Michael Forshaw (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I have to say that the speech by Senator Sterle is a tough act to follow. I note that I have about three or four minutes to speak on the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation Amendment Bill 2006 before we move to question time. That is a heck of a lot less than even the half-life of technetium 99, which is about 30 minutes. I will commence my remarks now and will no doubt return to them at a later time.

I think I am destined to make speeches in this chamber on nuclear issues until I leave. There might be some people who think, ‘Hopefully, that is not too far away.’ It is an issue that I have spoken on on many occasions in the Senate or at Senate committee hearings. Indeed, I have participated in a number of committee inquiries, in particular into issues surrounding the decision to build a new reactor at Lucas Heights. I will not bore everybody or drive everybody mad by going back over all of that history, but I mention it because I find it interesting that some participants in the debate on this bill—both here and in the other place—have only recently discovered the importance of the issue about what we do about disposing of nuclear waste—how we handle it and what is the appropriate role for ANSTO in that process.

I remind the Senate that, back in 1993, when Labor was in power, the government commissioned a report that became known as the McKinnon report. It was the report of the research reactor review. Two important recommendations came out of that report. The first was that, before any final decision was made about whether or not we should build a new reactor to replace the HIFAR reactor at Lucas Heights, there should be a proper, detailed consideration of alternative sites to Lucas Heights. The second clear recommendation was that there should be evidence that the issue of treating, storing and disposing of nuclear waste had been advanced to a point where there was clearly evidence of a system that could be introduced to deal with that issue.

At a later time in the debate, I will return to expand on my comments in regard to this bill.

Debate interrupted.