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- 22 June 2004
Georges River Riverkeeper Program
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Page: 9862
Mr PAUL LYNCH (Liverpool) [9.12 p.m.]: I wish to report to the House on the Georges River Riverkeeper Program, which impacts very significantly upon my electorate and directly involves a number of my constituents. The riverkeeper for the Georges River is Simon Annabel, who is jointly employed by the Georges River combined councils and the Waterways Authority, which is under the control of the Department of Transport. One of the roles of the riverkeeper is to try to establish volunteer riverkeeper groups along the Georges River. One volunteer group is based at Lansvale within my electorate, and its major organiser and spokesperson is Jo Jones, a constituent of mine. The program has a number of aims, but the most obvious one focuses on minimising pollution and rubbish in the Georges River system. This allows the maximum use of what is an extraordinary resource of great natural beauty in the middle of urban Sydney. It is already a major recreational centre with great use. The Riverkeeper Program aims to maintain this situation and develop it.
Several weeks ago I had the opportunity of inspecting the river system with riverkeeper Simon Annabel. By boat I saw the Georges River from Revesby to the Liverpool weir, including the Chipping Norton Lakes, significant parts of Cabramatta Creek, Prospect Creek and Orphan School Creek. An extraordinary amount of rubbish finds its way into our waterways. At one level it is unsightly, and at another it can have a quite horrific impact upon the river. Smaller bits of rubbish can form a complete mat over mangroves or other similar areas, killing them off. There is a significant dumping of cars, and that is quite serious for the ecology of the river, given the effect of battery acid, to say nothing of oil or petrol, on surrounding waters.
The riverkeeper has organised to remove dumped cars, including winching them out of the river. Another of his roles is to co-ordinate periodic detainees and others under the control of the Department of Corrective Services in working on various programs. Their efforts include cleaning up the rubbish that has found its way onto river banks and islands. It also involves a quite spectacular plan to plant 70,000 trees on Heron Island in the Georges River in the Chipping Norton Lakes area. I saw some of that work firsthand. Some of the detainees, I should add, also undergo training and obtain certificates in this process. There are also plans to establish some of the wildlife sanctuaries of the islands and reintroduce native animals to them. The absence of foxes and cats makes this option particularly attractive. This is the Wildlife Habitat Enhancement Project.
One glaring need that struck me during this inspection was the desperate requirement for gross pollutant traps at the point of exit for stormwater drains into the river and surrounding creeks. They can be comparatively cheaply installed, with wire mesh at an angle directing gross pollutants to one side. One of the interesting characteristics of the river system is that rubbish that enters the system in one council area tends to pollute not that council area but an adjoining council area. That suggests that a concerted stormwater drain effort by all councils would be helpful. Another serious problem is the growth of a particular weed in the water. This weed will die in saltwater so does not normally grow below the Liverpool weir on the Georges River, which is the saltwater area. Above the weir, of course, the river is freshwater and there the weed is growing in vast amounts. The only way to really impact on this in the long run is to reduce the nutrients going into the river. The development of reed beds in Bunburry-Curran Creek, for example, would go some way to help that.
The problem for the saltwater reaches of the river is that in times of heavy rain, water cascades over the weir, taking with it large amounts of weed. So the weed is a problem in both the saltwater and freshwater portions of the river. It forms larger islands and attracts all sorts of debris, including wood and timber. It forms a thick mat several feet deep. It is quite dangerous and it also has serious environmental consequences. Another problem involves syringes. The number of syringes washed up with other rubbish is quite extraordinary. There is no easy solution to that, especially for those of us who support harm minimisation programs, but it is certainly a problem that requires consideration. I should add that despite these issues there are some quite spectacular scenes. Going up the Cabramatta Creek, including beyond Ireland Bridge, and seeing hundreds of fruit bats hanging from trees and taking flight in the middle of the day gives the impression of being just about anywhere except in the centre of Sydney.
The work done by the volunteers to whom I referred earlier is really quite impressive. They have regularly cleaned parts of the river in the Chipping Norton Lakes area, which is adjacent to Lansvale. They act, in a sense, as the eyes and ears for the riverkeeper. Once a month some of the participants in the Lansvale group put a boom across Prospect Creek to collect rubbish from the creek. The first meeting of the Lansvale volunteer riverkeepers was in March this year. Following the storm in April, vast amounts of rubbish, including weed from the freshwater portion of the river beyond the Liverpool weir, were washed down the river and the volunteers helped remove a remarkable amount of it. The volunteers adopt the view that trying to clean the Georges River should not simply be left to government bodies, at whatever level, that it is a community issue. As Jo Jones rightly said:
The rubbish wouldn't be there if it wasn't for the people dumping it. This is our community and everyone living on the Georges River needs to take responsibility for it.
The volunteer riverkeepers are putting that theory into practice. I am happy to draw the attention of the House to the work of the volunteers and of the riverkeeper, and to congratulate them on all the work they are doing.
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