The ACT Greens will champion a better, more ambitious deal for Canberrans on housing, climate and the environment by sitting on the crossbench in the sole balance of power for the 11th ACT Legislative Assembly.
“At the election, the Canberra community clearly showed us their desire for something different in politics. They want more from their representatives. They want us to take on the housing crisis, the climate crisis and the environment crisis,” said Leader of the ACT Greens, Shane Rattenbury.
“The ACT Greens stepped up to this challenge with a bold and ambitious plan to build more public homes, target our biggest polluter by delivering better public transport and properly investing in environmental restoration across the city.
“Because business as usual won’t cut it when we’re facing a future where homeownership slips further out of reach, our climate is reaching a point of no return and our natural environment continues to decline.
“If we truly accept that the housing market is in crisis, and if we truly accept that our climate is in crisis, then we cannot in good conscience continue to deliver a business as usual approach to government when people and our planet are hurting.
“But unfortunately over the past two weeks, negotiations with ACT Labor have not delivered enough of a commitment to address these big issues in order to give us confidence that any power-sharing agreement would deliver the level of change that Canberra needs.
“Negotiations were unable to produce a commitment from Labor to build enough public homes that people on low incomes can afford, tackle our transport emissions, or increase the government’s ambition on restoring our environment.
“The ACT Greens did not demand an exact commitment to our policies-negotiation requires compromise and we offered compromise. But on some of the most important matters to our party, Labor was unwilling to budge.
“In housing, ACT Labor was not prepared to commit to a single extra public home beyond their existing policy.
“On climate, we know that transport is responsible for sixty percent of our emissions, but Labor was not willing to accelerate building light rail or invest properly in active travel.
“On the environment, they were not willing to commit to any specific funding which would scale-up our ambition on environmental protection and restoration.
“These are key priorities that the ACT Greens made clear were essential to securing our support during the election, including a commitment to build 10,000 new public homes, build light rail faster and establish a $50 million Bush Capital Restoration and commit $50 million towards healthy waterways.
“Therefore, as a party that has always put people before power, we have chosen to sit on the crossbench over the next four years-championing these key issues, holding the government to account, being a constructive, collaborative and progressive alternative to Labor.
“As a party we have made this decision not in an effort to block progress that Labor is willing to agree to, but to use the position Canberrans put us in at the election to contribute to a positive public conversation about the bolder change that is needed for our city.
“By sitting on the crossbench during this term of government, we are confident we are using the best mechanism available to us to push for bolder change and create a better deal for Canberrans- to build public housing, go further, faster on our nation-leading climate action and truly protect and restore our environment.
“Late on Tuesday night, I wrote to the Chief Minister asking for his support to commit to a number of key Greens policies in exchange for supporting him as Chief Minister. The details of these policies will be announced in the coming days.
“Labor and the Greens are currently finalising the text of an agreement that will commit to a number of key Greens policies in exchange for confidence and supply and support for Andrew Barr as Chief Minister.
“This document will be released shortly.
“As the Leader of the ACT Greens, I am ready to get on with the job of making Canberra a fairer place, and pledge to work constructively with Labor, the Independents and the Liberals to make this vision a reality,” said Mr Rattenbury.
