QLD Parliament: Hansard - Beattie and Bligh on Traveston
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Queensland Economy
Hon. PD BEATTIE
It is rank hypocrisy by the federal government, which has done nothing to build much needed national infrastructure, to attack the Queensland government for planning and building the roads, rail facilities, hospitals and schools our community needs. I challenge John Howard to do this: tell the people of Queensland which piece of this vital infrastructure program he would axe.
Mr Gibson:
Traveston Dam!
Mr BEATTIE:
Come clean with Queenslanders and name the projects that he wants us to put a stop to. Let me make it clear while we are talking about the Traveston Dam that the Prime Minister has told me that he supports it. I am really delighted with that interjection. I am absolutely delighted with that interjection. Any other interjections that those opposite wish to make I would like to hear as well. Those opposite think we can live without water.
Hon. AM BLIGH
(South Brisbane—ALP) (Deputy Premier, Treasurer and Minister for Infrastructure)
(12.06 pm): This government’s unprecedented efforts to secure south-east Queensland’s water supply are proceeding at a rapid pace and I want to take this opportunity to update the House. Across the water grid we are reaching significant milestones. The length of pipe laid has reached triple figures. At last Friday, 101 kilometres of the 450 kilometres in total is now in the ground, representing 22 per cent.
On the Western Corridor Recycled Water Project, work is advancing steadily on yet another front—construction of the advanced water treatment plant at Luggage Point, where tomorrow 100 truckloads of concrete will be poured to form the base slab for the plant’s raw water tank. The Premier and I recently witnessed the final stages of pipe laying for the Bundamba-Swanbank project at Ebbw Vale in Ipswich. In coming weeks purified recycled water will flow through that pipeline into the Swanbank Power Station, saving millions of litres of valuable drinking water a day.
All up, almost 62 kilometres of the 200-kilometre pipe in the western corridor project has been laid, 30 per cent of the total. We are one-third of the way there. Pipe laying on the southern regional water pipeline to connect us to the Gold Coast is 40 per cent complete, with more than 35 kilometres already in the ground. At the Gold Coast, all of my cabinet colleagues recently had a first-hand inspection of the tremendous progress on the desalination plant. The self-elevating platform is now driving pile casing in the ocean off Tugun, with marine boring to start on Thursday. The plant buildings that will house the reverse osmosis equipment are 27 per cent complete.
On another front, the Coordinator-General today will release the final terms of reference of the environmental impact statement for the proposed Traveston Crossing Dam. This process involved considering more than 260 submissions from community groups, government agencies and individuals. Some 112 changes and additions have been made to the original terms of reference as a result of the consultation on the draft. Queensland Water Infrastructure, the company established by the state government to deliver the dam, will now press on with preparing the environmental impact statement, which is expected to be released for further public comment by October. The federal Minister for the Environment and Water Resources had advised that he was satisfied at this stage that stage 2 of the proposed dam did not require a separate referral and assessment process under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act.
stevem
New option for Traveston Dam study
Roberta Mancuso
August 7, 2007
An environmental study of south-east Queensland’s Traveston Crossing Dam will now include the option of scrapping the controversial project altogether.
Deputy Premier Anna Bligh today said Department of Infrastructure coordinator-general Ken Smith had altered the terms of reference which will govern the study into the environmental, social and economic impacts of the proposed dam, near Gympie.
The changes came after the government received more than 260 submissions from community groups, government agencies and individuals on what the environmental impact statement (EIS) should cover.
Ms Bligh said the submissions, most of them from the public, led to around 112 changes or additions to the draft terms of reference.
The finalised terms of reference now require the EIS to include discussion of feasible alternatives to the dam project, including the option of building no dam, building other dams, recycling and desalination.
Ms Bligh said all of the issues raised in the submissions would be addressed.
“Queensland Water Infrastructure, the company established by the state government to deliver the dam, will now press on with preparing the environmental impact statement, which is expected to be released for further public comment by October,” she told state parliament.
Opposition Leader Jeff Seeney welcomed any opportunity to stop the dam, which has been the subject of a Senate inquiry due to report next week.
“The Traveston Dam is an outrage, and any opportunity to stop it we should embrace,” Mr Seeney told reporters.
“The Traveston Dam is only on the agenda because the Beattie government haven’t built all of the other projects that were planned from the day that the Wolfdene Dam was abandoned.”
The Wolfdene Dam, proposed by the Nationals for south-east Queensland, was canned after the Goss Labor government was elected in 1989.
The first stage of the proposed dam will deliver up to 70,000 megalitres of water a year to the drought-stricken south-east.
Construction is planned to start in mid-2009 for completion by the end of 2011.
stevem
8 AUG 2007
Mr GIBSON:
My question is to the Deputy Premier, Treasurer and Minister for Infrastructure. Yesterday the minister announced the release of the terms of reference into the environmental impact study for the proposed dam at Traveston Crossing. This terms of reference finally includes an examination of alternative non-climate dependent water resources to her proposed dam.
Does the minister stand by the comments that the Premier made in 2006 that ‘this dam will go ahead, feasible or not’, or does she now agree that there are better ways to supply water for south-east Queensland than damming the Mary River and will she commit to a proper examination of these non-climate dependent options?
Ms BLIGH:
I thank the honourable member for the question. He is quite correct in reminding the House that yesterday I advised the House that the final terms of reference for the environmental impact statement of the Traveston Crossing Dam were now approved, final and available and provided to the member for Gympie. I was very interested later that afternoon to find that Senator Ron Boswell had put into the public arena his view that these terms of references were now incontrovertible proof that the Beattie government had abandoned plans to build the Traveston Dam and that this was the beginning of the end of the project. I was equally interested half an hour later when the Greens put out a press release saying that the terms of reference were incontrovertible proof that we were going to go ahead with the dam regardless of what the EIS said. So I figured we probably got it right.
I can assure the member for Gympie that our government’s resolve to ensure that this dam goes ahead is as strong as it has ever been. As I did at the meeting in Gympie, I absolutely refute—and the Premier can speak for himself on this—any suggestion that the Premier ever said that the dam would go ahead, feasible or not. Who would build an unfeasible dam?
Government members
interjected.
Ms BLIGH:
I take the intersections from my colleagues. Of course, the National Party are experts in building unfeasible dams. I know it was a headline in the Gympie Times
but I would draw—
Opposition members
interjected.
Mr SPEAKER:
Order!
Ms BLIGH:
I know the quote used by the member for Gympie was a headline in the Gympie Times
. This, however, does not make it true—remarkable as that may seem for that great journal of record. The environmental impact survey on this project will be as rigorous as it has been on every other project that this government has undertaken. We are required under our own legislation to do this in a completely thorough way. There is nothing unusual about terms of reference changing between the draft and the final. Imagine after 260 submissions if there had been no changes? You could have been absolutely ridiculed for not listening to the community. This is a normal, standard part of the process.
Not only are we required under our own legislation to conduct the EIS in a satisfactory way; but also we have a bilateral agreement with the Commonwealth that they will use this material to make their own decision under their own legislation in relation to this project. I do not think that anyone would be surprised to know that the Commonwealth, as it should, will expect that EIS to be done in a completely rigorous way.
I do need, however, to be very, very firm. I am not, like Ron Boswell, going to offer false hope to the people of the Mary Valley. If this EIS stacks up, this project will go ahead. Our commitment to this dam is as strong as it has ever been. It is an absolutely critical part of water for south-east Queensland—absolutely critical—and I look forward to sending an invitation to the member for Gympie to come when we open it.
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