Site Contamination, Clovelly Park and Mitchell Park

The Hon. K.L. VINCENT (14:29): Supplementary question: given that TCE poses a particular risk to pregnant women, did the minister, when doorknocking the residents of Clovelly Park, make a particular effort to warn pregnant women of the potential risk of congenital heart defects in newborns?

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation, Minister for Water and the River Murray, Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and Reconciliation) (14:29): It is important to understand in all this that the advice from the Department of Health is that the level of TCE coming up through the soil from the contaminated groundwater is such a very low level that it is unlikely that any resident was exposed to this chemical in a way that would have caused them any health dangers at all.

It is important to understand that the occupational limit for exposure to TCE in the workplace is 27,000 times higher, I am advised, than the level that was found in these houses—27,000 times higher. This is occupational exposure, eight hours a day, five days a week, and that is 27,000 times higher at 54 milligrams per cubic metre. The World Health Organisation advises that the levels discovered in the houses of two micrograms—not milligrams, but micrograms—per metre squared are sufficient to inquire further. That is the extent of the information. I repeat again: the Department of Health is of the view that the levels found in this report are of a level that would not have an adverse impact on any of the residents in their health.