Jason Falinski (Mackellar, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Now, after that, we are going to get into something exciting! We are going to talk about the Northern Beaches of Sydney, home to some of the most pristine and beautiful waterways in the country. From the sandy shores of Avalon Beach to the creeks of Bantry Bay, we are very fortunate to live where we do. With this fortune comes a great responsibility: we are responsible for protecting and preserving these waterways and the flora and fauna of which we call them home. It is our responsibility to preserve them for future generations.

It is estimated that between one and 2½ million tonnes of plastic are entering the ocean each year from our waterways. More than half of this plastic is less dense than the water it is entering, which means it will float on the surface. You may have heard of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. This is a collection of marine debris which the currents have pulled together in the north Pacific Ocean, between California and Japan. This garbage patch is largely made up of microplastics and is three times the size of France. It is the result of poor management of our waste and is what we should be working hard to avoid.

Australia generates around 67 million tonnes of waste each year, of which 37 million tonnes is recycled. Only 12 per cent of the 103 kilograms of plastic waste generated per person in Australia each year is recycled, and most of this recycling happens overseas. The government is taking this problem seriously. Let me commend the minister for waste reduction and recycling, Trevor Evans, who is leading the government down the path of smarter waste management.

The Liberal government is building Australia's first domestic recycling capability through its $167 million Australian Recycling Investment Plan. This plan will increase Australia's recycling rates, tackle plastic waste as well as accelerate work on a new battery recycling scheme and halve food waste by 2030. Microbeads are also being phased out, and 94 per cent of cosmetic and personal care products in Australia are already microbead free. Crucially, we are banning the exporting of wasted plastic, paper, glass and tiles. No more will Australia produce plastic waste and then call it someone else's problem. The roughly 67 million tonnes of waste that we produce will be managed here in Australia under strong environmental conditions. This is a priority, as scientist estimates that in just 30 years a time, the weight of plastic in our oceans will exceed the weight of the fish.

Recycling is not only beneficial to our environment but is also a job creator. For every 10,000 tonnes of recycled waste, more than nine jobs are created. Waste management jobs add $6.9 billion to the economy annually. The Liberal government is also encouraging business to come on board and do their bit through its $20 million commitment for innovative projects under round 8 of the Cooperative Research Centres Projects Grants to grow our domestic plastic recycling industry.

Recently, I visited the Mona Vale Woolworths in my electorate where I spoke to Rachel and Lee about how they are reducing their waste and ensuring they do their bit to protect the local environment. Firstly, they have switched their lights to eco-friendly LEDs, which not only use less power but also help to preserve the fresh produce for longer, as they produce less heat. The older lights would cause the fruit and vegetables to wilt faster, thereby also creating more food waste. They also told me that they don't actually turn the lights off, because they undertook a study where they found that reducing the lights at night by 50 per cent uses less electricity than turning the lights on and off. They also were encouraging the use of recyclable paper bags, and the phase-out of plastic bags has proven very successful with their overall plastic use declining year after year. People who buy non-plastic bags have that money donated to local Landcare groups.

Improving waste management and reducing unnecessary packaging while increasing recycling rates is everyone's business. We owe it to the next generation to ensure we provide them with the same pristine, beautiful waterways which we were provided with. (Time expired)

Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Centre Alliance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to support this motion. As a proud South Australian, our state has led the way on waste management for several decades, with the first container deposit scheme in the country starting way back in 1977. The first plastic bag ban in the country started in 2009. Our state government is continuing this good, bipartisan work and is currently exploring how to further expand both of those schemes. The recycling crisis now facing Australia creates both risks and opportunities. South Australia is well positioned to capitalise on those opportunities, and they predominantly involve energy generation and creating circular economy products. South Australia has also had the capacity to work on packaging design, better collection and sorting infrastructure that produces high-quality sorted recyclable materials and the development of Australia's re-manufacturing capacity as well as the end of market for clean material.

Three South Australian councils, the City of Onkaparinga, the City of Marion and the City of Holdfast Bay, have combined to put forward a major proposal located at Seaford Heights that directly addresses the need for local governments to have certainty and greater control over their waste and recycling needs. The group has created the Southern Region Waste Resource Authority and their proposal is to develop and operate a materials recovery facility that manages the domestic kerbside recyclables collections from three councils, but also with a view to service other councils and waste authorities. Key materials would include cardboard, newspapers, mixed paper, glass, steel, aluminium and plastic deposit containers. However, the facility is envisaged to be more than just another big recycling depot. The facility will be one of the first to be developed in Australia since the global changes that resulted from China banning waste imports, and so has been designed to produce recycled material that meets the quality needs of both Australian and international markets.

The vision is to support the co-location of remanufacturing businesses to turn recyclable material into marketable products and to actively engage with research entities and the business sector to fully develop the circular economy south of Adelaide. This includes research into the economics, reverse logistics, manufacturing and material sciences. The hope is that the development will include a start-up incubator and accelerator that will draw together this vision and turn it into practical action. A part of the vision of the three councils is that they can develop a stronger circular economy model that can aspire to replicating in other locations across Australia.

I want to take this opportunity to thank the city of Onkaparinga for working so actively on this issue with me and my office. I also would like to acknowledge Trevor Evans, the Assistant Minister for Waste Reduction and Environmental Management, for being so considerate and constructive in his engagement with me, the councils and state government. I want to thank my office for being very passionate and keen on this. They have been working with the minister to investigate the project and its great potential. Governments at all three levels have a tremendous opportunity to work together to manage the waste and recycling crisis. We can look at it as an opportunity, not as a crisis. I hope that these early shoots of collaboration on the Southern Region Waste Resource Authority are a model of how we can meet this challenge together as a community. Thank you.

Luke Howarth (Petrie, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Community Housing, Homelessness and Community Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of this motion moved by Dr Allen, the member for Higgins. The motion states:

That this House:

(1) recognises the imperative of improving waste management, reducing unnecessary packaging and boosting recycling in Australia;

(2) acknowledges that:

(a) Australians generate about 67 million tonnes of waste each year, of which 37 million tonnes is recycled;

(b) only 12 per cent of the 103 kilograms of plastic waste generated per person in Australia each year is recycled, mostly overseas;

(c) for every 10,000 tonnes of waste recycled, more than 9 jobs are created; and

(d) waste related activities add $6.9 billion to the economy annually;

(3) welcomes the Government's recent $20 million commitment for innovative projects under round 8 of the Cooperative Research Centres Projects grants to grow our domestic plastics recycling industry; and

(4) notes that this is part of the Government's Australian Recycling Investment Plan, a package of initiatives totalling $167 million designed to grow and strengthen Australia's domestic recycling industry, and to support industry and community initiatives to lift recycling rates in Australia.

I support that. While this is an issue that has always been prominent in my mind—as someone who loves the Australian environment—it was brought back to the forefront when I recently met with one of my constituents, Mr Les Barkla. Les is a fundamental part of the 'Pristine peninsula' community group and a very vocal constituent on one of the more important issues affecting Petrie, Australia and the world.

We must not forget that Australia is a large contributor to worldwide waste. Our share of the global waste almost doubles our share of the global population, and a large contributing factor to this is problematic single-use packaging. As someone who loves the environment, freshwater ecosystems and our native reptiles, too often I see this in freshwater creeks and in saltwater creeks. These are items that have such minimal use in our day-to-day lives. They are quickly disposed of, either picked up by volunteers that populate Les's group—there are a number of them and they do a great job—or they end up getting washing into Moreton Bay when my community next has heavy rain. They flow unobstructed through our waterways and into Moreton Bay, with devastating effects on our marine environment.

Some direction can be taken from the 2018-19 Keep Australia Beautiful National Litter Index report. We saw some promising changes, with beaches, parks and residential sites all exhibiting decreases in litter, specifically cigarettes, takeaway containers and paper litter.

However, increases at industrial sites, highways and shopping centres show that there is more work to do. According to the National waste report of 2019, Australia as a nation produces 64 million tonnes of waste each year, which equates to 2.7 tonnes of annual waste per person.

Our government has committed to getting recycling done locally. That's very important to me. We have implemented a comprehensive $167 million Australian Recycling Investment Plan to increase Australia's recycling rates, tackle plastic waste and litter, and accelerate work on new recycling schemes. We will ban the export of waste, plastic, paper, glass and tyres, beginning next year; significantly increase the use of recycled content by governments and industry; and reduce the total waste generated in Australia by 10 per cent per person. All of this is important. We also looked forward to the future last year, with Australia's ambitious but achievable target of making 100 per cent of Australian packaging reusable, recyclable or compostable by 2025 or earlier. That was something that Les raised with me. He would love to see it brought forward earlier.

We have also got great environment initiatives in Moreton Bay. In the Scarborough Marina we soon will have two new sea bins going in to collect waste. They collect a lot of waste, including 90,000 plastic bags per sea bin. We also have environmental projects rolling out in native creeks. We also have a few other things, but I am out of time. It's a very important issue and I'll keep fighting for it.

Steve Georganas (Adelaide, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It gives me great pleasure to speak about this motion on recycling, especially because South Australia, my home state, has shown the way on recycling. As the member for Mayo said, in South Australia we started a deposit scheme with bottles way back in 1977. It was meant to be a controversial thing, but it has worked smoothly for many, many years. We also led in 2009 with plastic and cartons. So for South Australia, this is not a new thing; we have been recycling for many years in our state.

I know that waste management and waste is going to be one of the toughest things to tackle over the coming decade as we see rapid growth in this area, where we use plastics and timbers and a whole range of things, and we use more and more, whether it be batteries, mobile phones, electrical wiring—you name it. There is so much that we use that gets dumped into landfills. We are finding that we have just about seen the end of being able to ship it off, as we have done in the past, and say, 'Waste out of sight, out of mind.' I think those days are soon going to be behind us. We have to be sensible about reducing our carbon footprint and properly focus on our recycling efforts. This is a task for every single citizen and every Australian.

As I said, I am proud to say that South Australia has been doing well in this area and in this space for many, many years. The United Nations reports that less than 10 per cent of all the world's plastic is recycled. South Australia, my home state, diverts more than 80 per cent of its waste from landfill to be reused in the recyclable economy. This economy, driven by renewable flows of energy, is an adjacent model to the linear economy and aims to regenerate a product of material at its end of life, largely thanks to work started under the former Labor state government.

But it is not just up to governments and individuals. Workplaces, offices and factories need to ensure that they are also focused. There is a great organisation in my electorate called Advanced Plastic Recycling, based in Regency Park. Advanced Plastic Recycling has transformed discarded materials into furniture and other alternatives. They have been doing this for the last 16 years. The company converts melted high-density plastic pellets into a wood plastic composite—they use a little bit of wood as well—for private infrastructure pieces. From this material, they make everything from bollards to benches and boardwalks—and many more things. It's a great initiative by Advanced Plastic Recycling, in my electorate, in Regency Park. I congratulate them for having the innovative insight to do this.

Of course, in South Australia, as I said, we've had the container deposit scheme for a very long time, and it's led the nation with a 77 per cent rate of return of containers. While this may be controversial in other states where they are trying to implement it, in South Australia we've been doing it for a long time without a blink of an eye, and 77 per cent is a big return rate of containers. It was just last year that I met with a French delegation that was here in our parliament. They were very interested in the container deposit scheme that we have in South Australia. When they had their talks in South Australia with the government and others, they discussed it to learn ways to turn their minds to waste management and the recycling schemes.

We produce a lot of waste in Australia on a per capita basis, and we don't reuse or recycle nearly enough of it, only a miniscule amount of it. It would be good for the government and everyone involved to take a more national approach to recycling and waste management, like France is saying they're going to do. Just like climate change, we need leadership on this issue. We can't afford to play chicken with our planet any longer. We know that, for example, $6.9 billion is added to the economy from recycling, and, for every 10,000 tonnes of recycled material, nine jobs are created. So there are all positives in this; there are no negatives—we clean up our environment, we create jobs, we add to the economy and we ensure that we don't just dump things in landfills.

Pat Conaghan (Cowper, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak to the motion by the member for Higgins. With today's fast paced life and the way we're living with everything being disposable, the amount of waste and plastic Australians generate has increased significantly. Growing up, there was no such thing as going down to the shop and buying a bottle of water. You either took a container with you or you drank out of the hose in someone's front yard, if you could find one. We need to consider the cans and plastic drink containers we see on the side of the road, thrown out of car windows as rubbish rather than treated like the resource they could be. It's also a travesty that many of the recycled products, or supposedly recycled products, that go into our yellow bins are often not actually recycled.

I'm part of a government that recognises more needs to be done in waste management and recycling in Australia. I'm also someone who looks at waste and recycling as an opportunity. This industry already adds $6.9 billion to our economy and provides nine jobs for every 10 tonnes of waste recycled, so we need to harness this opportunity and build incentives, like our government's Australian recycling investment plan. We need to provide jobs in this sector and carbon abatement measures and do more to educate our citizens better so that plastic and recycled waste is seen as an asset and not as rubbish. And this is precisely what the Australian Recycling Investment Fund has done. This fund has supported projects that increase our recycling rates, turn our waste back into valuable products and encourage innovation so that resources are not lost to landfill or end up in our waterways or our oceans.

One program boosting the amount of plastic recycled in my region is Round 8 of the Australian government's Cooperative Research Centres Projects. This program has just provided $2.5 million to a Coffs Harbour based company, Plastic Collective, to develop recycling machines that turn waste plastics into money or useable products. I've seen the prototype of this machine and it is fantastic. It will change the way we deal with recycling not just in Australia but around the world—and, more importantly, in developing nations and remote communities. The Shruder, as the Plastic Collective's machine is known, shreds hard and soft waste plastic into small flakes. These flakes can either be on-sold for money or heated through the machine's extruder and turned into filament and other moulded plastic products. Countries such as Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia and Thailand have already expressed interest in buying the recycling stations.

Plastic Collective CEO, Louise Hardman, says she's already had international companies line up to buy the plastic recycled flakes for reuse in products like sunglasses and make-up bags. They already have orders to fill 50,000 tonnes of shredded material and this is just one small company in Coffs Harbour. While the Shruder recycling stations are still in the development phase, they already support 50 local people who work on part-time jobs on the project. In the future, should demand for the product grow, and I'm sure it will, I am told that a medium-sized manufacturing facility would be required in Coffs Harbour to build the Shruder recycling stations, creating up to 50 jobs.

There are several other innovative projects happening in Cowper that I would like to mention. One of my favourites is also the Otta-Seal road trials happening in Nambucca and Bellingen. Councils have been trialling the use of the Otta-Seal bitumen road product that is made up of three to 15 per cent recycled truck tyres. For the road aggregate, they are using non-specified quarry products which wouldn't ordinarily be used. A major road project that will start early construction work later this year is the Coffs Harbour bypass, and I am looking forward to examining how recycled products may be used in it.

Improving waste management and boosting recycling hold great possibilities for our nation. We are a large nation with a relatively small population, so it makes sense to use our recycled waste in our roads and in a whole lot of other things.