Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak about coal seam gas. It is particularly appropriate, given that today we saw all parties, bar the Greens, vote against the need for coal seam gas to be safe for our environment before we proceed with it. It was particularly peculiar, I thought, that the Nationals were not even in the chamber for this vote, because after my last motion, which called for a moratorium on coal seam gas until we know that it is safe for our water, was voted down by all parties a month ago, I thought, 'Maybe I have the words wrong; why don't I try again?'

I am going to talk a bit about the policy that the Nationals released on the weekend. There was one good point in it, and that was the basis of my motion today. Yet given a chance to vote for their own policy they did not even bother to put their bums on the seats in the chamber. They all came in about five seconds later, which was very telling, I thought. I find it incredibly disappointing that clearly this policy has only lasted 72 hours; it has already been abandoned.

Was it the Liberals that caused the Nationals to quash this policy? Did they wimp out on standing up to the Liberals or were they really just not that committed to the policy anyway? I think the folk of the bush—in fact, anyone who likes to eat Australian produced food and who is worried about our water resources and our reef—would be incredibly disappointed at the stance that the Nationals took today. They could rightly feel very ripped off that their representatives are not representing them at all.

I want to talk a little bit more about some of the statements that the Leader of the Nationals, Mr Warren Truss, made the other day on Radio National—again, about this issue of coal seam gas. It seems that on the weekend the Nationals released a blueprint. They also call it a policy but it is all of 1½ pages long. The blueprint has some points in it and concludes with a reference to the fact that they will launch a discussion paper soon. So we have a blueprint, which is 1½ pages, and a forthcoming discussion paper. Then we had today's vote, when they would not even back their own blueprint. It is very curious and one wonders what on earth the Nationals are thinking on this matter.

There were two good points in their policy. They said that coal seam gas should not proceed where it poses a significant risk to groundwater and should not proceed unless it is safe for the environment. The other good point is the recognition that prime agricultural land is crucial. Yet we saw in this place the Nationals speak against both of my bills, which would, in fact, have delivered on their own policy commitments.

As the chamber would know, I have a bill to give landholders the right to say no to coal seam gas projects on their land—a right which they lack at the moment in all jurisdictions bar certain land tenure in WA. My other bill is to give the federal government power to regulate mining where it would have an impact on water. Yet we have seen the Nationals—and, of course, all other parties except the Greens—speak against these bills.

I fail to understand why that is. Clearly, this chamber needs to be reminded of the importance of groundwater and our surface water systems on this driest inhabited continent on the planet. This chamber needs to be reminded and of the fact that we only have four per cent good-quality, food-producing land in this nation and that we have a precious Great Barrier Reef. Anyone who saw Four Corners on Monday night would know that the reef is under threat from coal seam gas port development and the dredging that is entailed in that. Yet we have all the folk in this place, bar the Greens, putting their heads in the sand and saying, 'No, we'd rather keep taking the company tax revenue. We'd rather keep taking the political donations. We'd rather put our heads in the sand and vote for short-term fossil fuel greed than long-term environmental sustainability.' So the Greens are greatly disappointed that they are again alone on this important issue. As I said, we saw the Nationals release a policy on the weekend that they have now voted against.

I want to correct the record on a few points that Mr Truss made to Fran Kelly on her program on Monday morning of this week. Unfortunately, the reason I want to correct the record is that he misconstrued my bill. He might like to have a read of my bill because he might discover that he actually likes it and would prefer to support it. He made the claims that both Mr Windsor's bill and, by extension, my bill—the two are similar, although they differ in one important matter that I will not bore the chamber with at this point—would mean that the green police are going to be trawling around farm properties and looking at various issues, not just coal seam gas but inevitably at what else happens on farms. He said, 'Now, I don't think farmers are going to be very keen about that.'

No, Mr Truss, that is not what the bills do. You would be advised to have a good read of them. They are clearly focused on mining and the impacts mining would have on water resources. I can assure Mr Truss—I hope to gain his support by clarifying this for him—that neither Mr Windsor's bill nor mine will have any effect on farm operations. That is one important point that I hope the Nationals are now considering.

The other point Mr Truss made was that the Commonwealth already has all the powers, and that all of the projects in Queensland have been approved. Well, actually they have not—there are a few outstanding—but that is not the point I want to make. Mr Truss said that the Commonwealth has the capacity to intervene and therefore Mr Windsor's legislation is simply going to be a 'burden rather than an advancement'. I am afraid that Mr Truss is, again, wrong. We are in the federal parliament; it really would do well for people to be across what our federal laws say on an issue that they profess to be concerned about in an area that covers most of their electorates.

The legislation does not allow the minister to consider the water impacts of coal seam gas. The only reason the minister was able to consider water impacts in those three Queensland projects that have been approved—not four, nor five but three—was that there was a particular endangered ecological community entitled 'the community of native species dependent on the natural discharge of groundwater from the Great Artesian Basin'. To put that simply for folk who are interested, the only reason the federal minister could even consider the water impacts of coal seam gas was that there were some endangered critters that were dependent on that water.

That is great. That is all well and good. It meant that water could be considered in that instance, but there is not always going to be an endangered ecological community dependent on groundwater. Unless there is, the federal government will not be able to consider the water impacts of coal seam gas. When we have folk like the National Water Commission, the CSIRO, other expert hydrologists that I have spoken to, farmers and worried members of the community saying that we simply do not know enough about our groundwater systems to know what is connected and what is not, and that we cannot be sure that punching a great big hole to get to coal seam gas is not going to do some damage, then maybe we should press 'pause' and do those studies. We should get that research and base our policies and our decisions on science. Is it such an outlandish notion that we should have science based policies? On this topic, whatever happened to the precautionary principle? It is actually enshrined in our law and the federal minister is not meant to make a decision where there is the threat of extreme damage to the environment and when there is any uncertainty surrounding that.

There is uncertainty surrounding the impacts of coal seam gas and they primarily relate to water, so it is about time the federal minister was empowered to consider those water impacts. I think members of the Australian community would be flabbergasted that our environmental laws shelter the minister so much and preclude him from considering what is the key concern with coal seam gas. Of course another key concern is climate change, but I do not think I will have time to address that. That will be for another night.

In the Nationals blueprint they also said that federal leadership is demanded, yet they then speak against my bill and speak against Tony Windsor's bill, and they do not support giving the federal government the power to assess the water impacts of coal seam gas. So, I am a bit perplexed as to what federal leadership they are demanding if they refuse to support the amendments to the laws that would enable that federal leadership to be taken. I am a bit confused and I suspect that they are a bit confused too.

I will now go back to the moratorium point. I put a motion in this place in the middle of September calling on the government to implement a moratorium on coal seam gas until we have had the time to do the science and really understand what the impacts on our groundwater, our food security, our reef and our communities are going to be. When we have that understanding, then we need to have the conversation with the Australian community about whether that is the sort of the future that we want. It is so incredibly premature that industry has barrelled ahead. Key approvals have been issued in Queensland already and ticked off by the federal minister, with a few more in the pipeline to come. We have seen the disastrous impact on the reef already from just 1½ million cubic metres of dredging from Gladstone Harbour when 46 million has been approved.

It is about time that this chamber concerned itself with coal seam gas and took an interest in the fact that our key advisory bodies are telling us that we do not have enough information to know that this industry is safe. It is about time that all parties, including the Nationals, took the Australian community seriously enough to turn their minds to this issue and, frankly, to support the Greens' bills that will help fix up this mess.