GARRETT MUST DO MORE TO STOP DUD PIPELINE

22-June-2009

The Victorian Government’s managing director of the Office of Water, David Downie, has provided evidence to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal that contradicts a number of Water Minister Tim Holding’s claims in regards to the North-South Pipeline.

This evidence proves that Mr Brumby’s pipeline will not deliver the required water to Melbourne.

“The Victorian Government has tried to ignore the pleas of local people and the criticism of the Auditor General, but surely it can’t ignore the evidence from the head of the Office of Water,” Sophie Mirabella MP, Federal Member for Indi said today.

“There is mounting evidence to prove that the Brumby Government has lied to Victorians about its pipeline project,” Mrs Mirabella said.

Mr Downie said Melbourne Water had told the department the pipeline would not be completed until at least the middle of next year; while the Water Minister told the Victorian Parliament in May that the pipe would be operational as early as February 2010.

Mr Downie also said that unlike other Government projects, the food bowl modernisation project policy was made before the business case was done and promised water savings that just don’t exist.

 Premier Brumby asserted in the Victorian Parliament on 18 July 2007 that 900 gigalitres of water is lost in the irrigation system each year - this is not the case, only 343 gigalitres was lost in 2008-09.

The Brumby Government continues to misrepresent and deny a number of important facts regarding the pipeline, one of which is that irrigation efficiency is most dependent on available water and not infrastructure, that is, more rain equals more efficiency.

 “I have said before that Mr Brumby’s focus is on providing water for Melbourne at any cost – now we know that water can’t even be delivered. Mr Downie’s admissions show just how far the Premier and the Water Minister are willing to go,” Mrs Mirabella said.

In an interview regarding his decision not to stop the north-south pipeline, the Environment Minister Peter Garrett said that under Federal laws he has the responsibility to protect the health of the rivers “to the extent that it impacts on matters of national environmental significance.”

“Mr Brumby’s pipeline jeopardises the Murray Darling Basin. It will extract water from the already stressed Murray Darling Basin, a river system of national environmental significance,” Mrs Mirabella said.

“Peter Garrett must recognise the risk to the Murray Darling Basin and put a stop to the Brumby Government’s disastrous pipeline project,” Mrs Mirabella concluded.