Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I certainly will. I was reading an article in the Queensland local paper, the Courier-Mail, this morning. It actually quoted Maritime Safety Queensland’s General Manager Mr John Watkinson, who said yesterday that two filtering machines which were being supplied to help clean up the mess were on their way to the island. Further on, there was an interview in the same article, on page 5, by Mr Brian Williams with Moreton Bay Regional Council Mayor Allan Sutherland. He was talking about cleaning up, and he said: ‘We did not use heavy machinery as much as we thought. We found the oil was lightly dispersed and heavy machinery was just putting a lot of it back into the sand. It ended up that rakes and shovels were best.’ That is just to clarify that.

Some of Senator Brown’s other statements, I think, have to be challenged. I cannot reiterate enough that this is a very serious situation, and the Queensland government is onto it. If I remember reading rightly, it was reported at 3.15 am. The ship contacted AMSA and by eight o’clock the national plan was well underway. Through you, Mr Acting Deputy President: Senator Brown, I know that you spent most of your 10 minutes absolutely haranguing us about why that ship headed out to sea. It is a very good question. Why did that ship go out to sea? Before senators opposite interject, I think they should take note that there are laws of the sea that have been in place for the 12 years that their government was in power. I would hope they would not belittle the situation by trying to attack this government, which has only been in power for some 17 or 18 months. But, unfortunately, Australia’s powers to regulate foreign ships in Australian waters are subject to international conventions. Senator Brandis would be well aware of where I am coming from in this argument. Even though the ship was travelling from Newcastle to Brisbane, it was not carrying coastal cargo and had no permit to carry coastal cargo; it was going on to Indonesia from Brisbane.