Ian Campbell (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for the Environment and Heritage) Share this | Hansard source

It is absurd to ask a question about a state government applying for an activity on airport land, referring to a brickworks and then, when I answer and bring in all of those aspects, to take some spurious point of order. The question quite specifically goes to why we approved a brickworks on the site and did not approve something else. I am going directly to the issue because I am saying that if it is an application from a state government that has lax environmental standards—if they exist at all—which is prepared to say to the people of the Swan Valley, ‘We do not even want to take you into our confidence when it comes to approvals on the airport land,’ then I do not take seriously claims by the Labor Party or their comrades in the state government in relation to any other approval on that site. Any application for land at the airport will be dealt with using the very highest standards, both within the Department of Transport and Regional Services and when it comes to me and my department for advice in relation to the environmental impacts.

The environmental performance of the Labor Party in Western Australia in relation to the brickworks is an absolute disgrace. I am very glad that my department did a thorough analysis of the proposals at the airport, and I am very glad we were able to shine a very big light on the gross hypocrisy of the Australian Labor Party when it comes to air pollution in the Swan Valley airshed.