Alex Somlyay (Fairfax, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts, I refer the minister to the Queensland government’s environmental impact assessment for the Traveston Crossing Dam, which the minister is currently assessing and which is opposed by 80 per cent of the people in South-East Queensland. Does the minister regard Queensland’s proposal to continuously catch Australian lung fish, Mary River cod and Mary River turtles and carry them around the Traveston Crossing Dam as a satisfactory way to save these endangered species whose habitat will be destroyed by the dam?

Peter Garrett (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for his question. Before I answer his question in some detail, I want to point out to him that I have made it clear, on all the questions that have been put to me in the House about approvals that I am required to consider under the EPBC Act, that I do not come to a view about the matter until the final advice has reached me. I do that in the context of the legislation which I am required to observe. On this particular matter, I say to the member that I am aware of the significant interest that Queenslanders have in this particular proposal and that it has been the subject of some significant assessment by the Queensland Coordinator-General under the bilateral agreements between the Commonwealth and the state. The Coordinator-General has provided that assessment to my department, and my department is considering the advice that is already in place in relation to this matter and will look closely at what the Coordinator-General brings forward, including the many conditions that he has attached to the proposal.

I will consider the advice that my department brings forward to me. I will also consider carefully that which has been put to me by the scientists who have considered this and have made submissions to both the department and the assessment process, and also the public submissions that I have received. I have not yet received that advice. It has not come to me from my department. When it does, I will consider the matter and I will make my decision properly and within the time required.