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Legislative Council - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2010-11-24 Daily Xml
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WASTE AND LANDFILL POLICIES

Adjourned debate on motion of Hon. J.M.A. Lensink:

That the Environment, Resources and Development Committee inquire into and report on the Environment Protection Authority's Environment Protection (Waste to Resources) policy and the standard for the production of use of waste derived fill.

(Continued from 27 October 2010.)

The Hon. CARMEL ZOLLO (23:15): In response to the motion raised by the Hon. Ms Lensink, I indicate that the government opposes the motion.

The Hon. J.M.A. Lensink: Crikey, you oppose everything!

The Hon. CARMEL ZOLLO: Well, there you are. The advice provided to me is that the EPA's Waste to Resources Policy was provided to the Environment, Resources and Development Committee, along with a regulatory impact statement, earlier this year and tabled in parliament.

The regulatory impact statement specifically addressed landfill bans and illegal dumping. The government believes resending this matter to the committee, in this form, would amount to unnecessary duplication of a process that the committee has already had an opportunity to undertake, or can undertake.

As a member of the committee I am, however, aware that there is some confusion as to whether the reference for this particular policy was received and, as such, the committee has not yet commenced any analysis of the Waste to Resources Policy, in order to make its comments. I do hasten to add that the policy can simply be resent.

All that aside, I would like to respond to specific concerns raised by the Hon. Ms Lensink with the Waste to Resources Policy, relating to the timing and implementation of the landfill bans, particularly e-waste, and the ability of the EPA and local government to deal with illegal dumping. The Waste to Resources Policy and the landfill bans aim to support the South Australian waste strategy, including the targets for diversion of waste from landfill.

The staged timing of the landfill bans was deliberately structured to operate in a complementary manner with existing, or anticipated, alternative treatment pathways. There are existing alternatives to landfill disposal for the materials banned from landfill on 1 September 2010.

In preparation for the future landfill bans, in its business plan, Zero Waste SA has identified specific tasks relating to developing strategies to support and underpin the landfill bans listed in the Waste to Resources Policy. These strategies may include investigating funding options to assist with waste management. Zero Waste SA will work with the EPA, local government, the recycling industry and other key stakeholders in formulating these strategies.

The commencement of the bans can be suspended by the EPA where such alternatives have not been developed in time. While illegal dumping has been a significant and ongoing issue for the EPA and local government, the Waste to Resources Policy contains a provision which prohibits the unlawful disposal or stockpiling of waste. This provision contains high penalties for illegal dumping and seeks to address certain evidentiary issues associated with the disposal of inappropriately managed inert wastes. The EPA is currently investigating methods for maximising the benefits from this provision of the Waste to Resources Policy.

In relation to the regional grant program to progress waste management initiatives, this program is delivered by Zero Waste South Australia and is known as the Regional Implementation Program. I am advised that this program was not cancelled in 2009, but rather the program was reviewed to seek feedback from stakeholders on any barriers experienced in implementing projects, to identify opportunities for improvement and to gauge future demand. This review was undertaken in late 2009 and was vital in identifying areas for improvement which included:

continued funding of the program to encourage and enhance the recovery of materials from country areas;

to provide a more flexible approach to funding in order to cater for the different needs in regions, including support through provision of planning expertise, provision of regional waste coordinators where co-funded on a regional basis, and more funds for demonstrated collaborative regional projects; and

streamlining the process for evaluating and selecting funding recipients.

Key recommendations of the review have been incorporated into the next funding round of the Regional Implementation Program, and in July 2010 the Minister for Environment and Conservation announced that $1.6 million will be made available over three years for projects in regional areas.

In relation to the Zero Waste SA Environment Users System, which has also been referred to, I am advised that implementation of the system (known as ZEUS) began in the 2007-08 financial year and was implemented in June 2009. ZEUS allows the electronic capture, storage and reporting of waste and recycling data across metropolitan and non-metropolitan areas and at a state level for South Australia.

Following implementation, Zero Waste SA has been collecting illegal dumping and municipal solid waste data volunteered from metropolitan and non-metropolitan councils across the state, with an aim to assist councils to identify hot spots for illegal dumping. Zero Waste SA has worked closely with local government to train council staff in the use of ZEUS, particularly in entering illegal dumping incidences. Fifty persons from 25 councils have so far been trained in the use of ZEUS. Zero Waste SA is eager for more councils, external agencies and industry to start using ZEUS and will continue working to increase its uptake.

The standard for the protection and use of waste-derived fill currently contains both the regulatory expectations and guidance on resource recovery principles. The EPA is in the process of reviewing the standard to ensure the regulatory expectations are differentiated from the guidance. This review will assist with the readability of the document and reduce incidence of confusion. An examination by the committee at this time would be premature.

The standard was developed in response to calls from industry for greater certainty as to what does and what does not constitute a waste, and to move away from using costly court action to resolve disputes. Under the Environment Protection Act 1993, any soil excavated and removed from a site is considered a waste and the receipt of this soil requires an EPA licence or limited purposes declaration. The standard provides for soil to be re-used as fill rather than disposed to landfill, but does not prevent waste soil from going to landfill.

Prescribed bodies, industry associations and all EPA licensees were advised on the intent to develop a standard for waste-derived fill and invited to participate. Those 100 parties who indicated interest, including the Civil Contractors Federation, were advised on the draft document on 9 April 2009. In addition, the standard was released publicly on the EPA website.

The EPA reviewed the responses and considered them in amending the standard; however, no submission was received from the Civil Contractors Federation. The revised standard was released on 12 January 2010, accompanied by a Response to Submissions, which outlined the changes made or the reason changes were not made.

The standard is consistent with and clarifies the approach previously taken by the EPA for the use of waste soil as fill. Under specified circumstances, the standard expands on the types of waste soil that may be re-used as fill rather than disposed to landfill, thus providing more options for re-using waste, which supports the waste hierarchy and reduces the burden on virgin materials.

For all the reasons I have outlined, the government does not support the motion of the Hon. Ms Lensink and urges the chamber to vote against the motion.

The Hon. M. PARNELL (23:24): This motion should effectively be in the category described as a 'no brainer'. The reason I say that is that, under the Environment Protection Act, all of these environment protection policies must be referred to the ERD Committee, and they are referred to the ERD Committee for inquiry and, if the committee desires, report.

So it is part of the statutory regime that this committee looks at these policies. The question then arises, why have we not looked at it already? The answer is that it came in that period before the election when parliamentary committees were not sitting, and the period for comment expired before the ERD committee was re-established. That is my understanding of the time frame.

What I think that says to those of us on the committee is that we need the same sort of law reform in the Environment Protection Act that we have in the Development Act, because in the Development Act it says that if one of these documents that the ERD committee has the right to comment on comes along during the Christmas/New Year period, then the clock stops; you wait until parliament starts again and then the committee gets a look at it. So, we should have the same provision. If we had had that provision here, we would have looked at this policy already.

So I am not proposing to go into the merits or otherwise of what might be found when inquiring into it, as the Hon. Carmel Zollo did. I do not need to do that. I have an open mind about the pros and cons of this policy, but at its most basic level this motion just says that it be referred to the committee. One of the reasons that it is appropriate to refer it to a house of parliament, rather than the committee just agreeing to look at it itself, is that this guarantees that it will get on the agenda if it goes through. I think that is why the Hon. Michelle Lensink has done it that way.

Really, this motion does nothing more than remedy an error in legislation which makes it possible for an environment protection policy to slip through the net by virtue of it having been promulgated and referred to the ERD committee in a period when we are not sitting. It is as simple as that, so I can see no reason not to support this motion. The Greens certainly do support it, but not with any particular outcome in mind. We just think it should be referred, because it slipped through the net back in February and March this year, and there is no reason for it not to come back to the committee for an inquiry now.

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD (23:27): I think the Hon. Mr Parnell said it very well. Unlike in the previous bill, I agree with him on this occasion, and so Family First will also support the motion.

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK (23:27): I will be brief, given the hour, but I could not let some of these comments from the government go past without responding. I too, like the Hon. Mark Parnell, have an open mind on this issue. I think broadly there is a lot of support for the work of the EPA in developing these policies and so forth, but there is no harm in having a look at them, particularly when statutory responsibility to look at these policies has not gone through the process that it ought to have.

It beggars belief that the government keeps opposing things like this. It is not going to change the world; the sky is not going to fall in; we are not going to disallow the policy; and things are not going to stop operating the way they are. It is almost as if they have an attitude of, 'We're from the government and we have got it all covered; don’t worry; parliament doesn't need any oversight of these things.'

In particular, the first policy in this motion has a huge impact on the local government sector. They do the lion’s share of implementing our waste policies and, from what they have said, in certain instances, certain councils, particularly in the country, are having difficulty; they would like some help and they think that some of this is unreasonable. So what is the harm in getting everybody in to tell us what they think? We may well be able to make recommendations to the government that improve the policy.

In relation to the second one, which is the standard for production and use of waste-derived fill, I am bemused that the government says that this policy is already being reviewed, when the draft came out only in 2009. So, I think it is another case of the government has decided that it will announce a review to use that as an argument to block the parliament from reviewing something. The government really ought to appreciate the role of the standing committees. We can do some really useful work that it does not need to be scared of.

It is not going to get a bad headline; in fact, it is more likely to get bad headlines by blocking our reviews, which is what has happened in the instance of this committee. I will continue to push for this committee to do its work, because we are well remunerated. With those words, I thank honourable members for their contributions and would like the government to review its resistance to looking at any policy which is not one of its own making, because it does not really have as much to be afraid of as it thinks it does.

Motion carried.

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