Steve Fielding (Victoria, Family First Party) Share this | Hansard source

I take this opportunity to speak to the Wild Rivers (Environmental Management) Bill 2011 as a whole at this stage, as I did not speak during the second reading debate. The objective of this wild rivers bill is to circumvent the Queensland Wild Rivers Act 2005, which allows the Queensland minister to declare an area to be a wild rivers area. The effect of the Wild Rivers Act is to enable the Queensland government to make wild river declarations that limit the range of activities that may be carried out in a decl­ared area of land in order to preserve the natural value of that area. The bill before parliament today seeks to change the way in which a wild river declaration is made, tak­ing the power from the Queensland minister and putting it in the hands of other interest groups.

Since the debate on wild rivers last year I have had the chance to look at some of the wild river declared land firsthand. I have also listened to the lengthy debates from both sides of the argument and have considered the arguments through the inquiries. The more that you look at the issues, the more you realise that there are two valid and opposing arguments. Firstly, I think that some areas of this country do deserve to be protected. I am not in the camp of locking things up for the sake of it. But, equally, I am also not in the camp of bastardising the environment. Some areas of this country are special and ought to be declared as special areas in order to safeguard and preserve these areas. Under this bill, a wild river declaration can only take effect if it has the written consent of all the interested parties of the land. The practical result of this will make it extremely difficult for any wild river declarations to ever be made. This, I think, is a problem in itself.

This problem arises because of the def­inition of 'owner' in this bill. That definition of 'owner' means that a wide variety of people and groups may fall under the def­inition of owner for a particular area of land. For example, it includes people with native title interests, freehold interests, leasehold interests and other interests, too. This means that, in order for an area to be declared to be a wild river area, every one of these groups that falls under the definition of 'owner' needs to give their consent for a declaration to go ahead. To put it another way: it means that every single person or group that falls under the definition of 'owner' gets an auto­matic right of veto on a wild river dec­laration. As an example, even if eight parties affected by a wild river declaration agree to give their consent, the declaration can be nullified because of the opposition of just one party. This hardly sounds reasonable. What it really means is that the likelihood of ever getting an area to be declared as a protected or a preservation area is extremely slim. I have spoken to some members of parliament who support this bill because they do not believe in creating preservation areas and are happy to see nearly every part of the land developed. That is something that I do not agree with.

The second point I want to make is that there seems to be a lot of confusion within the communities that new development is not allowed in a declared area. This is simply not true. For example, the following types of development can still occur: tourism, eco­tourism, development of associated infra­structure, grazing and pastoral enterprises, residential and commercial developments, commercial fishing and fishing based tour­ism. However, I do recognise a real problem, and that is that people are put off from doing any development because they do not know how to wade through the entire permit app­roval process and because it looks way too hard. I believe that this is a real problem. Many people who do not have the resources to jump through all the hoops, the paperwork and the bureaucratic red tape end up missing out.

Particularly within many of the Aboriginal communities there are development plans that are never made because people within a declared wild river area do not feel that they have the resources, the money, the time, the administration or the know-how to overcome the hurdles standing in the way of the developments. This needs to change. Just like there is legal help for people who cannot afford legal representation, so too we need a type of free professional service to help people who want to do development in these areas but do not know how to navigate the approval process. This is something I have raised directly with the government and I am pleased that these concerns have been listened to. As a result, the government has promised to provide funding to establish a professional services resource that will help Indigenous Australians move forward with their plans for development in areas that have been declared wild river areas.

The third point I want to make is that before a Queensland minister can make a wild rivers declaration there needs to be adequate consultation with the people aff­ected by any such declaration. In fact, if you are going to limit the range of activities that can be carried out on an area of land then you should have to ask the people who have a stake in the land what they think. It is clear from the inquiries into this bill that the level of consultation that has occurred thus far has been substandard in some areas. It is not enough for the Queensland government to pay lip-service to the consultation process. They need to actually sit down and speak with the people who use the land and take into account their legitimate concerns. There are plenty of people out there with very reasonable concerns and it is important that we listen to what they have to say. This is something that I have raised directly with the Queensland government and the federal government because it is a problem that needs to be addressed. I am pleased to say that the Queensland government will be establishing Indigenous reference groups to improve the consultation process. These Indigenous reference groups will provide information and recommendations to the minister on natural values, economic asp­irations and consultation processes. This information will need to be taken into consideration by the minister, along with other advice such as scientific advice, when defining the areas. These reference groups will provide legitimate and representative input to the Queensland minister. It will give parties a greater voice in the decision-making process of any declared areas.

Finally, this wild rivers issue is very difficult. I am sure that both sides of politics would agree about the tremendous difficulty in balancing environmental interests with those of landowners and development inter­ests. After considering all of the information, and given that the federal government has agreed to fund a professional services resour­ce to assist people with getting an application for permit approved, and given that the Queensland government will establish Indig­enous reference groups to ensure proper consultation, I will not be supporting this bill.