General Purpose Standing Committee No. 5

Debate resumed from 13 May 2009.

Mr IAN COHEN [2.32 p.m.]: I feel that the poor performance outlined in the Waste Avoidance and Resource Recovery Report 2008 will continue to be discussed during this year's budget estimates hearings. The New South Wales Government cannot continue to collect record levels of funding from the landfill levy without an accompanying obligation to reduce waste generation and increase recycling rates. Local councils are screaming for innovative waste management strategies and extended producer responsibility schemes. They want the reinvestment of the landfill levy to deliver real outcomes for waste avoidance and resource recovery, yet we are not seeing that.

The Hon Robert Brown and I raised during the committee's hearings the issue of river red gums, albeit from somewhat different positions. From the Greens point of view, it is not acceptable that the river red gums in the Riverina area are the only major forested region in New South Wales that has not been subject to a regional assessment and has never received a valid legal approval for forestry operations under either the New South Wales Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 or the Federal Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999. The Minister did make representations that current environmental impact statement [EIS] processes under part 3A may not deliver the information required and I will be taking this matter up with the Minister again. Broadly, we must be ensuring that all the necessary assessments are undertaken in order to fully inform decisions about future protection and ecosystem management. The river red gum system and the Ramsar site are too precious to manage without full and informed understanding of the diverse ecosystem traits of the area.

The other hot topic was the joint New South Wales and Federal Government purchase of Toorale Station at Bourke. I anticipate that budget estimates hearings on the environment will continue to focus on Government acquisition—not compulsory acquisition but acquisition from willing sellers—of natural resources such as water, biodiversity and land. Some committee members have raised concerns about Government management models for these lands. Strategic Government purchase of ecosystems and natural resources are often purchased on a regional landscape or at statewide level. They are envisaged to be part of a comprehensive, adequate and representative system or to deliver catchment-wide benefits.

Turning to the Primary Industries hearing, one of the topics receiving attention was the reform to the Rural Lands Protection Boards [RLPBs] now operating under the moniker of Livestock Health and Pest Authorities. At that time the legislation had not been introduced and questions to the Minister focused on the IMC Report. It is certainly interesting to revisit some of the points made by the Minister in response to questions about administrative efficiency. In particular, I recall a response to a question asked by the Hon. Robert Brown about whether the reforms will cause a reduction in farm gate services. The Minister stated:

A range of changing circumstance such as climate variability, increasing demands from ratepayers and the ongoing record drought will continue to put pressure on the current system. These changes, along with the changing regulatory environment, have seen an increase in administrative costs. Without action these costs would continue to rise

The Rural Lands Protection Amendment Bill was passed late last year. Action has been taken and reform implemented, yet we are witnessing astronomical increases in rate levies and the levying of landholders who have established wildlife refuges or conservation covenants for locust control activities that have no impact upon them. During the discussion of reform to the rural lands protection boards the Minister for Primary Industries was required to defend the Government's funding priorities for climate change mitigation. Specifically, the Hon. Rick Colless and I challenged the Minister about balancing funding for clean coal projects with soil carbon sequestration research and development.

While I acknowledge that different levels of greenhouse gas are emitted from coal-fired power plants and agriculture, the output differential does not in any way justify the funding disparity, considering the significant agricultural management benefits of soil carbon sequestration techniques. The amount of funding for the National Centre for Rural Greenhouse Gas Research compared with the contribution to the Clean Coal Fund by the Government is not achieving what I would term a multidimensional approach to climate change mitigation, and it in no way attempts to address other environmental challenges including ecosystem depletion.

The final issue I want to highlight relates to the protection of agricultural land within the Sydney Basin. I am certainly heartened by the Minister's response on this issue, both at the committee hearing and more broadly in this House. As the Minister acknowledged, agricultural production output from the Sydney Basin is valued at about a billion dollars annually. Urban encroachment on farming acreage within the Sydney Basin is becoming an increasingly problematic planning issue with the blinkered-vision Department of Planning bureaucrats peddling planning decisions oblivious to the impacts of reducing agricultural activity in the Sydney Basin.

During the Water, Rural Affairs and Regional Development hearing a number of pertinent issues were canvassed. The desalination plant at Kurnell, the Tillegra Dam and the Kangaloon aquifer all continued to raise public concern. Part of the public opposition to those projects and the basis of opposition with which I strongly concur is that those centralised large-scale water infrastructure projects are often accompanied by significant ecological impacts and are not cost-effective compared with more decentralised options. For example, constructing the Kangaloon bore field was costed at $95 million and considered necessary to provide for Sydney's emergency water planning. As I asked the Minister, who has installed water tanks on his property, how many water tanks could the Government subsidise for homes across New South Wales with that $95 million?

Decentralised solutions such as rainwater tanks are often overlooked as real alternatives in comparative environmental impact statements and relegated as some utopian diversion from the inherent logic and rationality of large-scale infrastructure projects. From my perspective, the measuring of those alternatives is important. Water tanks in rural and urban areas can deliver far more than their stated capacity. If properly managed, a 5,000-litre water tank saves not just 5,000 litres of water: the tank's capacity can be used many times over. However, it is often said that the water-saving capacity of a tank is not good enough. That is one of the Government's great misunderstandings.

The Government wants massive, centralised infrastructure projects, at huge expense. Nothing is a more blatant millstone around the neck of the Government than the desalination plant, which is absolutely inappropriate. Other members of this House put forward many other perspectives. During the last election campaign the Opposition announced its water plan and its consideration of sewage reuse. Those plans left the Government's plans far behind. When senior Government members, including the Premier, in election mode accused the Opposition of wanting the people of Sydney to consume their own effluent that was a cheap political trick that stopped a move forward to a sustainable water economy. The Government should be held responsible for its philistine attitude on this matter.

I thank the members of the committee and all the committee staff for their participation in the budget estimates process. The hard work of the committee staff is greatly appreciated, and without committee staff guidance the hearing would not run anywhere near as smoothly or efficiently. When reading the transcript I noted that the committee members had really honed in on some very important topics, albeit from different political positions. The committee functioned very effectively, especially compared with the style and manner in which other committees were operating. Having said that, the effective oversight of the committee and its general functions are equally dependent upon mature and responsible ministerial engagement with the committee. In almost all hearings that was the behaviour exhibited. I look forward to this year's estimates process and am hopeful that the committee can continue its good work. I commend the report to the House.

Question—That the House take note of the report—put and resolved in the affirmative.

Motion agreed to.