Glenn Lazarus (Queensland, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I would encourage senators across the chamber to listen in. Let me tell you about the water situation in Queensland and why the state of water across the country is an absolute mess.

In my home state of Queensland, more than 50 per cent of our people live outside the state capital. This means that the majority of Queenslanders live across rural, regional, northern and western Queensland. With so many Queenslanders living outside the state's capital, you would think that most people have access to town water. Unfortunately, you would be wrong. Many people across Queensland still do not have access to town water. As a result, many Queenslanders have to rely on bores, rainwater tanks, purchased water and dams to survive—to shower, to run their homes, to operate their businesses, to feed their stock and to irrigate their land.

Eighty per cent of my state is in drought. In fact, we are experiencing one of the worst droughts on record. We have been in drought for four years and the drought is expected to worsen. Despite this, governments at all levels have let my state down by doing absolutely nothing to help with the drought or address the issue of water in Queensland.

With so many people relying on water sources other than town water, you would think governments would understand the importance of people being able to access clean water via other sources, such as groundwater. Again, you would be wrong. The scourge of coal seam gas mining is devastating rural and regional Queensland. Queenslanders have no legal right to stop a mining company from entering their land to mine for CSG. Governments have been giving mining companies, including international mining companies, unfettered access to our water; any amount of water they want to extract from the ground, without regard for the impact on the people of Queensland. This means that CSG mining companies drill into the ground, depleting underground water tables and contaminating what water is left.

Landholders who are not connected to town water, who rely on underground water, are being left with no water. Their bores are going dry because CSG mining companies operating on their land or near their land are extracting water from the underground water table with such ferocity that they are depleting underground water resources across huge—

Senator Heffernan interjecting—