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Dirranbandi is a town in crisis! A town at the mercy of State and Federal Governments haggling over the compulsory acquisition of Cubby Station, a 80,000 hectare irrigation property which has the capacity to store more water than Sydney Harbour.
The buy-out which would require Federal Government support to the tune of $128 million would focus on assisting Queensland to fight salinity problems.
Premier Beattie flew to Dirranbandi last Thursday to assess the problems first hand and address a public meeting of townspeople on the health of the river system and salinity.
Locals booed the Premier who was greeted by protest signs bearing impassioned messages.
Lower Balonne irrigators were prepared to share cutback’s rather than see a closure of Cubby Station and Dirranbandi left in tatters.
The Premier’s concern was for the future use of the land. His Department was issuing hundreds of specially prepared documents detailing the issues of salinity. The potential extent of the problem in the Queensland area of the Murray/Darling Basin was highlighted.
The facts are - Cubby is downstream of Dirranbandi/St George and the Premier proposed to take water now used for irrigation and divert it into another river and then into the Narran Lake to enhance birdlife habitat, will not prevent salinity in the Murray/Darling Basin nor help Dirranbandi or St George, said Member for Warrego, Mr Howard Hobbs.
“Other salinity maps exist developed by Australian Geophysics that use aircraft that fly grid patterns to monitor salt which is followed up with ground truthing techniques using test drilling to prove the existence or not,” he added.
The scientific, hydrological data provided to the Murray Darling Basin Commission, the Federal Government and the National Competition Council (NCC) by the Queensland Government is the flawed data that was discredited in court and further the independent auditor of the Murray Darling Basin Commission denied a request to review the new data.
Queensland takes less than six percent of the total water extractions in the Murray Darling Basin, and the end of valley flows at the NSW border are presently among the highest of most catchments in the Murray Darling Basin system” Mr Hobbs said.
“As far as I am concerned, the proposal as it stands is dead in the water,” said Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Transport and Regional Services, John Anderson.
“In my view, the Cubby Station proposal fails on all counts of transparency, consultation, science effectiveness and value for money. The idea that governments, other than Mr Beatties should meet 85% of the purchase price is preposterous given Queensland’s primary responsibility for its own water management.”
Residents of Dirranbandi and St George are very much dependant upon accurate studies assessments and their effects being made, as are downstream communities.
The problems that may be associated with the long-term usage of huge volumes of water at Cubby Station were questioned many years ago by the Lightning Ridge Chamber of Commerce and Industry Inc.
The present “knee-jerk” proposal by the Queensland Government is itself questionable.
If salinity is at such a level that a joint Government purchase of Cubby Station is the inevitable solution, why have they been sitting on their hands for so long and failed to monitor the situation?
Why, when vast tracks of land in Western Queensland and NSW are in the grip of their worst drought in a decade is more pain being inflicted?
Mr Beattie’s compromise as reported in the Dirranbandi Telegraph “was to put on hold for six months plans to buy Cubby Station;and to conduct an independent review to clear up any doubts about the science behind it, once and for all. He added if the Federal Government agreed to buy Cubby Station at the August 2 Community Forum at Parliament House, then the future will be in the hands of that decision.
Clearly decisions made State or Federal, belated as they may be, will have long term effects on communities border to border.
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