North Queensland growers have been left the “sacrificial lambs” as State and Federal Governments continue to politicise the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) as part of their desperate attempts to look busy on Reef health, Hinchinbrook MP Nick Dametto has said.

Mr Dametto, speaking following the release of the Queensland Parliament Health and Environment Committee’s (HEC) report into his Environmental and Other Legislation (Reversal of Great Barrier Reef Protection Measures) Amendment Bill 2021, said all debate around the GBR continued to be politicised.

The HEC rejected Mr Dametto’s Bill, and made a single recommendation that it not be passed by the Queensland Parliament.

This is despite around 60 per cent of the submissions received by the Committee into the Bill being supportive of it.

Today, Mr Dametto met with Burdekin cane farmers to discuss the disappointing rejection over a schooner of The Brewery’s new “Great Barrier Reef Gose” beer.

The beer, brewed with water of a pristine quality from John Brewer Reef, has been crafted to celebrate how “unspoilt and special” the GBR off Townsville is despite politically-motivated arguments otherwise.[1]

The North Queensland farmers, who said they were sick of being falsely framed as an enemy of the natural wonder, shared their frustrations over a Reef water-based beer.

The irony of the situation was not lost on them, and Mr Dametto said after expert rigorous taste testing he could confirm the beer did not taste like herbicides, pesticides or fertilisers.

The Hinchinbrook MP said his Bill would now proceed to a debate in the Parliament in the New Year.

“Leading scientists confirmed ‘climate change’ is the major threat to the GBR, so why does this Government continue to vilify our farmers?” Mr Dametto said.

“Serious questions remain over the scientific basis that claims farmers and their operations are enemies of the Reef, but to date the Government is unwilling to confront this.

“For example, much is made of the many scientists who agree on the Scientific Consensus Statement for the GBR, and the thousands of papers that have been cited in the Consensus Statement and Reef Outlook Report.

“However, most of those papers rely on a very small number (less than 10) of data sets about pesticides, sediment and nutrients.

“All of those data sets show that either the effect of farming is very small in-shore, and effectively zero on the GBR-proper.”

Mr Dametto said the HEC report had further endorsed an “absolutely impossible” task for farmers.

“The science the HEC report has referred to has also given the farmer no way that they can ever satisfy evermore stringent demands to reduce pesticides sediment or fertiliser,” he said.

“The scientists invoke the precautionary principle, reversing the onus of proof so that farmers must prove they are having absolutely no effect on the Reef.

“How do you prove that no coral has ever been killed by farming?

“What measurement can possibly be done to prove that?”

Mr Dametto said extreme idealogues and environmentalists would not be satisfied until all farming was banned along the GBR river catchments.

Aaron Harper MP, who sits as the Chair of the committee that refused to endorse the KAP Bill, was invited to join Mr Dametto and the farmers for a beer to discuss their concerns.

Unfortunately he was unable to attend and formally sent his apologies.

For more information about the Environmental and Other Legislation (Reversal of Great Barrier Reef Protection Measures) Amendment Bill 2021, go to: https://documents.parliament.qld.gov.au/ TableOffice/TabledPapers/2021/5721T528.pdf

[1] https://www.brewsnews.com.au/2021/10/13/townsville-brewery-brews-gose-from-reef-water/