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Thank you Danno. Here is Dorothy Pratt in PARLIAMENT recently:
Queensland Parliament Hansard [8/3/11]:
... Mrs PRATT (Nanango--Ind) (3.20 pm): I rise to speak to the Mines and Energy Legislation Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2010. Over the past 13 years, I have become very interested in mining because there are a lot of mines in my electorate such as the Meandu Mine, the proposed mine at Coolabunia and Cougar Energy?s UCG operation which, as everyone in the House would be aware, caused a lot of issues in my electorate and the town of Kingaroy. I thank Minister Kate Jones for her due diligence with regards to UCG in the South Burnett. I thank her for taking very seriously the people?s concerns. In fact, I commend her. She did not turn a blind eye or say that this was just another whingeing community. She took it to heart. She had the matter investigated by an expert panel, which looked at the entire project. As we all know, after the report was released the decision was made that Cougar Energy was not to proceed.

In saying that, many believe that the people of the South Burnett and I in particular are opposed to any sort of gas mining. That is not the truth. We all know there has to be progress, but it has to be done in a proper and secure way. There cannot be a Russian roulette approach that may risk a community simply because megadollars would come out of a venture. We all know that that is the way of the future, but we have to recognise that the people who live in the area--and some families may have lived there for generations--have rights. Unfortunately, regardless of who is in power, governments reap a lot of money from mining companies and that money holds a lot of sway when governments need money.

One of the lessons learnt from the Cougar Energy exercise is that the government did not do its own homework in the first instance. It did not lay proper ground rules for a company to follow, because there was no baseline data to compare before and after the event. There was no proper investigation of where the underground water ran. Governments must endeavour to find out those things. We all know that ours is the driest continent in the world. We all know that the underground watertables travel almost the length of Australia, from the north to the south. We all know there are interconnections underground that we do not see. They could be mapped. I believe it is essential that all underground watercourses be mapped in the future so that severe damage is not done to the nation as a whole. We can say, ?You cannot touch the prime farming land, the good arable land; you cannot destroy that?, but that land will be destroyed if we do not preserve the underground watertables and the underground streams and rivers that run into those watertables. If we do not preserve those, crops will not grow. If we cannot water crops and animals, and all the other things that happen on the land, we will be a very poor country in the not-too-distant future.

I commend the member for Callide. He stood in this House and said that he backed the minister all the way when it came to shutting down Cougar Energy. At last, he has made the right move--at last. Throughout this whole process, throughout the time that we were fighting to reveal the truth about what was happening on the Cougar Energy site and have that placed in the public arena and brought into this House for debate so that it could be investigated, I cannot remember--although it may have done, but I have asked the library to search this for me--the opposition stating that it had major concerns about UCG. Today at 3.11, the library sent me an email that states--

We have checked Hansard for the 52nd and 53rd Parliament, and searched for relevant media, but we have not been able to find any instance where Mr Seeney has asked for Cougar Energy to be shut down.

That is fine, but today he said he backed the minister all the way.

I am very angry about this. I want to correct the record in the House, for the simple reason that I do not like people taking credit or even suggesting that they deserve a bit of credit if they have, in fact, not done anything here in this House. With all due respect to Mr Seeney, and I do respect the man, perhaps it should have been said that in the past an error was made in supporting a project or whatever, but at least admit that the project was supported in the first instance and was not opposed in any way, shape or form. I made inquiries at the minister?s office as to whether or not any correspondence had been received from the opposition in relation to Cougar Energy. One official letter basically asked for an update, but that was it. The member for Callide did not raise any concerns. However, I am glad he is on the right side.

The member for Callide also said, and I support him in this, that we have to monitor any mining company and any relatively new mining ventures in Australia and in Queensland to make sure they do the right thing. It is up to the government to do that, and to do it before the event. It should not be done after the event, when people?s properties and livelihoods have been jeopardised, as they could have been and as some people believe they were in the South Burnett. People?s cattle were tested. They had to come up with new forms of testing to test the cattle for benzene. As I said earlier, they had no baseline data to compare that data with. All those things should be put in place in the first instance.

Many members would know that yesterday outside parliament a march was held by people from the Darling Downs, concerned about mining, fracking and so on. The government must take that seriously, because those people are living with it every single day. They are the ones who are experiencing impacts on their properties. It is all right to say that that should not happen, that we should not have rusting wells, we should not have water and gases bubbling out of the ground. It is right that that should not be happening, but it is happening because to a great degree we let the companies self-monitor. There should be independent monitoring. I hate putting another layer of bureaucracy on any industry, but in an instance like this when the very livelihood of the state is threatened--and that is true, because lately all our dollars seem to be coming from the mining industry--we have to make sure we get it right in the very first instance and that companies do not carry on with improper practices.

I am passionate about UCG. That does not mean I am totally opposed to it, but I am very passionate about it being done in the right way. In the first instance we have to get the underground watertables, streams and rivers mapped so that we do not impact greatly on them in the future.

The issue of safety has been talked about here in the House. I must admit that I learnt to drive as soon as I was old enough to stand on the clutch with both feet, hang on with one hand and push the gear stick with the other. I was not a big girl when I was younger. I must have been 7 by the time I could actually jump onto the clutch and had the coordination to change the gear. By the time I was 8 I was ploughing paddocks and pulling a scuffler and potato digger. By the time I got to high school I could probably drive as well as any man or woman who had been driving for 20 years. I can understand why people on the land, especially where it is a family concern, do make use of their children in this manner. I would have thought it very improper if my father had banned me from driving at that age. I was able to do it, so I figured I could do it. If I was big enough to do it, I could do it.

This legislation talks about mine sites being proper, fully-fledged industrial mine sites. I would not be a bit surprised if there were fathers, mothers or whoever drives a 30-tonne truck out there who have snuck their kid into the seat on a day when the mine was not working and let them have a steer. It happens. We have even heard of that sort of thing happening with commercial flights and one thing or another in the past. People do allow their children a little freedom. However, there is not a parent alive who I believe would intentionally risk the life of their child.

I turn now to the issue of gravel mining on the Brisbane River. Last week I walked along what used to be a beautiful riverbank. The actual riverbank was not there anymore so I could not walk upon it. I walked about 15 feet lower than the original riverbank. The riverbed must have been 20 to 30 yards wider than it was the last time I walked along it. I spoke to one man who was so devastated he could not go to his neighbour?s place to see what he had lost. He himself had lost five or six acres of land which had washed away. I went to look at what the bloke down from him had lost. He had lost almost 30 acres of land from the riverbank. I would like the minister--and I invite him now--to come with me one day to talk to these property owners about the damage that has been done by the river which they believe has been severely exacerbated by gravel quarrying in the Brisbane River by Karreman Brothers.

After seeing the devastation I personally believe that a very close look has to be taken into whether or not that operation did cause the severe damage because below the point of quarrying the damage is nowhere near as severe. That operation has removed all that used to control the river and slow it down a little bit. In this case the floodwater just ran through there and gouged everything but slowed down below where the work had taken place. Unless the minister goes and sees it for himself, I do not think he will understand the damage that has been caused. Also of concern is the issue of licensing, permits et cetera. There seems to be some secrecy with regard to the type of permit or licence that Karreman has or the amount they are allowed to quarry. Nobody seems to be able to get any answers, which I find a little bit disturbing. I would have thought that that kind of thing would be public knowledge.

I was not going to speak very long on this bill, but I am passionate. Although a lot of people say I am not a greenie and that I am opposed to the greenie philosophy, that is not true. When you are born on the land you are very much a greenie on your own property. I know very well that as you learn something you must adopt it in the best interests of the country. We now have to look overseas to see exactly the issues relating to UCG mining and gas mining. They have had huge issues overseas. People keep telling me that there are successful operations overseas. However, I cannot find one. I have asked and asked for members of this parliament and ministers of this government to tell me where they are so that I can at least investigate them for myself. I have not been able to find a UCG or CSG operation that has not had a huge impact on the residents in the surrounding area. If the minister could find me one example I would be happy. I ask every minister, new and old, to find me one example that I can show to the people of my community and other communities.

I would also like the minister to show me an example--if he can find one--of a successful clean-up operation and to tell me how long it actually took. Some in America claim to have been successful, but the impact still exists today. I would like to know exactly what people have to do to clean up. How do they clean up the underground caverns that they burn? How do they stop the contaminants from drifting here, there and everywhere? It is always said that there is minimal risk, but when it comes to our underground water, I am afraid minimal risk does not exist. There must be no risk to our groundwater, our underground water and our communities.

These operations will have to be very well set up in the first instance. Regulations will have to be so tight. If one person breaches them they should be held up as an example to every other mining company that comes along. The Cougar Energy operation appeared to choose which government regulations it would comply with and it did not necessarily understand the one relating to time limits within which to report incidents. It is my belief that if a company, big or small, chooses to flout the rules, it is up to the government to be very severe. If that means that the company never operates at a particular site or even in Queensland as a whole, then so be it. We should not be willingly sacrificing our long-term future for a short-term gain, and I believe that is exactly what has been going on.

I wish the minister well in his new role. I think he and I will have a lot to talk about over the remainder of the term and I hope it is a positive conversation. I hope that in the first instance he looks after the people, the towns and the communities in the rural areas where most of this mining occurs. Yes, there are big benefits to a mine being located in someone?s area. We know that. I even fought for the existence of the Kunioon Mine when it was thought Meandu was going to close because I know the value in the 400-plus jobs. I fought because I knew the reputation of the company that was taking over Meandu Mine and that they would keep those jobs. If I did not have faith in the company that was operating that mine, members would hear about it. This whole parliament would hear about it.

I did have concerns with Cougar. The people of my community stood up, and they were only a small group to start with. At first we all thought they were anti-mining people. However, they fought and they did it with knowledge, not with emotion. They gathered the knowledge and they presented their case. That is how they won--I hope--with the government. They did it by being realistic and putting forward the arguments in a true and proper manner. Again, I appreciate that the government listened to them.

I hope that the people in the next towns or locales affected by mining, whether it be UCG or CSG, are protected by this government because of the lessons that we have all learnt with regard to the UCG project in the South Burnett. I look forward to hearing what the minister has to say.