Andrew Gee (Calare, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent the following from occurring immediately:

(1)   the Stopping Wind Farms in State Forests Bill 2025 being called on;

(2)   debate on the second reading of the bill proceeding immediately for a period of no longer than one hour; and

(3)   any questions required to complete passage of the bill then being put without delay.

This bill requires the urgent attention of this House. In the last parliament, I introduced a game-changing bill which would stop the building of wind farms in softwood pine plantations which are state forests. I've brought it back again. I introduced this bill in the first place because of the continuing pain, anguish and anger that many of our local residents are feeling over wind farm proposals in these areas. The pain is real, and the anguish is real. Since bringing this bill to the House, the situation on the ground for our communities has not improved, and the House needs to hear it. The pain and the anguish have not gone away. Politicians of all persuasions have failed to act. They've let our communities down. So I'm once again bringing this bill to the House. It needs to be passed into law, and I'm giving all members the opportunity to vote on it again.

I'm not against renewable energy, and neither are our communities. But our communities are crying out for reasonable and commonsense balance. I've attended many community meetings and consultations over these proposals, and what residents are experiencing is really concerning. I have to tell you, bogus consultation is a major feature of these windfarm companies moving into our area. It's fly in, fly out tick-a-box consultation from developers, without meaningful engagement and genuine dialogue, and this has been a feature of our residents' experiences. These developers fly into our communities, and then this elaborate charade of consultation commences. The companies assiduously tally up all the contacts with community members so that this can appear in documents to support their development approvals.

I have to tell you, there's a strong feeling in our communities that they are being played for mugs by people with no real stake in the local area besides the businesses operated by their bosses. These windfarm companies are overseas for the most part. Many of the companies are foreign, and the decisions made about turbine placement are made in foreign boardrooms with little regard to the impact on residents. It's all about the money, and it makes a mockery of the consultation process. The people on the ground from the turbine companies say they feel the pain of local residents, but this rarely translates into meaningful change.

City people may think putting turbines in state pine forests means they're out in the back blocks, far from having impacts on local residents. Some people in our area think that, as well. But that is not the case at all. The developers are putting them close to the powerlines and to road access, which means they're extremely close to towns, villages and community members. They are literally surrounding some of our communities and some of our isolated farmhouses, for example—and not-so-isolated farmhouses.

In the case of the Sunny Corner Wind Farm, some residents were given maps that showed 300-metre turbines less than one kilometre from their homes—just a few hundred metres. I had one resident approach me to tell me he'd sunk all his super into his house and land package and that he can't sell it now because of the proximity of the turbines, which he pointed out, one being just 700 metres away. People in the cities don't understand the anguish and the stress this causes for our local residents. I've been contacted by many constituents who've spoken of the mental toll this takes on them. There's a real human cost to this that is too often lost, overlooked and ignored.

In the case of the Sunny Corner Wind Farm proposal the developer, Someva, has clearly placed turbines in locations that will cost them the least yet impact residents the most. It's all about the money, and, sadly, profits are being put ahead of people. It's appalling. People have had enough of it. In the Oberon area, the developers of the Pines Wind Farm, TagEnergy and Stromlo, have managed to turn a whole community and region against it. The backlash in and around Oberon has been extraordinary.

Here is an example of the doublespeak of these companies. The developers told me they would be putting turbines only within the boundaries of the state forests. They made that very clear when I first spoke to them. This has turned out to be blatantly false. They have been shopping turbines outside the boundaries of the state forests, after giving those assurances that have proved to be false, and they're moving into the Trunkey Creek area, a small, close-knit farming community that just want to get on with their lives without this hanging over their heads. The community is in shock. So I say to TagEnergy and Stromlo: Move on. Read the community and move on. Just leave the area.

As I've said, for all of the so-called consultations and the calming words of the city based consultants on the ground, decisions about turbine placement are, for the most part, made in foreign boardrooms far, far away. It's a business decision, and moving turbines away from impacted residents costs money. It's the same with the Kerrs Creek Wind Farm near Molong. I spent months and months trying to work through the community concerns with the developer, Res, which is controlled by the McAlpine Group in the United Kingdom, and, after all of that, there's been hardly any movement at all—no meaningful movement. This whole consultation process has been a waste of time. Does anyone really think the United Kingdom boardroom of the McAlpine group of companies is going to care what the people in the Molong area want? I don't think so.

How did we get here? It's a failure of politics and the result of politicians doing nothing. The problem is that the wind farms are regulated by state planning laws and, in 2021, the New South Wales National Party passed a law to put wind farms into state forests. And, when they did it, they did not properly regulate and set out the rights of impacted residents and neighbours. It was exactly the same with the creation of the renewable energy zones, which the National Party created, and they again abjectly failed to properly regulate them. Look at what has happened with EnergyCo and ACEREZ in the Merotherie Road area near Gulgong. They basically bulldozed a centuries-old wildlife corridor and have wrought significant and devastating destruction on that local community, all in the name of saving the environment. It should not have come to this and it would not have come to this if the National Party had done its job. But it has failed.

What this bill will do is use the corporations power within the Constitution to provide that a corporation must not construct, install or commission a wind farm in a state forest. And, to put it beyond doubt and without limiting the definition of state forest, it includes the Sunny Corner State Forest near Portland and Lithgow, the Vulcan State Forest, the Mount David state forest and the Gurnang State Forest. They are all in the Oberon area. And there is also the Canobolas state forest near Orange. I've had many constituents contact me about the Spanish company Iberdrola's planned wind farm in the Canobolas state forest, known as the Four Mile Creek Wind Farm, and they are very upset about it—and this bill would stop it. The bill and the operative clause are not limited to those named state forests. They are for any state forest.

It's now up to all parties to get behind this bill, because our communities want action. Given that the National Party has brought this unregulated mess onto our communities, this bill aims to clean it up. Our communities need support and they need their voices heard. They want their voices heard and they want these wind farms in state forests stopped. So I commend this bill to the House, and I urge every right-thinking member in the House of Representatives to come down and support it. Our communities and our residents need this bill, and they need the support of members in this place.

Terry Young (Longman, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is there a seconder for the motion?

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Katter's Australian Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion. I've had practical experience in the outcomes that the honourable member is referring to. The Chalumbin Wind Farm was on the front page of the Spectator magazine. It was a national issue, and the outrage of the people in the heartland of the electorate I represent concerned the last remnant jungles on earth. There's a little bit in Africa, there's a little bit in South America and there's a little bit in Australia—and that's about it. There are hardly any jungles left in the world. They were putting Chalumbin Wind Farm right alongside a remnant jungle on earth. So when the myriads of flying foxes and birds flew out—chop, chop, chop. But the suggestion is outrageous because it's on top of the Great Dividing Range, and you have to clear a 100-metre-wide path where you're going to put these wind farms. So now we have no ground cover—because you have to clear the grass away, too, because of fires—on top of the Great Dividing Range, with what the World Heritage declared, quite rightly, some of the last remnant jungle on earth. That was the proposal for Chalumbin!

It was spectacularly fought in the national media—on the front page of the Spectator magazine, to quote but one example—and among numerous national media outlets. Eventually, Minister Plibersek quite rightly put the mocker on it. She took a risk because the greenies think this is the answer to all of their prayers—a wind farm. The ridiculous nature of the costs alone would prohibit any sane person from proceeding down this pathway. And I speak with authority, because I was the minister for electricity in Queensland. I put in the first standalone solar system in Australia in 1982 or 1983. Before most people in this House were actually born, it was put in. But I had to do my homework on the alternative proposal for wind farms. Would you believe that, for the solar proposal that we implemented on Coconut Island, the incoming Labor government put in wind farms—I mean, a wind farm on a tiny little island of about 10 acres! You go to bed every night with 'whoomp, whoomp, whoomp', desecrating and polluting paradise.

A wind farm only lasts for about 20 years. The wind farm at Ravenshoe has to be dismantled by law when it comes to its end of life. They just dumped all of the fan blades on the ground, on properties owned by the Kidners, a very prominent, well-loved and popular local family. They just dumped them on the ground and walked away. When people proceeded to take legal action on it, the company had vanished. It didn't exist anymore. There was no-one you could sue or take action against. So here we are desecrating paradise. This is some of the last remnant jungle on earth. They just dumped the stuff in the middle of the jungle. Again, it attracted national publicity, but this House and the state house in Queensland have taken no action upon this. So I commend the member for bringing forward this matter of very great importance to the people of Australia.

Why they go to put it in national parks is because you can't be far away from the grid. So you've got to find somewhere near the grid, and a lot of people live near a national electricity grid. National parks are a place where people don't live, so we'll put it in the national parks. Of course, people live adjacent to the national parks. But why do you have a national park? It's to keep it as it is, or as it was for 100,000 years or whatever! We want to keep a little bit of Australia the way it was, and I think every Australian would agree with that concept. Well, now you are doing the exact opposite. You're putting wind farms in there.

The cost of electricity generated by wind is about three or four times the cost— (Time expired)

A division having been called and the bells having been rung—

Milton Dick (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As there are fewer than seven members on the side for the ayes in this division, I declare the question negatived in accordance with standing order 127. The names of those members who are in the minority will be recorded in the Votes and Proceedings.

Question negatived.