Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is disappointing, having had Senator Urquhart sitting beside me for some period of time during the hearings of this inquiry into wind turbines, that she would present the summary we have just listened to. I do certainly intend to come back to it, but I just want to place on the record, as I did the other night, that I am certainly a supporter of renewable energy. I have spoken on large-scale solar, hydroelectricity, wave energy, tidal, hot rocks et cetera in this place before, but each of those share one common parameter: not one of them has ever been shown to cause, nor has it even been suggested that they cause, any ill effects on human beings.

The question before us, as has been indicated in the interim report presented by the chair, Senator Madigan, and commented on already by Senator Urquhart, is whether or not there are any health ill-effects. I first became interested in the question in 1988, when I was the chief executive officer of Rottnest Island, in Western Australia, where the first wind turbines were placed. I spoke on this issue in August 2011, expressing my concerns, and again in August 2012. I refer to the 2011 report of the Community Affairs References Committee, chaired by Senator Siewert, looking at the social and economic impacts of rural wind farms. It is interesting that several of the recommendations of that report in 2011 are mirrored in those of the report brought down by Senator Madigan this afternoon. The first recommendation, about noise standards adopted by states and territories for planning and operation, are mirrored by recommendation 3 today. For recommendation 2, back in 2011, recommending that responsible authorities should ensure that complaints are dealt with expeditiously and that the processes should involve an independent arbiter, we can go to recommendation 5 today, recommending a national wind farm ombudsman. The third recommendation from 2011 was for further consideration of the development of policy on separation criteria between residences and wind farm facilities. Senator Urquhart knows, as the rest of us do, that when the Australian acousticians met before us and assured us that the all planning for each of the states was very reputable and we asked them, 'How do you then reconcile the fact that it is a two-kilometre setback in Queensland, a 1½-kilometre setback in New South Wales and only a one-kilometre setback in South Australia and Victoria,' they could not answer that particular point.

I was not going to refer to Professor Simon Chapman, a sociologist and an epidemiologist, I understand, from the University of Sydney, but Senator Urquhart told us that Professor Chapman has undertaken ongoing research into a whole stack of clinical signs or indications of adverse health. I will be very interested to learn of the scientific papers upon which Professor Chapman undertook that ongoing research that she mentioned. I will be particularly interested in that. Professor Chapman's contribution has been to give reference to a term called the nocebo effect. The nocebo effect basically is that you assume something wrong is going to happen and it does as a result. That is Professor Chapman's conclusion on the long list of maladies that Senator Urquhart read out to us. That is about as useful as Professor Chapman's contribution. The committee only last week in Adelaide received evidence from a Mr and Mrs Gare. Let me put to rest the nocebo effect, if I may—I quote Mrs Gare before the committee:

Thank you for letting me speak to the committee today. I would like to open my statement with the following: developers and construction. In the beginning, I was excited about the wind farm and of course the financial security for our property and family. The process began with high-pressure consultations …

No nocebo; no expectation of some ill effect, but a hope and expectation of a technology that brings that family $200,000 a year because they have 19 turbines on their farm. When Mr Gare was asked by Senator Xenophon whether he would do it again, he said, 'No. We can't bear it. We just want them to go away.' This is a host and his wife who earn $200,000 a year from industrial wind turbines. I do not know where the nocebo is in that case, Professor Chapman.

We have also had evidence from a Mr and Mrs David Mortimer, he a retired military person with expertise in wave technology. They were the first people earning income from industrial wind turbines to put their hands up and say 'We cannot survive.' It is disappointing to hear what Senator Urquhart has said, because I do not really want to make this comment, and it probably will be met with some derision: I could only hope—and I say this genuinely, through you, Mr Acting Deputy President, to Senator Cameron and Senator Urquhart—that if the people who were affected as they say they have been affected were members of the MUA or the CFMEU, members of unions, I can assure you there would have been loud complaint and allegations—