Barnaby Joyce (Queensland, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I think we are all in screaming agreement that the proposed Traveston dam is the wrong dam for a whole range of reasons. From our side, that is not a statement that we are against dams; it is a statement that if you are going to build a dam you are best to build one in the right area. I will give you a couple of examples. This dam would cost about $1.7 billion of the Australian taxpayers’ money for about 150,000 megalitres of water. Its average depth would be about five metres, just the right depth for Cabomba weed to infest it. It is in a siltation area and it will be a siltation trap. There is about 90 feet of silt where they are building it at the moment, so it is a predominant alluvial floodplain.

It is not the case that these people are just saying, ‘We don’t want this dam.’ They have even suggested an alternative dam in their backyard, an alternative dam that is proximate to where the state government is talking about putting it, and that is Borumba. Let us look at the difference. For Borumba you have a 200-metre wall. You will get one million megalitres of water stored. And this is in the same area, with the same people. It would have an average depth of 90 metres, and the land is already owned by the state government. It seems so obvious. People say, ‘It would never fill.’ That is not correct. In fact, the last time it would have filled would have been in the 1990s. It would have been 90 per cent full. There are times on the Borumba Dam at the moment where three Sydney harbours spill over it in a day. That would suggest that there is potential for an increased capacity.

It is also believed that the costing of this dam could spill out to around $3 billion for construction and $1 billion for reticulation and piping: a $4 billion investment. That is why we have to start asking questions, because, ultimately, it is the taxpayers’ money that is doing it—especially when you could build a desalination plant for about $450 million to $500 million which would provide the same amount of water as Traveston dam, and you could then put the change into the Ipswich Motorway, hospitals or other water projects. These are the questions that have to be asked.

There are two major issues pushing this project: one is the ego of Mr Beattie and the other is the ego of Ms Bligh. That is what is driving this. If there is a political opportunity there, there is the political opportunity there, but that is not the reason this inquiry is going forward. The reason is that the people of the Sunshine Coast want it. The people of the Sunshine Coast have been amassing in groups. The last time there were about 500 or 600 people at a meeting on a Sunday afternoon to say: ‘We want our day in court. We want someone to hear us. We want someone to listen to us.’ Anytime there is a meeting, they turn up. These people want to be heard. The primary driver of any political issue should be that you listen to the people. When they start amassing at meeting after meeting, asking for someone to hear the truth, for someone to hear the other side of the argument, then we have to try as best we can to give them that opportunity.

I agree entirely with Senator Bartlett: no-one has said that this Senate inquiry will stop the dam. No-one has suggested that. And the people understand that completely. We have said that to them over and again. We said it to them on the radio this morning. It is not about that; it is about getting the truth on the table and raising the political pressure on Mr Beattie and Ms Bligh to do the decent thing, the logical thing, to find a better expenditure of the taxpayers’ money at an alternative site. And some of those that have been suggested are in the backyard of where the current dam is, so it is not just parochialism.

I welcome what Ms Bligh said. She said she has nothing to fear. A person who has nothing to fear should have no worries about turning up to the Senate inquiry. The only reason you would not turn up to the Senate inquiry is that you have something to fear or something to hide—some reason why you do not want to tell the truth, under oath, on the public record. That is why you would not turn up. It is going to be interesting to see whether this person who tells us they have nothing to fear shows us later that they have something very great to fear.

I think the fear would start with the assessment process and why we ended up with the Traveston dam site. Let us methodically go through the list of all the proposed dam sites to determine which would be the best deliverer of water for south-east Queensland. People want to have that debate. We have heard that the fishing industry and the tourism industry will be threatened, but, when this dam goes through, Queensland will fail to be self-sufficient in dairy products. It is a small issue! People in Brisbane like to drink milk. When the dam goes forward, one of the major dairy areas of south-east Queensland will be taken out of production. That issue obviously needs to be discussed further.

There are so many issues that have to see the light of day and be put on the table. The people of the Mary River and the Sunshine Coast are sick and tired of the manipulation and obfuscation—the nefarious imbroglio of Mr Beattie’s and Ms Bligh’s process for assessing this dam—and they want to get to the facts. I take on board what Senator Siewert says, but, with all due respect, there is nothing in her terms of reference that is not already offered and I do not think we should start this process with our own little jousting match about the terms of reference. We have acknowledged everybody. We have not isolated anybody and said that this is just a National Party idea, a Liberal Party idea, a Democrats idea or a Greens idea. We are just saying in this chamber that it is a good idea—and it is a good idea for people to know that they have a chance to have their day in court.

I acknowledge the hard work that Senator Trood has done in this process. There has been a bit of rough and tumble in trying to get this process going. Senator Trood has been a great advocate for the people of the Sunshine Coast and the Mary River. I also acknowledge the work that senators from other parties have done. But let us not cloud or stymie the issue now with an internecine fight over terms of reference. Yes, we have the potential to turn it into a political issue. But that is not just for the sake of politics; it is to get something that is just and right and to have oversight of how our nation’s money is spent. Investment in this ridiculous process will yield nothing more than a stinking swamp—and, very importantly, it will not be completed until 2011.

Ms Bligh argues that we are threatening Queensland’s water supply. Let us get this straight. Even with the most perfect time frame this thing will not be completed until 2011. The fact is that Brisbane will run out of water in the middle of next year. A dam that will only supply water by 2011 and will work only if it fills up with water—I imagine that means rain—is going to be no good for fixing a problem that will arise next year. So let us talk about the solutions for next year and how we go about doing something that will actually deliver water for the people of Brisbane. Good suggestions about desalination have been put on the table. There have been investigations by the local member, Dave Gibson, who has gone over to Western Australia to look at the costings of their desalination plants. Why would there be a wish to focus on that? Because that is all the time we have left if we want to provide water for Brisbane.

Surely, the issue that ought to be on the table is the fact that we have one of the major cities in Western civilisation and it is about to run out of water. Even Constantinople managed to deal with the siege of the Turks for three years without running out of water. But Brisbane is going to run out of water because of the complete and utter lack of planning by, and the complete and utter negligence of, the administration that currently holds the reins of power in Queensland, the Beattie-Bligh Labor government. They are going to run out of water. Ms Bligh has been saying lately, ‘We’ve got a water grid going.’ I read in the paper the other day that—if my recollection is correct—they have laid only about 500 metres of the 200 kilometres of pipeline that have to be put in. That is not a sign of a government that is taking seriously the threat of a major Western city running out of water.

We have to come up with serious solutions. Desalination has to be put on the table because, no matter what people think about it, we do not have the time to consider other alternatives. We have to come up with something that is going to deliver water for the area. We have to look at recycling, for industrial use at least, to try and take the pressure off. Certainly, new dams will have to go in—and I would be the first proponent for relevant dams—but we have to look at the facts. Why would you go for a dam that is five metres deep and on an alluvial swamp? There are even suggestions that it traverses a fault line. It will have huge social and economic impacts on the area—not just the immediate area but the whole of south-east Queensland. It will be a prime site for weed infestation. It will have huge environmental consequences for the Australian lungfish, the Mary River tortoise, the Mary River turtle, the Ramsar wetland and the Great Sandy Straits. Why would you do that when there is another site, proximate to the area, where the infrastructure is already in place and you can store seven or eight times the amount of water at far less cost? It is an argument of logic.

As Mr Beattie and Ms Bligh dig their heels in more and more, the biggest threat facing the people of the Sunshine Coast and the Mary River valley is the egos of those two individuals, who, in a dictatorial manner like a Caesar or a benevolent dictator—they have half of it right—have decided they can go into an area and inflict their wishes, illogical as they might be, on the people to prove a point. They are trying to prove the point that they are strong. This Senate inquiry will prove that they are not, that they are foolish, that they are unfair, that they are unjust, that they are wasteful and that they are completely negligent about looking for a real solution right now that is proximate to Brisbane.

Why hold an inquiry? People are going to say: ‘This is overstepping the mark. You’re infringing on that state’s rights.’ The one thing that Queensland is missing is an upper house. Queensland does not have a bicameral system. It only has a lower house and that is why there are times when this chamber must step in to give some other, greater review of the aspects of law to the unicameral system in Queensland. When it is the suggestion of the people of Queensland that there must be a review, when there are not just one or two but a whole raft of opinions—there is an overwhelming sentiment—that there has to be a review of a decision made by the single house in Queensland, then I think we have the moral premise to go in and have an inquiry.

I look forward to this inquiry taking place. I hope that it has a hearing in the Mary River area. I hope we can give the people of that area the time for their day in court without undue cost to their wallets—and gosh knows that they have had to fork out enough so far. I acknowledge that Ms Bligh has said she has nothing to fear and I look forward hopefully to her appearing at the inquiry. If she has nothing to fear and nothing to hide, it stands to reason that she should be willing to turn up. I acknowledge that the people of the Mary River and the Sunshine Coast know, and everybody in this chamber knows, that the Senate inquiry itself cannot stop the dam, but it certainly can raise the political temperature on it, and so it should. It will be a just outcome and that is what this chamber should be espousing: a just and fair outcome for those people who have not been heard.