Kate Lundy (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Local Government) Share this | Hansard source

Labor will be supporting these amendments primarily because it is consistent to support amendments that give effect to the view we expressed in our second reading amendment, which is that we believe that communities ought to have the right to have a say on nuclear facilities, be they nuclear reactors or locations for nuclear waste—particularly the 25 nuclear power plants that the Howard government wants to impose on the Australian community. We believe that the location of nuclear facilities will have a long-lasting and possibly irreversible impact on communities and that these special and quite extraordinary circumstances raise questions of public policy that are certainly out of the ordinary and warrant this attention.

Labor believe that if the Howard government were fair dinkum about empowering local communities—and we have heard a lot of comment about that in the context of this bill—they would empower them to have a plebiscite on this matter. We think this stands as quite a strong test for the government as to the credibility of their sincerity on this issue. It certainly came up, along with many other ideas about what a plebiscite could be used for, in the course of the Senate inquiry. This issue was a particular standout because, after all, the Howard government has placed it firmly on the agenda for local communities. For the record, we know that many government backbenchers are opposed to the location of nuclear facilities in their own electorates. I would expect that many of them would indeed support the prospect of allowing those communities to have a plebiscite.

We have good reason to be concerned, because there is a great deal of history of coalition governments considering sites for nuclear reactors, dating right back to 1969, when the then Liberal government considered a number of sites, including Jervis Bay, which is part of my electorate, on the coast close to Nowra; the Murrumbidgee River between Williamsdale and Tharwa; Paddys River in the ACT; Bass Point in the electorate of Eden-Monaro; and the Hawkesbury River site at Spencer, which is in the electorate of Robertson. In 1981 the coalition government’s National Energy Advisory Committee considered sites in Perth, Adelaide, Tasmania and Darwin to be suitable for nuclear reactors. In July 1997 a cabinet submission signed off by the then Minister for Science and Technology, Peter McGauran—now the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry—considered sites in Goulburn; Holsworthy; the Mount Lofty Ranges, in the electorate of Mayo, in Adelaide; the river and lakes region of South Australia; Olympic Dam, in the electorate of Grey, in South Australia; Woomera; the electorates of O’Connor, Pearce, Brand and Canning, in Western Australia; Broken Hill; Mount Isa; and Darwin.

On ABC radio on 5 June 2006, Ian Smith, the head of ANSTO, considered sites for four to five nuclear power plants on the east coast of Australia. A feasibility study by the Uranium Enrichment Group of Australia for the Fraser government considered Western Australia, Queensland and South Australia to all have suitable sites. In May 2006 the Australia Institute identified Western Port Bay, in Victoria; Port Stephens, in Paterson, in New South Wales; the Central Coast of New South Wales; areas south of Wollongong, around the electorate of Gilmore; the Sunshine Coast, in the electorate of Fairfax, in Queensland; Port Phillip Bay, in the Corangamite electorate, in Victoria; and Portland, in the electorate of Wannon, in Victoria. On 16 October 2006 Clarence Hardy, the Vice-President of the Pacific Nuclear Council, identified the Gold Coast, Brisbane, Gladstone, Townsville, Newcastle, Cessnock and Perth.

We know the coalition has four decades of form when it comes to advocating nuclear reactors. There have been four decades of determining to impose them on local communities. I call on the coalition to be consistent and to at least allow these amendments. I concur with Senator Murray’s interpretation. While the bill itself is not specific about its application to amalgamations, that is certainly the appropriate interpretation, which therefore justifies inserting these particular amendments into this bill. As I said, Labor will be supporting these amendments and we commend them to the chamber.