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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
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NATURAL RESOURCES COMMITTEE: ALINYTJARA WILURARA NATURAL RESOURCES MANAGEMENT REGION

The Hon. S.W. KEY (Ashford) (11:02): I move:

That the 86th report of the committee, entitled Alinytjara Wilurara APY Ranges Sub-Region Fact-Finding Visit 'Camelot', be noted.

The Natural Resources Committee fact-finding visit to Alinytjara Wilurara Natural Resources Management Region (North) has been anticipated for a long time. After being forced to reschedule a number of times over the past five years, the Natural Resources Committee finally completed its visit to the AWNRM Region (North) in April 2013.

Our hosts were the staff of the Alinytjara Wilurara Natural Resources Management Board/DEWNR, including the Acting Regional Manager, Matthew Ward, together with Helen Donald, Doug Humann, Justine Graham and Bruce MacPherson. We also met with local Anangu members of the APY executive, the principal of the Indulkana school, Paula McGuire, the Chair of the Antakirinja Matu-Yankunytjatjara Aboriginal Corporation—sorry to the member for Giles for my pronunciation.

The Hon. L.R. Breuer: I'm impressed.

The Hon. S.W. KEY: Thank you, I am glad you are impressed—Ian Crombie, and the chief executive of the Coober Pedy council, Phil Cameron. Details of our meeting and the evidence gathered are included in our report.

There is much happening in the APY lands. Mining companies have recently discovered one of the world's largest nickel deposits, ancient water has been discovered in deep rocks of the Palaeozoic period, and there have also been ongoing discussions around developing pastoral projects in partnership with the Anangu, involving cattle, wild horses, camels and donkeys.

The thing I recall most vividly from our visit was the urgent call from members of the APY Executive for action. The Anangu, we heard, were tired of successive governments, state and federal, promising but not delivering. They were concerned for young people having little to do on the lands in the way of employment activities and so sometimes getting into trouble. The Anangu are concerned that without enough support the communities on their traditional lands might be doomed. A possible way forward that is widely supported is getting young people more actively involved in managing the environment and natural resources in their traditional country.

Members were quite shocked at the extent that buffel grass has spread in the APY Ranges. It is probably too late now to do anything but slow the spread of this pest south and east. This highly invasive plant forms a monoculture resulting in the loss of habitat for native animals. Buffel grass has not been declared a weed of national significance or even listed as a declared plant in South Australia, though efforts to make this happen are underway. To complicate matters, buffel grass is still being promoted as a pasture grass in Queensland.

The committee was enthusiastic about DEWNR and the Anangu working as partners on NRM activities and projects that are meaningful to the Anangu as well as meeting federal and state government objectives. Suitable NRM projects are manageable in a scale like the excellent Warru (which is the black-footed rock wallaby) Recovery Plan. I have to say that I did not actually see any of these warru.

Mr Pengilly: Can you pronounce that again?

The Hon. S.W. KEY: The warru or rock wallaby. This may potentially include smaller pastoral or camel harvesting ventures to provide learning opportunities for people working on their traditional lands. Committee members intend to seek additional information and anticipate hearing from further witnesses on the potential for camel and other pastoral projects in the AW NRM region.

Success requires managing expectations, having realistic aims and ensuring room for flexibility around outcomes. It means providing challenges that are interesting and rewarding for the people without insisting on a full-time, nine to five work ethic. It means enabling communities to be self-sufficient, to generate income, produce food, care for families and look after people in a way that gives a sense of pride and wellbeing. Committee members are looking forward to undertaking part 2 of this fact-finding visit and are planning a visit to Yalata and Maralinga in the southern part of the AWNRM region in November this year.

I wish to thank all those who gave their time to assist the committee with this inquiry, and there are a number of NRM staff and Anangu and APY people who made that possible. I commend the members of the committee: the member for Frome, the member for Torrens, the member for Little Para, the member for Mount Gambier, the member for Stuart, the Hon. Robert Brokenshire, the Hon. John Dawkins, former member the Hon. Gerry Kandelaars, and the Hon. Russell Wortley for their contribution to this report. All members have worked cooperatively on this report. And finally I would like to thank the staff, Patrick Dupont and David Trebilcock, for their assistance. I commend this report to the house.

Mr BROCK (Frome) (11:09): I will be very brief but I would like to also comment on the 86th report of the Natural Resource Committee entitled Alinytjara Wilurara APY Ranges Sub-Region Fact Finding Visit, and that it be noted.

As the Presiding Member, the member for Ashford, has already indicated, the people up there were very appreciative of our visit. It had been promised many times over successive governments that people would visit that area and, even if they had visited the area, there were lots of promises but never anything coming out of it. I certainly would encourage this government to look very favourably and seriously at the recommendations in this report and to act on some of them.

One of the things that was very evident was the necessity for teaching young children in the APY lands and the surrounding areas the opportunities in the retail and hospitality industry, and that is something that is very precious to my heart, and we need to continue doing that. I congratulate the people up there who are giving opportunities to these young Aboriginal children who may not otherwise have employment opportunities.

Something else that struck me was the buffel grass. Over the border, it is very well contained and controlled, and there is a lot of cattle grazing on it. As soon as we came onto the South Australian border side, it is rampant and all over the place. I think that is an utter disgrace. It is an invasive weed and nothing can grow underneath it. I do not think even mice and things like that can live in it because it blocks out all sunlight. Certainly, I recommend very strongly that the government, through the NRM people, look at some sort of control for buffel grass.

As the member for Ashford has indicated, we also need to look at opportunities for controlling feral camels up there. They are very prevalent and it is a complete waste. They are doing a lot of damage and, again, we should be looking at controlling those animals with the opportunity for not only domestic use, through human consumption, but also the export trade.

I sincerely thank the parliament for the opportunity of being on this committee. It is a very hardworking committee and I have learnt a tremendous amount by visiting not only this region but also other regions across South Australia. I believe that, whoever you represent in this parliament here, it enhances you to have these sorts of opportunities to understand what happens all around South Australia, especially in the regional areas where there are lots of opportunities, but people do not seem to understand that and do not really take notice of the opportunities there.

To my fellow members of the committee and our staff, I thank them very sincerely and, again, I thank the parliament for the opportunity to be able to be part of the Natural Resources Committee. I thoroughly enjoyed it and the work tremendously, and I commend the report to the parliament.

The Hon. R.B. SUCH (Fisher) (11:12): I commend this report. It is ironic, if you think about it, that Aboriginal people, who were custodians of this land for probably 50,000 years or more, are now experiencing some of the consequences of what Europeans have done to this land in approximately 200 years. The Aboriginal people, as we know, have a strong link to their land—to 'country', as they call it. Contrary to what a lot of people say, they did not have a sense of ownership but of custodianship. They believed the opposite to us and believed that the land owned them, rather than what we have in our philosophy. We believe we own the land and, often (not always), we have treated it with disrespect.

I heard the previous speaker, the member for Frome, talking about buffel grass. It raises a wider issue, and that is that I think there needs to be more effort put into using genetic research in dealing with weeds. Unfortunately, one of the things that has happened in Australia in recent years is that there has been a reduction in support for research into pest plants, pest animals and so on, and I believe the only long-term effective solution is to use genetic engineering.

Feral camels were mentioned. They are a problem elsewhere. I have had a constituent contact me who drives trucks between Adelaide and Perth. As a result of raising the issue, the minister and the department took appropriate action on the Nullarbor to cull some of the feral camels there. There is no way you will ever get rid of feral cats or wild dogs, whatever you want to list—pest plants—without, I believe, using genetic engineering.

I would like to see the federal government in particular put a lot of money into research because not only will it benefit areas that we are talking about here but it will also benefit the farming community and the wider community as a consequence. You can increase productivity dramatically as a result, I believe, of using genetic engineering to control pest plants and pest animals.

I commend this report; it is another example of one of our standing committees doing excellent work. As I have said on many occasions, I think the committee system of the parliament is probably one of the most—if not the most—productive aspect of our parliamentary activity. I commend this report to the house.

The Hon. L.R. BREUER (Giles) (11:15): I just want to be brief on this. I congratulate the committee on the report. I am really pleased to see some of the recommendations it has come out with, but I would particularly ask them about the issue of buffel grass. I spent some time not long ago at the top of South Australia, the Northern Territory and Western Australia, and I was appalled at the spread of the buffel grass around those areas. I know that it is really taking over the APY lands and is a major problem.

I welcome anything the committee can do to stress the need to get some controls in there to see what can be done, because not only is it taking over the area but it is also creating a major bushfire hazard, as I understand it. I actually saw a fire with buffel grass while I was there and I was quite appalled at what was happening. I think if the committee can keep working on that issue, it would be of great benefit to this state and particularly that part of the state.

I pick up on the point about employment or opportunities for young people, and I would suggest that perhaps the environment is a good area for them to work in. Certainly, they have a real kinship with it and would like to work in it, I know. In Alice Springs and Desert Park, I know they train a lot of young people. If we could get young people trained in areas as park rangers, etc., I think that would be of great benefit for the state. Unfortunately, funding has been cut over the years for park rangers. We have fewer and fewer in this state, but in those areas I think they are particularly needed.

If we could get them trained in things like bush tucker, there is a whole range of areas that they could get knowledge of and pass that on. You see so many tourists up in those areas who love to speak to our Indigenous people. If they could impart some of the knowledge that they have and pass that on to those people, I think that would be excellent. I think there are opportunities there which we have missed out on but which we could develop in the future.

Camel control is another area that I would like the committee to concentrate on because it is a major problem. There have been all sorts of schemes to try to get rid of them—some of them quite harebrained, I think, and unrealistic. There are camels there and they need to be got rid of. At the moment, they cull them; they shoot them and they lie on the ground. There was a proposal for, and I think the development of, an abattoir. It does not seem to have got anywhere.

There are proposals to bring the camels out of the land and bring them down to abattoirs in South Australia. That also is a major hurdle because the freight costs are incredible. Also for example, there is an issue at the moment between the Western Australian border and Amata with bringing camels through; they cannot bring road trains through. There are all sorts of barriers to doing something about the camel industry, but we must do something soon. They are eating the vegetation around there, and they are a major problem, so maybe the Natural Resources Committee can keep looking at that issue and determine what is feasible and what can be done.

I am a bit anti the agistment of cattle in the APY lands because I have seen the damage that can cause to the environment as well. I do not really believe that that is an occupation for the future, so I think we need to be really careful about that. Perhaps the committee can look at that issue in the future, too, because there are areas where cattle have been agisted and there has been a lot of damage to the environment. So, good work, Natural Resources Committee—keep on it. Somebody has to keep an eye out on what is going on there, and I think you are doing a good job.

Dr McFETRIDGE (Morphett) (11:18): I congratulate the Natural Resources Committee on this report. Can I just say, for the information of the house, Alinytjara is Pitjantjatjara for north and Wilurara is Pitjantjatjara for west, so it is just the North-West NRM Board. The opportunity they had to go to the APY lands is something that everybody in this place should try to take up because it is some of the most beautiful country in this state. It contains Mount Woodroffe (Ngarutjaranya in Pitjantjatjara), which is the highest point in South Australia in the Musgrave Ranges; it is absolutely magnificent country.

Then, of course, further south you have Watarru or Mount Lindsay—a very isolated community. Mount Lindsay (or Watarru, its correct name) is a series of large granite outcrops across between Ayers Rock and the Olgas, Kata Tjuta and Uluru. It is just wonderful country and the tourism opportunities there are huge, but there are lots of problems.

A few years ago, on one of the Aboriginal lands committee trips up there, I bought a painting by a well-known Aboriginal artist, Ruby Williamson. It is called the Eight Pussycats Story. Being a vet, I saw this picture about these eight cats—and there were eight cats—but it is a bush tucker story. It is about 'We ate cats', because they estimate there are between 10 million and 20 million wild cats in northern Australia, depending on the seasons. They are doing a terrible job of destroying the natural fauna in the area.

Camels are another big issue we have heard about. There are variations between 600,000 and 1,000,000 camels wandering through that area up there. Bringing them out on road transport is very difficult. Road trains cannot travel through there, not only because of the condition of the roads but I understand there are regulations that will not allow them to travel there, yet across the border in Queensland they can. If you were able to get the camels out in road trains, it might be an economic proposition, but, at the moment, it is not an economical proposition to do that.

We heard about some abattoirs that were proposed up there. There were some even started in a very small way, but they collapsed. Taking camels out in boxes, not as live freight, is about the only way you are going to do it, because there are lots of legs and lots of hump that you do not get much money for.

I urge the committee to continue to look at the control of feral animals up there, not just cats and camels but donkeys and horses, and to make sure that that country is not only valued for its mineral wealth but also for its natural beauty. I have been told that the bottom half is floating on oil and the top half is an Aladdin's cave of minerals. I think there are about 27 mining tenements on the lands at the moment—everything from nickel through to uranium and all the other minerals you can possibly think of. However, we need to ensure that that country is valued for what it is because its natural beauty is just magnificent.

In a recent visit with the committee to Ayers Rock Resort, we met with Manfred Pieper, who is managing the resort on behalf of the Indigenous Land Council. They hope to employ 350 Anangu in their hospitality training. They can then go back onto the lands and do more remote tourism and hospitality work there. There is a $7.3 million trade training centre being built at Umuwa. However, the only problem is that, even though it has beautiful facilities for mechanics, woodworking and metalworking, as well as a huge industrial kitchen which you would see in any hotel or restaurant in Australia, there is no ongoing funding for it. There is no recurrent funding. They are having to pinch money out of the education budget here and there to try to train kids in hospitality.

Between what they are doing at Ayers Rock Resort and what could happen on the lands, there are huge opportunities. In South Africa they have remote areas where you can go and stay in the wilderness and enjoy the countryside. People pay big dollars for this, so the opportunities there for tourism are immense, but we have to make sure we control the feral pests, both plants and animals, in that sort of country so that we really do make sure that the future generations, not only the Anangu but also all the visitors to the APY lands, can benefit from that wonderful place and experience as it is a very beautiful and very valuable part of South Australia. I congratulate the committee on the report.

Mr PEGLER (Mount Gambier) (11:23): I would just like to say what an honour it was to go to that subregion of the APY lands and to investigate what all the various environmental issues are there. The buffel grass is a complex one in that in many parts of Australia it is used as a pasture species. I remember being up around Goondiwindi about 35 years ago and they were planting buffel grass everywhere then, so it is going to be something extremely hard to control on those lands because elsewhere in Australia it is used as a pasture. As far as I am concerned, the only way that they will ever be able to control it is perhaps with grazing cattle. I know they will do some environmental damage but they may also be able to control the buffel grass with them.

Cats and foxes are pests right throughout Australia, particularly out in the arid lands where it is extremely hard to control them. I do not think we will ever appreciate the damage that they do to many of our small native species of both birds and lizards. On another trip we saw where a cat had eaten 30 small lizards, two birds and a mouse in one day, so you can imagine if there are millions of cats out there the great damage that they are doing and, of course, foxes along with them.

We also saw the damage that the camels and donkeys are doing. They particularly do damage to native plants but they also often fall into the rock holes that contain water, and those holes have been very much a part of the Aboriginal tradition. They have been the watering points for many of those people and are watering points for many small animals, etc., but once the camels fall into them and drown, they are no longer usable. The people in the APY lands are also doing some great work in re-establishing some of the more rare wallabies. I certainly appreciate the great work that the local Indigenous people are doing. It was a great pleasure to go there, and I think that as a committee we should be looking into ways that we can definitely control these camels and donkeys.

The Hon. S.W. KEY (Ashford) (11:26): I thank members for their contributions this morning and also the other members who have not made a contribution today. I think that this is a really important area. As I said earlier, we have been trying, as the Natural Resources Committee, to get to this region for quite a number of years—certainly on the past committee that I was on—and it was great that we finally at least made the first part of the AWNRM trip.

We are looking forward to going to the southern part shortly. As part of our role as the Natural Resources Committee we feel it is not only important to hear from natural resource management committees who give evidence at Parliament House—and they do all come to visit us and talk to us not only about levies but also about work they are doing—but that we also visit the regions and spend time with the local people and the workers who have responsibility for natural resources in the area. I commend the report.

Motion carried.

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