GOVERNMENT'S RESPONSE TO THE INDEPENDENT EXPERT'S REPORT ON IMPROVING
WATER QUALITY WITHIN THE VASSE WONNERUP WETLAND SYSTEM VERY DISAPPOINTING
The public announcement by the Minister for Water Mia Davies about
the state government's response to the independent expert's report
on management of the Geographe Bay catchment was a great
disappointment.
Her presentation on October 31 to a large crowd of local people vitally interested
in preventing further fish deaths contained three main initiatives.
These were:
* $200,000 to be given to the Geographe Catchment Council to assist
the government in community consultation
* the establishment of a ministerial taskforce to "oversee
a long-term strategy to improve water quality and
the ecosystem" and
* $4.8 million dollars to connect 126 properties in Quindalup to
deep sewerage.
All three initiatives are disappointing for a number of reasons.
The one-off allocation of $200,000 to GeoCatch is not to allow any
on-ground works to be implemented, but only to consult and
communicate with the local community.
The taskforce will, for the most part, be reinventing the wheel,
since the management actions needed to improve water quality have
been outlined in documents and reports prepared by GeoCatch over the
last 10 years.
The money for deep sewerage connections in Quindalup is equal to
$38,000 per property with only minor improvements in water quality
to be gained by Toby's Inlet and Geographe Bay.
I was a former member of the GeoCatch board and the
former member for Vasse from 1996 to 2005. I'm highly critical of all three initiatives because they lack substance
and any long-term commitment to improving water quality in the Vasse
Wonnerup wetland system.
GeoCatch has been given a one year allocation of funds with which
it has to tell the community what a great job the government is
doing. Not one cent of this money is to be spent on water quality
improvement, even though GeoCatch was set up in 1997 to be the
coordinating body for on-ground improvements.
The ministerial taskforce appears to be an exercise in delaying for
a year - until much closer to the next state election - any
commitment of funds to allow catchment management actions to be
implemented.
The $4.8 million for sewerage connections is more about providing
the Water Corporation with a new source of income via wastewater
treatment from the 'lucky' 126 properties. As well, deep sewer connections will allow more of these properties
to be rezoned for tourist accommodation or higher urban density, so
the City of Busselton will be a financial beneficiary of this
initiative through an increased rate base.
$4.8 million equals $38,000 being spent per property on deep
sewerage, when instead the government could have installed $17,000
Aerobic Treatment Units (ATUs) at each property and given the
unspent $2.6 million to GeoCatch or the City to improve water
quality in the Vasse Wonnerup wetland area.
Professor Barry Hart, formerly from Monash University in Victoria,
was the independent expert called in by the state government in 2013
to provide a review of management needs in the Geographe Catchment.
His report contains 14 recommendations, the first of which - for the
state government to establish a single catchment management
authority to manage all wetland assets - has been rejected by the
state government.
Recommendation 13 - that the government provide $30 million of
funding over 10 years for management - has resulted in just $200,000
being committed, less than 1% of the recommended amount.
Dr Hart's review report was welcomed by the local community as
it gave them reasonable grounds for hoping that the state government
would do something meaningful to better manage water quality in the
Vasse Wonnerup wetland system.
Instead, we have had scraps of money offered to GeoCatch, a one
year delay before the taskforce reports and money being spent on
deep sewerage, a relatively lowly ranked management action.
My relevant background to water quality issues in the Geographe catchment include:
Former president, Geographe Bay Advisory Committee
Former member, Vasse Wonnerup Land Conservation District Committee
Former member, Geographe Catchment Council
Councillor, Busselton Shire Council, 2009-2010
Member for Vasse 1996-2005, including shadow minister for the
environment 2001-2004
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