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Proposed Highway: Coomera Connector Project

The Queensland government is proposing a highway through pristine wetlands that could make flooding on the Logan River even worse.

As the residents of Eagleby showed me on Tuesday19 September 2023, an alternative route is available just a few kilometres up the road. That option wouldn’t require filling up the Eagleby Wetlands, host to migrating birds and the rare Latham Snipe, with soil.

Government likes to pretend they care about the environment, yet they’ll completely ignore it if it means a flashy press release.

Questions have to be asked whether Transurban has influenced the route and connection point to maximise customers to their toll road.

Media

The government is compulsorily resuming land and literally filling in wetlands for the Coomera connector when an alternative is available just up the road.

At huge expense to the taxpayer, this plan needs attention and questions asked.

Courier Mail Article: read here at https://tinyurl.com/mszmkb3d

Senate Estimates | 12 February 2024

Infrastructure Australia

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: And if the first answer is positive then it will be even quicker! Thank you for being here so late as well. Are you familiar with the Coomera Connector stage 2 in Brisbane? 

Mr Copp: Yes. 

Senator ROBERTS: You are—thank you. Are you in possession of the business case for the Coomera Connector stage 2? 

Mr Tucker: We assessed the business case for stage 1 of the Coomera Connector but we haven’t received a business case for stage 2. 

Senator ROBERTS: Why hasn’t the stage 2 business case been published? 

Mr Tucker: That would be a matter for the Queensland government. 

Senator ROBERTS: Have they discussed it with you at all? 

Mr Tucker: I would have to take that on notice. We have regular engagement with Queensland, but I don’t recall a recent conversation on that particular project. 

Senator ROBERTS: Could you do that, please? My understanding is that the Commonwealth government may be tipping hundreds of millions of dollars into this project, so I’m wondering why the public can’t see the business case. 

Mr Tucker: I’m not aware if a business case has yet been finalised. We will assess it once it’s submitted to us. 

Senator ROBERTS: So you haven’t received it at all? 

Mr Tucker: No. 

Senator ROBERTS: No requests for funding? 

Mr Tucker: No. 

Senator ROBERTS: Okay. We’re very concerned about flooding of human habitat, and flooding and destruction of wetlands—triggers to the EPBC Act, and for migratory birds in particular. That’s all I have, thank you, Chair. 

Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for being here tonight. My questions are to do with the Coomera connector stage 2 freeway project in Brisbane. What is the status of the Coomera connector stage 2 with the department under the EPBC Act? 

Mr Edwards: At this stage, that project hasn’t been referred to us for assessment under the EPBC Act. 

Senator ROBERTS: Where is the public environment report for Coomera stage 2? 

Mr Edwards: Again, I’m not able to comment. I don’t have the project referred to me for assessment. 

Senator ROBERTS: You’ve had no contact at all with the state government on this project? 

Mr Edwards: That’s not what I said. 

Senator ROBERTS: I know it’s not what you said. I’m asking you. 

Mr Edwards: We’re certainly aware that there’s some work being prepared. 

Senator ROBERTS: By the Queensland state government? 

Mr Edwards: By the state government. We expect that there may be a referral sometime soon, but, unfortunately, I don’t have details of that. 

Senator ROBERTS: What information does the department have in regard to the impact of Coomera connector stage 2 on the estimated 299 bird species in the Eagleby Wetlands? 

Mr Edwards: I don’t have any information about that. 

Senator ROBERTS: None at all? Our information is that Coomera connector stage 2 has seven potential EPBC triggers in terms of sensitive fauna and flora. What triggers or potential triggers has the department been made aware of? None at all? 

Mr Edwards: The only contact we’ve had is a pre-referral meeting. There would have been a conversation, in general terms, about the types of impacts that may be in a referral document. What we do in those meetings is refer people to the relevant statutory guidelines and other things that they’ll need to consider in preparing the referral. 

Senator ROBERTS: In preparing their submission to you? 

Mr Edwards: Yes, that’s right. It’s more of a general exploration conversation about how to set up a good referral when it does come. 

Senator ROBERTS: Did they mention migratory bird species? 

Mr Edwards: I don’t have any information about the content of that meeting, but, if it were a likely impact, we’d generally run through threatened species, migratory species and Ramsar if that were relevant. 

Senator ROBERTS: Flooding of humans? 

Mr Edwards: Sorry? 

Senator ROBERTS: Flooding of humans? 

Mr Edwards: No. I don’t regulate impacts from— 

Senator ROBERTS: Diversion of rivers? 

Mr Edwards: No. 

Senator ROBERTS: Is there any chance of getting the contents of the discussion on notice? 

Mr Edwards: We would only have been talking about the controlling provisions under the EPBC Act. It includes threatened species, migratory species and Ramsar if that were relevant. 

Senator ROBERTS: Are there any minutes for that meeting? 

Mr Edwards: I’ll have to take that on notice. 

Senator ROBERTS: Please see if we could get a copy. 

Mr Edwards: Of course. 

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you very much. 

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Greens and Teals can’t see the wood for the trees

Native timber forestry does not harm the environment, but destroying an established 120 old industry does more harm than good to the environment and to Australian society.

How do the Greens and Teals think they’ll solve Australia’s housing crisis without wood?

Is this another one of those net zero solutions where the coal used to manufacture all those disposable ‘renewables’ is acceptable as long as its burned overseas? Perhaps the climate alarm switches off at the border where East meets West. So much for global climate solutions.

What about the jobs lost? What about the fire risks that come with shutting up forests and no longer managing them?

We’ve already had a taste of what green ideology does to our environment and it doesn’t take a genius to work out that fires need fuel.

The Greens and their climate crisis cronies seem more than happy to add that to the flaming wreck of Australian industries, jobs and the housing crisis.

These are tangible and more real than their manufactured climate fears.

Transcript

As a servant to the many different people who make up our one Queensland community, I speak in favour of Senator Duniam’s motion. The timber industry is an essential industry to maintain Australia’s way of life.

How can Labor Premier Andrews eliminate native timber production while at the same time Labor Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is promising to build 30,000 new homes which require timber? As a famous robot once said, ‘That does not compute.’  

Native timber forestry does not harm the environment. Sensible native timber logging has been going on in Australia for 150 years, and the forests are still here, the fauna and flora are still here.

Until these Labor and Greens ideologues declared war on sustainable timber harvesting, the jobs in the timber industry were still here, the communities that rely on these jobs were still here. Not any more—Dan Andrews has done them in: no jobs in forestry in Mr Dan Andrews’s socialist state of Victoria.

The truth is native timber logging disturbs a few per cent of the total forest area every year. Logging reduces the forest fuel loads to protect us from bushfires. We also saw how badly some areas of forest burned in the deliberately lit bushfires a few years ago, some areas have still not recovered thanks to Greens and teal policies—clearly, not areas that were logged and the fuel loads removed.

One Nation stands as a strong supporter of the logging industry and a strong supporter of humanity. Timber is essential.  

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Greens need division and victims

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The Greens profit from division and discrimination. You cannot label someone an oppressor without making a victim, so it is not in their interest to actually save victims.

Transcript

I want to refer to speeches that you gave yesterday and also Senator Thorpe. In your speech, you mentioned the term far-right extremist or extremist, every third or fourth line that enshrines separation. Five times in just 18 lines. Senator Thorpe used the term white privilege 11 times on average every fourth line, driving hate and conflict.

Now in private talk with Senator Thorpe, and not meant to be kept private but personal talk, she recognises to me that the Aboriginal Industry is doing enormous damage, but she doesn’t say that in public. What we’ve got is gutless, woke bureaucrats shovelling money continually to keep the gap open so that the people in the Aboriginal Industry, both black and white, can make money off it.

Care requires data and facts, not emotive slogans and labels. Care requires understanding. Senator Thorpe talks about climate and Aboriginals, the UN and Aboriginal, property rights and Aboriginals. They are not the same. These very things are hurting the Aboriginals, but not as much as the resort to labelled. Keeping people locked in victimhood makes them dependent so that The Greens can control them.

I’ve never heard anyone condemn you for your race, your gender, your background, only for your incitement to division and hatred. You have the privilege of being in the Senate and representing Australians. But your rhetoric is dividing on basis of race. Yet every Australian recognises we all have red blood, regardless of our skin colour. We all have a human spirit that we share with every human regardless of ethnicity, regardless of background, regardless of prejudices. And it’s about time that people in this Parliament, especially in The Greens, started to recognise that we should be united, we are one people.

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