Page 1609 - Week 05 - Tuesday, 8 May 2018
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in our waterways, which makes for a cleaner and a more sustainable city. The scheme will also create new opportunities for social enterprise and will support local charities.
I cannot fault the scheme that will be rolled out on 30 June. I look forward to continuing to champion it. This bill will ease the introduction of the scheme and create a feasible rollout program for suppliers. I commend the bill to the Assembly.
Mr Wall: What do your New South Wales counterparts say?
MS CHEYNE: It is totally different.
MS FITZHARRIS (Yerrabi—Minister for Health and Wellbeing, Minister for Transport and City Services and Minister for Higher Education, Training and Research) (4.49), in reply: The Waste Management and Resource Recovery Amendment Bill 2018 proposes a minor amendment to the commencement provisions in relation to the upcoming container deposit scheme. This amendment will ensure that the beverage industry has time to adjust its refund marking inclusion on the labels of beverage containers.
The territory’s CDS was established by the Waste Management and Resource Recovery Amendment Act 2017, which was passed in the Assembly in October last year. The government has made significant progress towards the planning and implementation of the scheme since then.
From 30 June 2018 the community will be able to return their empty beverage containers to a network of collection points across the territory for a 10c refund per container. I was very pleased to announce the scheme on 9 April, and we are one step closer to commencing the container deposit scheme and achieving another ACT Labor election commitment.
The CDS will help the community and the beverage industry to reduce litter and promote a cleaner environment. Beverage containers make up one-third of the litter stream in our waterways, parks and roadsides. Based on the experience in South Australia and the Northern Territory, this litter in public places will be reduced as a result of the scheme. In addition local schools, charities and sporting and community groups may benefit by collecting empty cans and bottles and returning them to a collection point to obtain a refund. This will help these organisations raise much-needed revenue for their sporting or community projects.
The scheme has been designed to align with existing schemes in New South Wales, South Australia and the Northern Territory. In particular, the scheme will enable the community to seamlessly access refunds for eligible containers, particularly across the ACT and surrounding New South Wales. The government has been consulting with other jurisdictions, as well as the beverage industry, advisory groups, retailers and the community, regarding the model. These groups will be significant participants in the scheme.
As part of this consultation, the beverage industry has asked for a two-year transition to the new container labelling requirements. Each beverage container which is eligible
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