Media Release

KAP Federal Member for Kennedy Bob Katter and State Member for Dalrymple Shane Knuth have warned the State Government against wasteful environmental water releases that risk multi-million-dollar crops and job losses in the Far North’s Tablelands food bowl.

Mr Katter and Mr Knuth – who have met with desperate farmers and received a commitment from the State Minister to review the release of thousands of megalitres from the half-full Lake Tinaroo dam into the Barron River – have also reiterated calls for an immediate transfer from the upper North Johnstone River to bolster water security for farmers facing lower allocations and drought declarations.

“The Government is asking for very serious trouble, allowing that water flow to go,” said Mr Katter. “No-one is going to stand idly by and watch 50 years of work go down the drain – certainly not people like Johnny Gambino, Makse Srhoj, Scotty Dixon, Bernie O’Shea, Vince Mete and Joe Moro from Mareeba’s Rural Action Council, who secured the Federal farm assistance welfare grants for more than 11,000 Australian families.”

Mr Knuth warned the Minister that Tablelands growers were in “a seriously desperate situation, facing the loss of multi-million-dollar crops and severe risk of job losses in the region”. “He gave me a commitment to review the situation, and I’ve also put the pressure on for the North Johnstone transfer,” Mr Knuth said.

Mr Katter and Mr Knuth pointed out that the Barron had survived since time immemorial with varying flows and rainfall.

“Sometimes the river has hardly run at all when we don’t get any rain – so there’s no environmental flows in those years, and that’s natural! To provide a guaranteed flow every year is not natural,” said Mr Katter. “If North Qld was a separate country, we’d be one of the wettest on Earth. Yet we are chronically short of water everywhere – whether it’s irrigating the Tablelands above Cairns or the Townsville supply – because floodwaters come in a rush but Governments haven’t allowed us to build a dam in Qld for 29 years (whereas prior to that, we were building one every year).”

Mr Katter said Mareeba was right on Australia’s biggest river by volume – the Mitchell – yet none of that water was being utilised. “All we’re asking for is that the great rivers of Australia, on their crashing journey to the sea, pay a small tribute to those people who live along the banks. The most we’d take would be 2-3 per cent,” Mr Katter said.

“But it’s just like the crocodile issue: we are putting environmental values over human values. Somewhere, someone has got to make some money here – and if that water isn’t there, nor will there be the mango or avocado trees, so no money to put petrol in our cars to go buy much-needed pharmaceuticals to survive and keep away pain. And I don’t think nature gets really upset when we take a fraction of the massive floodwaters for our usage.”

Mr Katter and Mr Knuth said it was time to get serious about the Tablelands water situation, with regard to:
1. The North Johnstone transfer. It costs nothing and is a secure supply to overcome the immediate situation where farmers are desperate with worry about the supply of water, with still four or five months to go of the dry.
2. A second dam on the Barron River (because there’s plenty of water flowing in the Barron River right now, said Mr Katter after recently viewing it well below the dam.)
3. Action for jobs and prosperity out of the Mitchell River. Mr Katter said a magnificent dam scheme a few kilometres downstream presents opportunity for another 10,000ha-20,000ha of irrigation and security of supply for the region’s mango and avocado trees (because if they die, it’s several years before they can come back into production.)

#ENDS#