❓ Opposition questions the Minister about WA's delay in signing the national action plan on salinity and water quality, contrasting it with progress in Victoria and Queensland. The Minister defends the government's position, blaming the Commonwealth for delays and highlighting WA's existing salinity spending.
AnsweredQoN 755Legislative Assembly
QuestionView source ↗
I refer to the minister’s refusal to advise her Government to sign off on the national action plan on salinity and water quality, which has put at risk $158 million of commonwealth funding, and her comments to this House on 20 February that, although some States have signed the agreement, the only State to which money has flowed is South Australia. (1) Is the minister aware that the Victorian Labor Government has announced $15.8 million in NAP funding from the Commonwealth? (2) Is the minister aware that last week, the Queensland Labor Government signed the bilateral agreement with the Commonwealth, which has paved the way for that State to receive its total allocation of $162 million? (3) Is the minister planing to contact her Labor colleagues in those States to find out how they managed to reach agreement? (4) Will she continue to insist that her refusal to sign is somehow the Commonwealth’s fault and not because of her Government’s policy to withdraw all salinity funding from this year’s budget? Dr EDWARDS
AnswerView source ↗
I thank the member for some notice of this question and I apologise if members have a sense of deja vu when we debate the matter of public interest that the Leader of the National Party intends to move later, because the MPI is on this topic. The member is entirely wrong in portraying the Government as reluctant to sign the agreement. We do want to sign the intergovernmental agreement for the national action plan on salinity. We have been very clear for a year that we want to sign the document and move on. We want to see commonwealth money flowing into the State. The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
(1) Is the minister aware that the Victorian Labor Government has announced $15.8 million in NAP funding from the Commonwealth? (2) Is the minister aware that last week, the Queensland Labor Government signed the bilateral agreement with the Commonwealth, which has paved the way for that State to receive its total allocation of $162 million? (3) Is the minister planing to contact her Labor colleagues in those States to find out how they managed to reach agreement? (4) Will she continue to insist that her refusal to sign is somehow the Commonwealth’s fault and not because of her Government’s policy to withdraw all salinity funding from this year’s budget? Dr EDWARDS replied: I thank the member for some notice of this question and I apologise if members have a sense of deja vu when we debate the matter of public interest that the Leader of the National Party intends to move later, because the MPI is on this topic. The member is entirely wrong in portraying the Government as reluctant to sign the agreement. We do want to sign the intergovernmental agreement for the national action plan on salinity. We have been very clear for a year that we want to sign the document and move on. We want to see commonwealth money flowing into the State. The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
(2) Is the minister aware that last week, the Queensland Labor Government signed the bilateral agreement with the Commonwealth, which has paved the way for that State to receive its total allocation of $162 million? (3) Is the minister planing to contact her Labor colleagues in those States to find out how they managed to reach agreement? (4) Will she continue to insist that her refusal to sign is somehow the Commonwealth’s fault and not because of her Government’s policy to withdraw all salinity funding from this year’s budget? Dr EDWARDS replied: I thank the member for some notice of this question and I apologise if members have a sense of deja vu when we debate the matter of public interest that the Leader of the National Party intends to move later, because the MPI is on this topic. The member is entirely wrong in portraying the Government as reluctant to sign the agreement. We do want to sign the intergovernmental agreement for the national action plan on salinity. We have been very clear for a year that we want to sign the document and move on. We want to see commonwealth money flowing into the State. The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
(3) Is the minister planing to contact her Labor colleagues in those States to find out how they managed to reach agreement? (4) Will she continue to insist that her refusal to sign is somehow the Commonwealth’s fault and not because of her Government’s policy to withdraw all salinity funding from this year’s budget? Dr EDWARDS replied: I thank the member for some notice of this question and I apologise if members have a sense of deja vu when we debate the matter of public interest that the Leader of the National Party intends to move later, because the MPI is on this topic. The member is entirely wrong in portraying the Government as reluctant to sign the agreement. We do want to sign the intergovernmental agreement for the national action plan on salinity. We have been very clear for a year that we want to sign the document and move on. We want to see commonwealth money flowing into the State. The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
(4) Will she continue to insist that her refusal to sign is somehow the Commonwealth’s fault and not because of her Government’s policy to withdraw all salinity funding from this year’s budget? Dr EDWARDS replied: I thank the member for some notice of this question and I apologise if members have a sense of deja vu when we debate the matter of public interest that the Leader of the National Party intends to move later, because the MPI is on this topic. The member is entirely wrong in portraying the Government as reluctant to sign the agreement. We do want to sign the intergovernmental agreement for the national action plan on salinity. We have been very clear for a year that we want to sign the document and move on. We want to see commonwealth money flowing into the State. The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
Dr EDWARDS replied: I thank the member for some notice of this question and I apologise if members have a sense of deja vu when we debate the matter of public interest that the Leader of the National Party intends to move later, because the MPI is on this topic. The member is entirely wrong in portraying the Government as reluctant to sign the agreement. We do want to sign the intergovernmental agreement for the national action plan on salinity. We have been very clear for a year that we want to sign the document and move on. We want to see commonwealth money flowing into the State. The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
I thank the member for some notice of this question and I apologise if members have a sense of deja vu when we debate the matter of public interest that the Leader of the National Party intends to move later, because the MPI is on this topic. The member is entirely wrong in portraying the Government as reluctant to sign the agreement. We do want to sign the intergovernmental agreement for the national action plan on salinity. We have been very clear for a year that we want to sign the document and move on. We want to see commonwealth money flowing into the State. The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
(1) Is the minister aware that the Victorian Labor Government has announced $15.8 million in NAP funding from the Commonwealth? (2) Is the minister aware that last week, the Queensland Labor Government signed the bilateral agreement with the Commonwealth, which has paved the way for that State to receive its total allocation of $162 million? (3) Is the minister planing to contact her Labor colleagues in those States to find out how they managed to reach agreement? (4) Will she continue to insist that her refusal to sign is somehow the Commonwealth’s fault and not because of her Government’s policy to withdraw all salinity funding from this year’s budget? Dr EDWARDS replied: I thank the member for some notice of this question and I apologise if members have a sense of deja vu when we debate the matter of public interest that the Leader of the National Party intends to move later, because the MPI is on this topic. The member is entirely wrong in portraying the Government as reluctant to sign the agreement. We do want to sign the intergovernmental agreement for the national action plan on salinity. We have been very clear for a year that we want to sign the document and move on. We want to see commonwealth money flowing into the State. The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
(2) Is the minister aware that last week, the Queensland Labor Government signed the bilateral agreement with the Commonwealth, which has paved the way for that State to receive its total allocation of $162 million? (3) Is the minister planing to contact her Labor colleagues in those States to find out how they managed to reach agreement? (4) Will she continue to insist that her refusal to sign is somehow the Commonwealth’s fault and not because of her Government’s policy to withdraw all salinity funding from this year’s budget? Dr EDWARDS replied: I thank the member for some notice of this question and I apologise if members have a sense of deja vu when we debate the matter of public interest that the Leader of the National Party intends to move later, because the MPI is on this topic. The member is entirely wrong in portraying the Government as reluctant to sign the agreement. We do want to sign the intergovernmental agreement for the national action plan on salinity. We have been very clear for a year that we want to sign the document and move on. We want to see commonwealth money flowing into the State. The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
(3) Is the minister planing to contact her Labor colleagues in those States to find out how they managed to reach agreement? (4) Will she continue to insist that her refusal to sign is somehow the Commonwealth’s fault and not because of her Government’s policy to withdraw all salinity funding from this year’s budget? Dr EDWARDS replied: I thank the member for some notice of this question and I apologise if members have a sense of deja vu when we debate the matter of public interest that the Leader of the National Party intends to move later, because the MPI is on this topic. The member is entirely wrong in portraying the Government as reluctant to sign the agreement. We do want to sign the intergovernmental agreement for the national action plan on salinity. We have been very clear for a year that we want to sign the document and move on. We want to see commonwealth money flowing into the State. The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
(4) Will she continue to insist that her refusal to sign is somehow the Commonwealth’s fault and not because of her Government’s policy to withdraw all salinity funding from this year’s budget? Dr EDWARDS replied: I thank the member for some notice of this question and I apologise if members have a sense of deja vu when we debate the matter of public interest that the Leader of the National Party intends to move later, because the MPI is on this topic. The member is entirely wrong in portraying the Government as reluctant to sign the agreement. We do want to sign the intergovernmental agreement for the national action plan on salinity. We have been very clear for a year that we want to sign the document and move on. We want to see commonwealth money flowing into the State. The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
Dr EDWARDS replied: I thank the member for some notice of this question and I apologise if members have a sense of deja vu when we debate the matter of public interest that the Leader of the National Party intends to move later, because the MPI is on this topic. The member is entirely wrong in portraying the Government as reluctant to sign the agreement. We do want to sign the intergovernmental agreement for the national action plan on salinity. We have been very clear for a year that we want to sign the document and move on. We want to see commonwealth money flowing into the State. The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
I thank the member for some notice of this question and I apologise if members have a sense of deja vu when we debate the matter of public interest that the Leader of the National Party intends to move later, because the MPI is on this topic. The member is entirely wrong in portraying the Government as reluctant to sign the agreement. We do want to sign the intergovernmental agreement for the national action plan on salinity. We have been very clear for a year that we want to sign the document and move on. We want to see commonwealth money flowing into the State. The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
The member is wrong in a number of instances. In this financial year, the Government will spend around $35 million on salinity. That is more than was spent previously. It is double the amount spent by the member for Merredin’s Government in 1996. In addition, significant amounts of money have been parked so that they can be regarded as new money. Those amounts include $10 million and $1.5 million for land care coordinators, referred to in our election commitments. The AlintaGas money has been parked. We will not touch it because we do not want to risk the Commonwealth saying that it is not new money. I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
I have been meeting with and writing to federal ministers, telephoning their officers and sending my ministerial staff to their offices in Melbourne and in other places, with little response. I wrote to the previous minister, Senator Robert Hill, on two occasions and got no response. I wrote to the new minister in December and enclosed my previous correspondence, but I did not receive a reply until 26 February. The delay can be sheeted home to the Federal Government. We wrote three times outlining our difficulties, and we gave ground. Finally, at the end of February, we received a response. Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
Mr Barnett: Did you pick up the telephone? Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
Dr EDWARDS: Yes, we have spoken to federal members. My colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries spoke to his federal counterpart last week. We have spoken to federal members incessantly. However, it has taken them this long to get back to us. The letter I received from the Federal Government leaves some doors open and accepts some of the areas that this Government wants to change. I will go through that in more detail during debate on the MPI. This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
This Government supports the intergovernmental agreement on salinity and wants to see it signed and implemented as a matter of urgency. However, we will not sacrifice everything in Western Australia for the sake of signing an agreement.
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