Paul Neville (Hinkler, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Last month the Assistant Minister for the Environment and Water Resources made a major funding announcement for the Burnett-Mary catchment area—$3.2 million from the National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality and the Natural Heritage Trust is being invested in the future of local wildlife through a specific program to study fish movements and shorebird roosts in breeding areas in the Burnett-Mary catchment areas, particularly the coastal areas. The group will undertake two significant projects. Firstly, it will locate and map significant shorebird roosts and breeding sites north of Point Vernon and on Fraser Island, stretching up to Tannum Sands, near Gladstone. Secondly, the group will look at ways to offset the impacts of barriers to fish movements in the catchment area, particularly in the Mary River.

There is a delicious irony in this. These studies are crucial, given the state Labor government’s refusal to consider alternatives to the Traverston Crossing Dam, which will have a hugely detrimental effect on local wildlife habitats, including the Great Sandy world heritage area and the Great Sandy Strait Ramsar site because of the change in river flows. It may seem an unlikely statement for me to make, but I am one of the dam’s strongest opponents. I am not anti-dam; in fact, generally I would rate myself as being pro-dam. But I am a strong believer in better infrastructure, and when a scheme is fundamentally flawed and does not give benefits to anyone except people outside the region, I cannot support it.

What I find most offensive about the state government’s determination to plough ahead with the Traverston Crossing Dam is that it will not benefit the communities which will bear the brunt of the impact. From the point of view of economics, the resumptions in the Mary Valley alone would fund two medium sized dams. Engineering wise, the dam will be required to have extensive foundations because it is sitting on 18 metres of gravel and sand and will cause disruption to both the Bruce Highway and the North Coast railway line. At the end of the day, it is a big shallow dam—that is its favoured design—and it will lose vast amounts of water to evaporation. Aside from the environmental concerns, the dam is bound to have negative effects on the downstream tourism and fishing industries and, by association, the economies throughout the catchment and downstream areas—to say nothing of the effects on the cities of Maryborough and Hervey Bay in general and the beautiful area of River Heads in particular. The Traverston Crossing Dam is one of the most abominable projects I have ever seen put forward by a state Labor government and it should be stopped. (Time expired)