‘Mary River Forever’ - Amen

The ‘Sisters of Mary’ alongside Senator Barnaby Joyce and others, on the steps of the Brisbane Convention Centre, day two of the Senate Inquiry into the dam. The previous day more than a hundred people crammed into the small conference centre at Gympie for the first hearing.

A total of 199 submissions were received by the Senate, and all but one—the State Government’s—were critical of the dam proposal. A number of those who made a submission had the opportunity to make presentations at the hearings and were subject to cross examination. Social, environmental and economic impacts were tabled, although the media’s coverage has, once again, been largely concerned with upstream issues. ourgreatsandy.com (read our submission here) joined the Fraser Island Defenders Organisation (FIDO) (here), in drawing attention to the impacts expected to occur in the Great Sandy region. The Hervey Bay City Council (HBCC) also reinforced these concerns by re-entering the ourgreatsandy.com submission.

The inquiry will resume in Canberra in May to hear submissions on alternatives to the Traveston project, including Federal Environment Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s proposal to pump water from northern New South Wales rivers to southeast Queensland.

Dolphin Research—Our Newest Weapon?

Recently there has been a bit of hype over Southern Cross University (SCU) researchers shooting darts at dolphins in Tin Can Bay and scaring them away from a popular dolphin feeding spot in the area.

The research process was labelled ‘inhumane’ by owners of Barnacles Dolphin Centre—the operators of the feeding site (which would have been illegal if the State Government hadn’t ignored its environmental protection laws once again.)

What the researchers were actually doing was collecting tissue samples (less that 5mls of tissue) from the animals in an attempt to determine their migratory patterns—the extent of their family trees and whether or not they migrate to other waters. It was the latest in a number of dolphin research expeditions in the Great Sandy Strait/Hervey Bay area by SCU. In 2004-2005 a study was made into the distribution and abundance of Indo Pacific Humpback Dolphins (sousa chinesis) in the area, with some impressive conclusions made, including the fact that Great Sandy and Hervey Bay support the largest number of dolphins recorded in Australia.

Results of the biopsies taken in Tin Can Bay last week are now being claimed to have the potential to stop the damming of the Mary River, because, like the dugong, a dam could have a detrimental affect on dolphin food sources, and threaten the very survival of dolphin populations in the area.

The Battle to Get Brisbane Onside

It’s not the first time the campaign has been taken to the streets (or in this photo’s case, river) of Brisbane, but the need to convince the people of the capital that the dam is the wrong way to go was reinforced at a public information forum held in West End on Saturday.

Queensland Senator Andrew Bartlett, a long term supporter of the Save the Mary River Group, hosted the session, which aimed to give Brisbane residents the facts on the dam and the threats it poses to the environment. Professor Stuart White from the Sydney University of Technology was also in attendance, presenting an outline of the anti-dam report he co-authored, after being commissioned by the Mary River Council of Mayors.

“We need to get Brisbane people on-side,” Senator Bartlett was quoted as saying in the Fraser Coast Chronicle. “The Government has already programmed themselves to ignore people outside Brisbane.”

Indeed, according to Queensland Deputy Premier, Anna Bligh, people outside Brisbane who are against the dam are suffering from nothing but a classic case of ‘NIMBY’ (i.e. ‘not-in-my-back-yard’) syndrome. She says we are selfish for wanting to prevent wide-scale environmental, social and cultural destruction in the landscapes we love; that instead we should be willing to sacrifice them for the greater good … blah blah. Sounds all too much like the ‘Local Pain for National Gain’ myth Arundhati Roy blasts in The Cost of Living; a biting commentary on dams in India. Well worth a read if you’re interested in this subject.