The state’s creeks, rivers and aquifers and the Great Barrier Reef will be protected under new water laws introduced to Parliament this week.
Natural Resources and Mines Minister Dr Anthony Lynham introduced the Water Legislation Amendment Bill 2015 to replace the previous government’s proposed water legislation.
“This Bill will underpin the sustainable management of our precious water resources for all users – landholders, communities, the resources sector — and protect the environment,” Dr Lynham said.
“In Opposition, Labor fiercely opposed many elements of the LNP’s water laws because we were very concerned about what they meant for the Great Barrier Reef and the potential for frittering away our water resources.
“We went to the last election with a commitment to act on this and we are delivering on yet another commitment today.”
Dr Lynham said a key issue was removing the LNP’s water development options.
“These options would have irresponsibly given water to big projects without consultation and without strong criteria to make good decisions,” he said.
The Bill also:
- restored the principle of ecologically sustainable development into the Act’s purpose. The LNP’s laws were going to remove it.
- replaced references to responsible and productive management with sustainable management in the purposes and throughout the Water Resources and Other Legislation Act 2014 (WROLA).
- stopped the creation of so-called “designated watercourses”, where water could have been taken without a science-based water licence.
Dr Lynham said the government would retain the proposed groundwater framework in the WROLA Act .
“The framework does not affect the amount of underground water the resources sector uses, or affect the Great Barrier Reef,” he said.
“This framework will give landholders the protection of a statutory obligation on miners to make good any impact on their water bores,” he said.
“Mines will continue to be subject to rigorous environmental impact assessments and landholders’ rights will be protected.”
Water expert Tom Crothers said the new laws claiming to protect waterways and farmers’ rights is “simply media spin”.
Mr Crothers, a former General Manager of Water Allocation and Planning in the Queensland Government, said the ALP had made ‘an unequivocal’ pre-election promise to protect water and farmers and it was using ‘diversionary tactics ’ to try to save face.
“Before the election, the Queensland ALP gave firm written commitments that it would ‘repeal the Newman Government’s water laws’ and promised to prevent ‘over-allocation of Queensland’s precious water resources’,” Mr Crothers said.
“It is now preparing to backflip on those promises but Dr Lynham’s media release today is trying to gloss over that fact.”
Mr Crothers yesterday released a major report, Report on Statutory Rights to Groundwater, warning that providing miners with a statutory right to take water was likely to result in the ‘unsustainable take of groundwater’ and may lead to ‘total loss of water supplies’ for other water users, including farmers and graziers.
“The Queensland Government is giving up the powers which it now has to prevent miners from extracting vast quantities of water to unsustainable levels during mining operations,” he said.
“The rights of landholders to object to the granting of water licences will be lost and the role of the Land Court as a crucial independent arbiter will also be removed.
“Farmers, graziers and rural landholders have a lot to lose if the government goes down this path and effectively gives up its powers to prevent unsustainable impacts on scarce water supplies by mining companies.”
The study, Report on Statutory Rights to Groundwater, was commissioned by Lock the Gate Alliance.
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