Page 3168 - Week 09 - Tuesday, 20 August 2019
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Minister Gentleman’s claims that the federal government has abandoned Landcare in the ACT does not align with the evidence taken about the significant funding of the healthy waterways project. Minister Gentleman stated that this significant project was a $15 million contribution from the ACT government and about $80 million from the commonwealth. This was soon corrected by the minister to $8.5 million only from the ACT government and $85 million from the commonwealth, a significant amount.
My colleague Elizabeth Lee and the Canberra Liberals have promised ongoing surety of funding with a four-year funding envelope of $2.4 million over four years for the three catchment groups should we win the 2020 election, showing our appreciation of Landcare’s genuine role in protecting our natural environment in the ACT.
Regarding the Office of the Commissioner for Sustainability and the Environment, the office is always somewhat confusing from a budgetary perspective. The office’s main function is to prepare the state of the environment report once every four years, yet funding envelopes are on a different time frame. That is why the committee recommended that funding be in a single four-year grant to avoid variances each year.
Again, questions were asked about some of the meaningless accountability indicators, including the 100 per cent completion rate of complaint investigations for years when no complaints were received or investigated. That is why the committee has recommended that this accountability indicator not be recorded as 100 per cent success when no work has actually been done.
There was a great deal of discussion about the Heroic and the dammed report on water abstraction charges. The government did not accept the commissioner’s recommendation that the water abstraction charge be directed to catchment management. The committee recommended that moneys raised by the water abstraction charge be hypothecated to preserving drinking water and waterways, rather than just collected in consolidated revenue. That is no doubt what the community rightly expects that money is for.
The commissioner and the committee examined the value of opening up catchment areas and other forest areas for vehicles. This recognises the fine line balance between people getting benefit out of all the ACT has to offer, keeping the fire trails open, and preventing people spoiling the natural environment by bad driving and car dumping.
Regarding the minister for the environment’s time before the committee, feral horses seem to be a preoccupation of many, even though almost none have been sighted in the ACT. Apparently one single lone stallion has been seen occasionally in recent years. Instead, ongoing cooperation between the ACT and New South Wales over appropriate surveillance should put concerns into abeyance. In fact, the committee discovered that it is debatable that pigs and deer are more likely intruders, and their numbers and impact could be more damaging.
The government’s plan to replant Ingledene forest with 500,000 trees at a cost of approximately $3.40 per tree is a positive and well-targeted initiative. The new forest will be able to be accessed and used for a number of outdoor recreational activities, from horseriding to dirt bikes, as well as allowing forestry.
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