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House of Assembly - Fifty-First Parliament, Third Session (51-3)
2008-11-26 Daily Xml
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STATE OF OUR ENVIRONMENT REPORT

Mr WILLIAMS (MacKillop) (14:53): My question is to the Premier. Does the Premier accept responsibility for the concerns expressed in recommendations in the EPA's report card, 'The State of Our Environment', released today that, under his government, results are not being achieved on a key range of environmental issues? Today the EPA released its five-yearly report card into the state of the environment in South Australia and it documents 'continually declining trends for many indicators of environmental health'.

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL (Cheltenham—Minister for Environment and Conservation, Minister for Early Childhood Development, Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and Reconciliation, Minister Assisting the Premier in Cabinet Business and Public Sector Management) (14:53): I love it when the Tories turn green.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL: That's right! This is a bloke who thought that climate change was a bad poll. He has no idea, and it is new found. I notice we see in today's 'Tiser that we need not have waited for the State of Our Environment report. We have the shadow minister for the environment telling us what was in it, and he got it all wrong because he made a few guesses. He made a guess about stormwater and recycling, and said that we had failed on that. Of course, he got that wrong because the independent authority, the EPA, confirm that we actually do this better than anywhere else in Australia.

I thought that the EPA was good. I was prepared to settle for the independent authority saying that we were doing it better than anywhere else, but in fact a Liberal senator goes one step further. Senator Birmingham today on radio was asked about whether he could suggest some things Melbourne could do to replace this water that it wanted to rip out of the River Murray. He said:

All of the same things that Adelaide's talking about. Increasing the size of Melbourne's desal plant as proposed, looking at stormwater recycling and harvesting, looking at recycling water more which Adelaide is a world leader in—so many options of things that could be done.

What we have here from those opposite is a complete set of disingenuous points they make about the environment, because, when the real tests come (say, for instance, in the lead-up to an election), what do we hear about some of these big issues? What do we hear about the big issues about how we deal with water, the things that take pressure off the River Murray? This was the election policy for the Liberals concerning water at the last election:

By 2009 a Liberal government will sign off on a strategy and timetable to remove both reliance on the Murray and any future need for lifestyle threatening water restrictions.

A plan for a plan! Then, what was their plan for stormwater reuse and wastewater reuse at the last election? Where was the sophisticated costed plan in the lead-up to this period of government in the last election? You go through 'A Plan for a Sustainable Future'—and it has a lot of pages—

The Hon. M.J. Atkinson: Who was the shadow?

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL: I am not sure who the shadow was in those days. There are 27 pages. I was searching for the bit about water in 'Sustainability', especially the bit about stormwater and wastewater reuse, and I found it. It is buried in 'Coast and Marine'. The second to last dot point says this, and it is a very sophisticated policy and I ask members to listen to this carefully:

...encourage the reuse of stormwater and wastewater.

That is the extent—

Members interjecting:

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL: That is all there is. It really is difficult to hear members opposite make points about the environment because they really do not care about it. Every now and then they toe in off what they think might be some bad news. They got a bad shock. In many respects we were endorsed for a number of the important steps that we are taking in this area. There is no doubt that our environment is under stress. We are in a period of extreme drought. We are in a period of what appears to be climate change. There is no doubt that our environment is under extreme stress.

The Hon. M.J. Atkinson interjecting:

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL: That's right; the climate change—

The Hon. M.J. Atkinson: The member for Hammond.

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL: That's right; the climate change deniers have now turned into—

The Hon. M.J. Atkinson interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The Attorney will come to order!

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL: There is no doubt that substantial areas identified in the State of the Environment report are of great concern. The Lower Lakes and the Coorong in particular is a source of grave concern to us. The Minister for Water Security has secured an extraordinarily important breakthrough just in recent weeks to ensure that this part of South Australia is managed specifically and managed as part of one river, and not managed just as the responsibility of South Australia but managed under the auspices of the Murray-Darling Authority to ensure that we take urgent steps to deal with the ecological health of that very threatened ecosystem.

We take seriously our commitment to the environment. The report documents a number of respects in which we lead not only Australia but the world. But, of course, there are many other areas about which we need to do substantial work.

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