NATURAL RESOURCES COMMITTEE: ANNUAL REPORT 2011-12

The Hon. S.W. KEY (Ashford) (11:29): I move:

That the 74^th report of the Natural Resources Committee be noted.

In the year 2011-12 there has been a continuation of the membership appointed after the March 2010 election with the expanded membership of nine members. There has only been one change. The Hon. Gerry Kandelaars replaced the Hon. Paul Holloway following his retirement from parliament in September 2011. There have been no staff changes during that previous year.

In the reporting period, the Natural Resources Committee undertook 30 formal meetings. I note that in this year that has just finished we actually had 30 meetings, so I am very impressed that our nine members have such diligence in attending these meetings. We believe that with our formal meetings we had something like 85¼ hours of work that was maintained by the committee. We also took evidence from 136 witnesses.

Fourteen points were drafted and tabled in the reporting period. These were the annual report for 2010-11; seven reports into the Natural Resources Management levy proposals for 2012-13; the final report from the bushfire inquiry; the report on the committee’s inquiry into the Murray-Darling Basin plan; the annual report on the Upper South East Dryland Salinity and Flood Management Act for 2010-11; two reports on fact finding visits (these were the Adelaide and Mount Lofty Ranges NRM Board and the Adelaide desalination plant); and also a report that was most famously commented on by the previous deputy premier, Kevin Foley, on little penguins. You had to be here to understand why I say it was such an interesting contribution.

Seven fact-finding tours were undertaken in 2011-12: three related to the committee’s Murray-Darling Basin draft plan inquiry including a tour of the Lower Lakes, Coorong and the Upper South East drainage and flood management scheme; one to the Mitcham Hills to observe bushfire preparedness, and that was initiated by the member for Davenport; one to the Adelaide and Mount Lofty Ranges NRM region; one to the Adelaide desalination plant; and one to Port Lincoln to take evidence on the committee’s inquiry into Eyre Peninsula water supply.

The committee’s inquiry into the Murray-Darling Basin plan was finalised in March 2012 with the tabling and forwarding of its report to the Murray-Darling Basin Authority as the committee’s submission to the draft plan. The inquiry concluded insufficient water was proposed, at that time, to be returned to the basin under the draft plan. It also concluded that the plan failed to acknowledge South Australia’s past efforts in capping water use compared to other states.

The committee commenced a new inquiry into Eyre Peninsula water supply in 2012 after considering evidence from the member for Flinders, Mr Peter Treloar. The local community for a number of years has raised concerns with regard to water security, management of underground water and questioned whether a series of mining venture proposals will further stress water supplies. The committee expects that this inquiry will continue at least for 12 months and we are looking at June as our deadline this year.

I would like to commend the members of the committee Mr Geoff Brock MP, the Hon. Robert Brokenshire MLC, the Hon. Mr John Dawkins MLC, Mrs Robyn Geraghty MP, Mr Lee Odenwalder MP, Mr Don Pegler MP, Mr Dan van Holst Pellekaan MP and the Hon. Gerry Kandelaars MLC for their contributions, and in addition I would like to thank the parliamentary staff who support our committee. I commend this report to the house.

Mr PEGLER (Mount Gambier) (11:34): I certainly support this report and first of all I would like to congratulate our chairperson, the Hon. Steph Key, on the great job that she does in chairing our committee and I would also like to thank and congratulate the rest of the members of that committee. The committee certainly has done a lot of work over the last 12 months, or in this term of parliament, and we all work together in a bipartisan manner and certainly have taken the priority of looking after the environment within our state at a high level and this committee has worked exceptionally well at doing that.

I would also like to say that all the various environmental concerns that we looked at right throughout this state have been well addressed by the committee. There are always going to be major concerns, there are always going to be major works to be done with our environment, but I think through a committee like this, the parliament itself becomes much more knowledgeable on what is happening in the environment within our state. I think the committee system works exceptionally well in informing parliament of what is actually going on in the regions, so I certainly endorse this report. I would just like to say that it is a great pleasure to serve on this committee.

The Hon. R.B. SUCH (Fisher) (15:35): I will be brief. I support the work of the Natural Resources Committee. I think it was a wise decision to create that committee. We all recognise, I believe, that we have to manage the natural environment. I do not know whether many members have read Bill Gammage's book on how the Aborigines used fire to manage what he calls the estate, but I suggest that people might want to read that. The point is, as I just said, that the environment has to be managed.

I would like to make the point that there is a lot of unfair and unwarranted criticism of the NRM boards which report to this committee. I think there is always a danger that any government organisation can become overly bureaucratic, and I think we always have to be watchful for that. However, as I have said on many occasions, we apply the torch to the NRM boards but we do not apply the same torch to the bigger spending government agencies, and I think we should. To that end, I think the Auditor-General should be empowered to look at efficiency and effectiveness, rather than just account keeping.

I am disheartened to hear constant criticism, particularly of the Mount Lofty Ranges NRM, in respect of the management of water in the western escarpment of the Mount Lofty Ranges. We can argue about whether they have got the plan right, but I think the point is that we have to manage the water resources in an area like that. If we do not, the people downstream will get nothing. We should have learnt that lesson in respect of the River Murray. The people upstream will take the cream and the people down at the bottom will get the skim milk, if they are lucky.

I am really pleased that we have this committee. I think it shows the value of parliamentary committees. I think they should be more adequately resourced and able to take on some other tasks, but I think it would be good—

Mr Pengilly interjecting:

The Hon. R.B. SUCH: A private jet. I think they need to be adequately resourced, but I think we should look at whether we need to add to the standing committees that we have. I commend all the people on the committee; I understand that there is a lot of work involved. There is on many of these committees, but I think this has been a great committee in terms of what it has been able to do, and I think it provides an insight into the expertise of the members on that committee and their different backgrounds.

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN (Stuart) (11:38): It is a pleasure to support this report. Natural resources is a very genuine and personal interest of mine, and it has been for decades. I note that all of the members who participate on this committee do so diligently and very genuinely. It is a very responsible group of MPs from a broad range of political perspectives, and I thank them for the way they go about their work. I also thank our chair, the Hon. Steph Key, for her leadership. I am more than happy to put on the record that, in many ways, I think she sets a good example for first-term MPs in lots of the things she does, and she does a great job with this committee.

One example of that is the fact that, in our travels across the state, she always invites the local member of parliament. If the local member of parliament is not already on the committee, she invites them to participate in everything we do in their electorate. I think that is an outstanding example of the way she operates and the way the committee operates, and the spirit in which the committee does its work.

With regard to the 2011-12 financial report, it is a bit more than six months old. The report is there to be read so I will not go into great detail. The key things we dealt with were: levy increase proposals, the Murray-Darling Basin plan, bushfire and natural disaster inquiry, inquiry into little penguins and the Eyre Peninsula water supply inquiry, which is still ongoing. Those are all important and significant issues. While it may not seem so, just by looking at the titles, I think when people read the report they will understand that much of what is dealt with in this committee is relevant to all South Australians, not just the people who, it would appear at first glance, are involved in those inquiries. So, I encourage people to have a good look through them. With regard to the next financial report, this year is already half over and I can assure the house that we have done an enormous amount of work already on what we are working on this year.

As the member for Fisher mentioned, funding can be a challenge. We live in tight economic times, you cannot get away from that and you should not try to get away from that, but the reality is that if the work is to be done there is a cost that goes with it. We do not need a jet or anything like that, but balancing the budget against the work that the two houses of this parliament want this committee to do is a difficult issue and needs to be dealt with. Otherwise, all that will happen is that the work of the committee and the results for the people of South Australia will be significantly diminished. I assure everybody that we are not frivolous in the way we spend our money. We eat a lot of sandwiches and we are quite happy to do that. We are not trying to waste money or do anything silly, it is just the key things that need to be done.

I would also like to comment on the NRM boards and their staff around the state, as a personal comment, not on behalf of the committee. I have concerns about the fact that the NRM boards have been absorbed by what was DENR and is now DEWNR. I think it is a shame that it takes away some of the independence of the work and it takes away some of the community flavour and the direct community input and participation. That is not to denigrate the individuals involved or the staff members. I regularly deal with many of them professionally, I know many just as friends in local regions, and they all work hard, they all try their very best and they do everything that they possibly can in essentially what is an almost endless task.

I am often approached by people who say, 'Well, why hasn't the board done this? Why hasn't the board done that?' If they had an endless budget, endless resources and an endless number of staff they could address all of those things. I am disappointed that they do not get to a lot of the jobs that I would consider to be very important to do in the different regions around our state, but I do not doubt that the people who do have those tasks are doing as much as they possibly can, so I thank them for that work.

I would also like to acknowledge Dr Mark Siebentritt for the significant contribution he made to our Murray-Darling Basin plan. He was a contracted person to give us extra research and other support and he did an absolutely outstanding job in that role. I thank my colleagues on the committee for their genuine effort. I thank the local members who participated when we were doing work in their area. As always, I thank our staff, Mr Patrick Dupont and Mr David Trebilcock, who both put a lot of work into this. I commend the report to the house.

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (11:44): I rise to speak to the annual report of July 2011-June 2012, the 74^th report of the Natural Resources Committee. I would like to congratulate the presiding member, the Hon. Steph Key, the member for Ashford, for the interaction I have had with her and the committee, especially with regard to being involved with the Murray-Darling Basin report. I am very pleased that the committee and the presiding member made sure that all local members were kept on board and kept in the loop. I managed to present evidence at both Goolwa near the Murray Mouth and at Mannum and Murray Bridge during the tour of the Lower Murray swamps, so I certainly thank the member for Ashford for that opportunity. I also thank the members of the committee. I think it is a committee that does great work and it is spread across both government benches, opposition benches and Independents.

There were many reports that the committee worked on this year: Eyre Peninsula water supply, little penguins and the levy report. It was interesting to note that sometimes committees do have teeth and it was good to see that there were some committee concerns about some of the natural resource management levy proposals, which saw a significant reduction with regard to the Adelaide and Mount Lofty Ranges region. Some people think that committees do not have any bite, but it was just good to see that they made a recommendation that the proposed increase of 11.4 per cent was too high and well above CPI and that, as a result of the committee's objections, the minister granted an amended increase of 6 per cent. As I said, that shows how well committees can act.

I want to focus most of my discussion here today on the committee's work and the recommendations involved in the Murray-Darling Basin Authority and the basin plan. Going through the recommendations, they include the salinity targets for Lake Alexandrina and Lake Albert of less than 1,000 EC units for Lake Alexandrina and 1,500 EC units for Lake Albert for 95 per cent of the time measured as a rolling average over a 10-year period. I think that recommendation has to be applauded because obviously the committee listened to the community—a community that is still suffering with high salinities in the high 3,000s off Lake Albert. Some of those farmers are only just beginning to irrigate their properties again after many years of not even being able to see the water, let alone use it, but they are getting back to use of those River Murray flows that have come back since around September 2010.

I am interested in the water height target for below Lock 1—and I think it is a good target to aim for—with the height of Lake Alexandrina to remain above 0.5 metres Australian Height Datum for 95 per cent of the time measured at a rolling average over a 10-year period. I think the Lower Lakes communities—Lake Alexandrina, Lake Albert, the River Murray swamps communities and anyone below Lock 1 at Blanchetown—realise that there is more likely to be more adaptive management of the river going into the future. It is usually held at 0.75 metres AHD, and certainly when you get below 0.5, it is very hard to operate the levees of the Lower Murray swamps and get that flooding effect which is the most efficient way for those swamps to operate.

In recent years, we have seen a real rationalisation of dairy farmers in that area. There were about 120 dairy farmers and now there are only a few more than 20, I believe, in that same area. What has happened, when we had the program for the rehabilitation of the swamps and about $30 million of federal money, state money and farmers' own money was spent, is that with the drought and the effects of low flows, sadly most of those properties, if not all, need major work.

I think the second recommendation is very important, because it is a place that produces great feed and is a great dairy producing area. As I have said in this place before—and I note the work that is being done there by other agencies—with the longer term aim, with what can be done into the future with the Lower Murray swamps, as a whole the community and governments must work out whether we bring these swamps back to their former glory or whether we just walk away.

We just cannot keep spending money if we are not going to have those water flows, that is the simple fact. I am not saying we should walk away by any means but, hopefully, as someone who wants to be on the government benches next year, we acknowledge that we have to be realistic with how the budget is spent, and we have to expect the whole community to be realistic as well.

I also note target 4, that will see the Murray Mouth open with river flows for 100 per cent of the time. That is certainly a target well worth having in the recommendations. Recommendation number 5 is for stronger requirements for monitoring and evaluation, because if you do not have that in place how do you know what salinity is there and what water heights are there? I also talked about before—and it is mentioned in recommendation 6—the adaptive management framework that will have to be put in place with the operation of the plan over time.

I note recommendation 7 talks about the preliminary terms for the review in 2015—which is getting ever so much closer as discussion on the River Murray just keeps rolling on—including the social, cultural and economic impacts as well as the benefits that can be had from the plan and its implementation. Certainly, there is the work in regard to recommendation 8, the requirement for additional hydrological modelling prior to the finalisation of the plan, that assesses the impact of removing selected operational constraints combined with water recovery on the ability of basin plan targets to be met.

In addition to some of these proposed changes to the basin plan, the committee recommended that the state Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation lobby the Australian federal government to undertake an independent basin-wide audit of the cost of further water savings from infrastructure investment. This is to help identify the extent to which these savings could make up the gap between the volume of water recovered to date and that still required. I think that is absolutely vital. For too long the authority has targeted the simple system of just buying water out of communities right throughout the basin—whether it be here, through Victoria, New South Wales or Queensland. It is just too much of a cheap and nasty, easy fix.

As I have mentioned in this place before, I have seen upgrades that can be done where people put investment into their own properties and get a 100 per cent improvement in their water use efficiency. That is just by putting in drip lines instead of relying on flood irrigation in areas around Deniliquin. I think too much focus has been put on water buybacks that can carve holes in communities, and that is why we have had so much backlash from the upper basin states.

In closing, I commend the work of the committee right throughout the year. I certainly commend the work of the committee that involved the River Murray, and its report to help guide the Murray-Darling Basin Plan. As a community, especially being on the end of the mighty River Murray, we must do our best to make sure it stays in the place it used to be, in its former glory before the drought. Otherwise the impact on communities—and not just here in South Australia—will be too massive for anyone to bear. It is not just the economic cost; it is the social cost and environmental cost. So I commend the committee for all its work and wish it well in its future endeavours.

Mr BROCK (Frome) (11:54): Mr Speaker, I also congratulate you on your new position, and I know you will do an excellent job up there. At the same time I would also like to thank and pay tribute to the previous speaker the Hon. Lyn Breuer, the member for Giles. I thought the member for Giles did an excellent job, but certainly we are looking for guidance from the Speaker and some improved protocols in this chamber.

Along with the previous speakers, I also compliment all the members of this committee. This is a very hard-working committee and its members cover a wide range of political parties, as well as Independents. This committee would be one of the hardest-working committees in the parliament. We have many visits to regional areas. We have dedicated ourselves to dealing with issues affecting the natural resources and environment across the whole of the state, under the leadership of the Hon. Steph Key. As the member for Stuart indicated, she has been a great Presiding Member for this committee. Not only does she make everybody feel relaxed but she also encourages everybody to have their say, and that is what happens on this committee.

The member for Stuart and other members may have mentioned that one of our big inquiries was the review of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, which the previous minister for water asked us to do. It was a very worthwhile, encouraging and informative inquiry. We visited the Riverland and other areas in the Murray-Darling Basin. Those people were very appreciative that a committee came down and took their views. Too often, the community, the parliament and associations forget about the regions and the locals. If you can go out there and show that you believe in them and feel for them, then they feel a bit more relaxed and more confident in giving full information. The result of our inquiry was that our submission to the parliament was then taken up by the government of the day, and I am sure that the response and the outcome is better for both the whole region and South Australia.

In regard to the NRM levies, one thing I find, when they send their plans in to our committee for us to have a look at and endorse, is that the time frame we have to digest and examine what they are going to do for the forthcoming year and get it through the system needs to be look at very seriously. We need to look at the time frames on that so as to give the NRM boards and the councils an opportunity to communicate with their communities, to get their plans through to the Natural Resources Committee for its views and comments, for us to get back to those boards if we have any concerns, and then get it through to the minister.

There was also the bushfire inquiry. The Hon. Iain Evans asked us to do this inquiry and when we went up to his electorate I saw a video of the Canberra bushfires. Even though we were in a CFS shed and were only watching a video, I felt the ferocity of that fire. Too often, I do not think people understand the dangers and the devastating effect that bushfires can have. The Hon. Iain Evans was very forceful and we did do that inquiry, and I certainly learned a lot about the issue.

Another inquiry was initiated by the member for Flinders, Peter Treloar. He asked if we could do an inquiry into water on the Eyre Peninsula, to look at the opportunities over there and see firsthand the issues confronting that region. It was an eye opener and, again, we certainly learned a lot, and I think the member for Stuart already indicated that that inquiry is still ongoing.

The member for Fisher raised the issue of the funding of committees. I know that everything is tight, but if we have an issue that we need to deal with or investigate, I think the parliament needs to be very serious about allocating adequate funds. Nobody wants to waste resources—and certainly not this committee—but if we are going to do our job correctly then we need to be able to get out there and talk to the people, feel the issues and conduct site visits. I do not think every committee should have the same allocation, but certain committees need to go out further into the whole state and I think we need to look at the budgets around that in the coming years.

The other one is our visits to the region. Again, I reinforce this from a region's point of view: at times, people in the regions at times feel as if they are neglected and unloved. But, by going out there and talking to these people face-to-face, and visiting the locations, farms, etc., it certainly gives them a far better idea and appreciation that the parliament is there to serve all South Australians, and I think that is what is happening with the Natural Resources Committee of this parliament.

In closing, I would also like to thank the parliament for the opportunity to be able to serve on this committee. This is my first full term, and I have certainly learned a tremendous amount about the issues confronting regional South Australia, including the Adelaide Hills, through the Natural Resources Committee. We need to ensure that we do everything to protect that but, at the same time, we need to make certain that we are very resilient and aware that we need to also back industries and continuation for that. I again thank the Hon. Steph Key for her leadership as the presiding member, and I also thank all the members of this committee. I commend the report to parliament.

Motion carried.