Steve Georganas (Hindmarsh, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of the Protection of the Sea (Harmful Anti-fouling Systems) Bill 2006. I am pleased to be able to support this bill because it affects the electorate that I live in. The electorate of Hindmarsh is bordered by the Gulf of St Vincent, and many ships come and go on a regular basis from that gulf. In the last few years the gulf has been contaminated with everything from water run-off from the plains of Adelaide to pollution through shipping and many other areas. A lot of fishermen make their living from that gulf, through the beautiful seafood that we have in South Australia, but in the last few years we have seen the seagrass being eradicated through pollution; therefore the breeding grounds of the fish are producing fewer fish in the gulf and there are fewer fish for the fishermen to catch.

The purpose of the bill is the implementation of the International Convention on the Control of Harmful Anti-fouling Systems on Ships, to which Australia became a signatory some four years ago—in August 2002. Antifoulants are paints used to prevent marine organisms from attaching themselves to the surfaces of boats and aquaculture farming equipment. They contain various compounds, many of which are highly toxic. These compounds leach slowly from the paint and accumulate within living organisms. They have substantial adverse effects on organisms’ growth and reproduction and the overall population of marine organisms, and hence the health of marine environments.

TBT is a highly toxic chemical used in antifoulants. It accumulates in the food chain and can occur in concentrations up to 250,000 times higher than other areas surrounding the sediment or seawater. It can actually even force a sex change and infertility in female snails. The presence of TBT has been observed within Adelaide’s port river in the gulf, where 100 per cent of populations of the gastropod Lepsiella vinosa have shown severe reproductive abnormalities in recent years.

This has been of direct and substantial concern within South Australia—at least in certain sectors, as substantial fish stocks are sourced in the Gulf St Vincent that borders the Adelaide metropolitan area and, as I said earlier, borders the seat that I represent, the seat of Hindmarsh. Apart from large-scale shipping, human transport and industrial fishing, this stretch of water also contains many thousands of recreational fishing boats and other recreational vehicles. That TBT accumulates within the food chain would always have been of concern to residents who enjoy local seafood produce and those involved in the substantial industry exporting their product around the country and beyond.

Responsibility for TBT and its availability and use within Australia has been split between federal and state. The National Registration Authority for Agriculture and Veterinary Chemicals, a federal body subject to federal legislation, has had the responsibility for the supply of agricultural and veterinary chemicals and products, including TBT, up to the point of wholesale. The Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority adopted the practice of labelling TBT paint products in such a way as to exclude their use on small vessels—that is, those less than 25 metres long—unless otherwise permitted by the South Australian government. Many countries around the world reportedly implemented a ban on the application and the reapplication of TBT on small vessels as early as the early 1990s. State and territory governments have had all other responsibilities.

It has been the case that South Australia has allowed vessels to be painted with a TBT product through licensed boat yards and slips on the proviso that national criteria are observed limiting use to products that leach TBT into the marine environment at no greater rate than five micrograms per painted square centimetre per day. The South Australian Environmental Protection Agency has been party to a national TBT survey monitoring stored paints and the environs around vessel maintenance areas and slipways.

The International Convention on the Control of Harmful Anti-fouling Systems on Ships was, as I have previously stated, signed by Australia on 19 August 2002. The Australian government drafted a bill to implement the convention in 2003. The convention was expected to come into force internationally in 2005. Australian industry anticipated the convention’s implementation and ceased the manufacture of any new TBT based antifouling paints. A formal ban came into place when the APVMA banned the sale and application of the paints in Australia by cancelling the registration of antifouling paints containing organotin biocides on 31 March 2003 and ceasing supply of the existing product on 31 July 2003.

We now have a bill before us. I understand that the convention will not be in effect triggered and become operational until 12 months have elapsed after 25 countries representing 25 per cent or more of the world’s merchant shipping tonnage have ratified the convention. Australia’s actions over recent years and our reliance on other countries’ actions to invoke the convention may make this bill largely academic from South Australia’s point of view, given the surface area of so many local vessels’ outer hulls and their time in local waters compared with that of overseas ships. Nevertheless, I fully support the removal of toxic pollutants from our national waters, whatever the toxin and whatever the source, and I hope the Australian government will encourage and support those within the international community working toward ratification of this convention—especially those countries upon whose ratification the convention most substantially depends.

The removal of toxic paints from use on or underneath port and seagoing vessels was one recommendation put forward by the 2000 Senate inquiry into the health of the Gulf St Vincent. It was not an insubstantial inquiry, receiving a myriad of submissions and making 15 recommendations, of which, as I said, at least the partial removal of TBT was one. But there is a greater threat to the Gulf St Vincent that has not been addressed to the same extent as that posed by TBT—a threat that the gulf has been suffering for many years and I feel will continue to suffer for many years to come—and that is the impact and continued threat of 174,000 megalitres annually of nutrient rich stormwater surging down from the Adelaide Hills and over the Adelaide Plains into the gulf, carrying all the pollutants that destroy the environment within the gulf on which so many of the creatures potentially affected by TBT rely.

The effect of TBT on the native fish stocks and the overall health of the gulf environment, including that of the Port River, is quite minor from many people’s perspective compared to changing the area’s water composition, underlying sea flora and, ultimately, the seabed itself. The prevention of run-off from the Adelaide Plains is probably the greatest environmental challenge facing the South Australian coast, the residents of Adelaide and our governments in this and the next decade. The ongoing construction of wetlands in Adelaide’s northern suburbs, both adjacent to the Parafield Airport and beyond, and associated aquifer storage, replenishment and initiatives—of which there are now about two dozen in the greater Adelaide area—have been encouraging for quite a few years, and ongoing research by the South Australian Department of Water, Land and Biodiversity Conservation should entice most sceptics to take a closer look at this as a substantial element of our future supply of water.

In areas other than the northern suburbs, there has been substantial energy applied to similar projects, such as within the Patawalonga Catchment at Morphettville—about which I have spoken here before. I support the initiatives within the northern suburbs—as I would in the southern suburbs—to source investment from wherever they can get it for these areas. In the northern Adelaide and Barossa catchment and the Onkaparinga catchment, aquifer storage capacities in place are expected to exceed the supply of available stormwater. A tremendous amount of highly positive work can be done in these two catchments to improve the health and the environment of the Gulf St Vincent in South Australia and to secure a substantial supply of water for industrial, horticultural and recreational use, and even for human consumption for many years to come.

I also support the use of the aquifer storage and replenishment schemes being pursued throughout the Adelaide Plains wherever there is stormwater available. There has been work over the last year or two that has investigated the possibility of using fractured rock aquifers in the Golden Grove Embayment—which covers part of the northern and eastern suburbs, through the area adjacent to Adelaide’s eastern parklands—and testing is under way. There is also substantial capacity within my own electorate of Hindmarsh, whether it be through utilising the first or second tertiary sediment aquifers.

We should be doing what we can to improve the quality of our ports and coastal waters. The removal of toxic TBT is a good measure which has broad support. We should also be looking at other areas. We are pursuing other measures; some have become well advanced. The strategy of minimising unnatural stormwater flow into the gulf is advancing steadily in terms of outcomes in some areas and continued research in others. This strategy will require additional investment from all players—local industry, local government, state government and federal government. For this investment, I am sure that the rewards will be—maybe now and certainly in the not too distant future—well worth the time, energy and opportunity costs they require. Labor certainly believes so.

Labor is not only much more concerned than the current government about the impact of development and expanding populations based on coastal strips but also more determined to make Australia as a nation more water savvy, more water wise and more water secure. At the same time, these measures would enhance the protection of the sea, especially in my electorate of Hindmarsh, as I said earlier, that borders the Gulf St Vincent. With the scientists working away in South Australia—and I hope around the country—and the prospect of a constructive government beyond the next election leading Australians towards responsible water resource and coastal protection initiatives, whatever the local geology, rainfall or local considerations may be, I am confident that we can compliment the intention of this bill and leave a better nation for our children and grandchildren. I am happy to support this bill.

See this speech in context