Adelaide International Bird Sanctuary

Ms PRATT (Frome) (16:24): Thank you very much, Acting Deputy Speaker. Winaityinaityi Pangkara is the Kaurna language for the Adelaide International Bird Sanctuary's name of country belonging to all birds, and Saturday 11 October was World Migratory Bird Day. There is a special association—Friends of the Adelaide International Bird Sanctuary—that was incorporated in 2016. They were established by a group of very enthusiastic people who wanted to make a difference for this particular pristine environment—specifically, the 60 kilometres of coastline that runs from the Barker Inlet into the electorate of Frome to Port Parham, and all the beaches in between, and it certainly does encompass the Adelaide International Bird Sanctuary.

The bird sanctuary sits right at the southern end of the East Asian-Australasian Flyway, and it is one of the key feeding and roosting sites for migratory shorebirds who use that flyway every year. An extraordinary number of birds fly between the Russian tundra in Siberia and Alaska, and make their way to Port Parham and Thompson Beach. More than five million birds a year use that flyway, and about 27,000 birds call the Adelaide International Bird Sanctuary home.

While it is one of Adelaide's longest continuous conservation areas, the bird sanctuary is also home to 263 unique fauna and flora species. In particular, it helps protect resident and migratory shorebirds, including birds such as the curlew sandpiper, the ruddy turnstone, the red knot and eastern curlew. I was delighted on Saturday, when I was out with the friends group, to be introduced to the great heron, the sooty oystercatcher and the red-necked stint—the shorebirds that were nesting too far away for us to see except through the scope of a beautiful Swarovski lens.

This is a space and an environmental group that I have not been able to explore previously, and I am delighted that I get to represent them, but they do this great work on their own. There are about 60 members. They attend this international bird sanctuary once a month for opportunities to come together to keep an eye on the birds. I joined them a few months ago when we were working on replenishing the habitat, and I cannot commend more highly people like Mary-Anne, Teresa, Anna and Lucy who helped me with the scope. They are dedicated volunteers and they deserve all the credit for the success, nearly marking 10 years of this friends group.

But there is, of course, the element of the environment we are trying to protect at play here, and that is the impacts of algal bloom beyond the dead marine life that we are aware of, beyond the impact to human health, business, tourism; and there is a fragile ecosystem that is tied to the algal bloom. Make no mistake, the algal bloom is certainly having an impact on the ecosystem and the migratory shorebirds. We just have to ask the commercial fishers in Gulf St Vincent who have had to make pretty devastating decisions to protect their business because that marine life is dead.

We know these birds feed on the food stock that is at risk of diminishing because of the algal bloom. Little molluscs are consumed whole and worms in the beach. They feed on fish; I was watching a great heron munch on one on Saturday. So it is very important that the government pays close attention to the concerns that are being flagged in correspondence to ministers and in observations by our park rangers. The friends group, FAIBS, is aware, and so is BirdLife Australia. In fact, they launched a campaign called Please Give Us Room in the Bloom. This is a campaign that is calling for funding, and it is a legitimate question to put to the government about the summer plan and its third instalment where we have seen the government drip-feed these announcements.

We learnt today from a successive environment minister that $11 million out of a total of $77 million with federal contribution has been allocated to migratory birds in Robe, so I am very optimistic for the Friends of the Adelaide International Bird Sanctuary that, if applying to the government for funding to preserve that food stock, they should see great success. We want to see the environment protected in this important way, and the government must not lose sight of the impact of the algal bloom on our birdlife as well.