. I know that the fire service had a store of that information so that if the fire service was despatched to any of these houses it would know if it had loose asbestos …
It has been an issue that has been debated in this place by many people. Mrs Cross asked questions of Ms Gallagher about this in 2004. Ms Gallagher responded:
The government has been accused of playing politics with matters of life and death on this issue.
These were questions that were being asked in 2004. Mr Barr was not at primary school then. He was actually in Mr Hargreaves’s office, as a staffer and then his chief of staff. He was well aware of these issues. There are many issues that could be examined in the period of time that Mr Barr has been in this place. Some of the issues that need to be clarified, need to be examined, have been covered and litigated in the media and in this place. I will quote from the Canberra Times of 28 August 2014:
ACT Chief Minister Katy Gallagher was warned personally and on multiple occasions since 2005 that Mr Fluffy home owners were at risk of coming into contact with the deadly insulation.
Documents obtained by The Canberra Times show that as industrial relations minister responsible for asbestos, Ms Gallagher received numerous recommendations to deliver “explicit”, “regular” and “systematic” warnings to more than 1000 Mr Fluffy home owners that remnant asbestos within their wall cavities posed a potential health risk.
That was 2005, Madam Deputy Speaker. The article continued:
While all levels of government understood that when the $100 million Commonwealth Removal Program wound up in 1993, some amosite remained and renovations, or even minor work, on these homes could be dangerous, this was not adequately conveyed to the public.
Two independent internal reports—the 2005 Report on the … Asbestos Removal Program, commissioned by the ACT Asbestos Taskforce, and the 2010 Asbestos Management Review, commissioned by the government—both recommended Ms Gallagher put in place stronger protections for buyers potentially purchasing a Mr Fluffy home, renters moving into them, and tradespeople who may work on them.
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