Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question without notice is to the Minister for the Environment and Heritage. I visited the Macquarie Marshes yesterday and found that the globally important ecosystem is under extraordinary stress. I ask the minister: is it true that, given the current availability of water, 90 per cent of the Macquarie Marshes faces ultimate death? Is it true that there is widespread death of the river red gums and that the egrets, which nested in thousands, have not now nested or fledged successfully for six to eight years, even though maximum life span is 11 years? What urgent action is the government taking to rescue this Ramsar listed wetland?

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

It is true that the Macquarie Marshes are under severe stress and that is a consequence of a number of stresses. The biggest stress of course is that Australia and much of the eastern seaboard have been under an unprecedented level of drought. That of course puts massive pressure not only on the human population but also on those ecosystems. There has also been pressure created by unsustainable farming practices. But Senator Brown would know that the Australian government’s $400 million a year Natural Heritage Trust package—the biggest environmental rescue package in Australian history—is seeking to invest directly in sustainable agricultural policies, working with farmers, working through local catchment management authorities and Landcare groups to address those causes.

Funding of half a million dollars from the Natural Heritage Trust has been provided to the Central West Catchment Management Authority to promote better grazing management practices in the Macquarie Marshes region. Recently, the Australian government Water Fund, through the Water Smart Australia program—a multimillion dollar program—is looking at an investment of around $13½ million, matched with funds from the New South Wales government for a specific program for the restoration of the Macquarie Marshes and the Gwydir Wetlands. Not only are we seeking to do that but, through the National Water Initiative, we are seeking a leadership policy, led by the Prime Minister, and have sought to bring transformational and historic reform to water management in Australia.

We are bringing in market based mechanisms to ensure that there is a market to trade water, that water can go where it is needed most, that you can purchase water for environmental flows and that you have a truly tradable water system across state boundaries. This will ensure, firstly, that water is not wasted for agricultural purposes, that it goes to the highest and best use within agriculture and, secondly, that when you achieve that, you will make savings to ensure that magnificent and Ramsar listed wetlands—such as the Macquarie Marshes that Senator Brown referred to—can be restored to full health.

It will be an enormous challenge to see the Macquarie Marshes and Gwydir Wetlands returned to the condition they were in some years ago. That will ultimately require what most of Australia needs at the moment—that is, a damn good drink of water, and that can only occur when this drought breaks. But, in the meantime, this government will continue to lead, through the Natural Heritage Trust and the National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality, as well as a range of other specific water related measures, such as the Water Smart Australia program, to ensure the environmental outcomes that I am sure Senator Brown and I would like to occur within that important Ramsar area.

Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I ask a supplementary question. Why does the minister say that the biggest problem is the drought, when every expert on the ground in ecology and farming says it is not the drought but the siphoning of water by the big overseas-owned cotton-growing combines which is destroying the wetlands? Would the minister answer the question about the impending complete destruction of the breeding of the egrets in the Macquarie Marshes? Would the minister inform us why it is that better grazing management practices are being implemented but nothing is being done to compensate the graziers who have been denied water in the Macquarie Marshes region and have lost half their income because it has been given to those big cotton combines upstream?

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

Mr President, Senator Brown clearly was not listening to the answer. I said that we are in fact addressing water allocation issues. We are addressing water allocation and overuse and unsustainable use of water resources across that entire catchment through bringing into Australia, for the first time, a comprehensive water trading scheme which will ensure that water goes to the highest and best use.

We are working with local landholders and cattle graziers; we are working through the Natural Heritage Trust and our natural resource management programs to ensure that agriculture remains sustainable and that the sort of environmental repair that Senator Brown seems to desire can be achieved. There is no doubt that in Australia you can have a viable cotton industry, a viable agricultural industry and also a restoration of environmental health. Unlike Senator Brown, we seek to have a win-win. We would like to have agriculture in this country but also a healthy environment. He would like to wipe out agricultural investment; we do not want to do that. (Time expired)