The Guardian 13 February, 2008
Victorian government
short-sightedness
Bob Briton
The effects of decades of ill-advised skimping on infrastructure and failed privatisations are now weighing heavily on the shoulders of the Brumby government. Crumbling regional rail networks, city traffic choked by container trucks and inadequate port facilities are hampering the state’s development. But rather than taking a far-sighted approach to rectifying the situation, Brumby has signed off on a risky and unpopular plan to deepen the channel of the Port of Melbourne by taking millions of tonnes of toxic sediment from the bay and Yarra river mouth and dumping it in Port Phillip Bay.
The giant Queen of the Netherlands dredger is finally moving into action. It had sat idle at Melbourne’s South Wharf awaiting the go-ahead from Federal Environment Minister Peter Garrett. The new minister had initially approved the project but an application in the Federal Court by protest group Blue Wedges forced Garrett to take advice from his department. He was obliged to wade through an environment management plan and check off its 16 conditions for allowing the dredging.
In the Federal Court last week, mediation between the port corporation and Blue Wedges ended in agreement for limited dredging to begin in the southern channel of the bay. The clay removed in this phase will be used to build a wall around the dumping ground off the coast at Mordialloc. Approximately 23 million cubic metres of toxic sediment will eventually be dumped at the site. The Federal Court will bring the parties together again on February 20 to rule on the rest of the project.
The Port of Melbourne Corporation has pushed very hard for the dredging. Chief Executive Stephen Bradford argued that the bay is not deep enough for up to 44 percent of container ships when fully loaded. However, according to the corporation’s own data from last year only 25 percent of vessels were in that potential category. The state government’s own Ports Monitoring Post puts the figure at 14.1 percent. Hypothetical situations aside, the fact is that not many large container vessels visit Melbourne fully laden. They usually call in on route from the other major Australian ports.
Outside the Port of Melbourne Corporation and the government, there are few real enthusiasts for the dredging project. The corporation has been accused of bullying shipping companies into supporting it. "Well, they were rather forceful in their views", as Shipping Australia Chief Executive Llew Russell put it. ANL Chief Executive John Lines supports the dredging but would be just as happy to see it scaled back and all international container trade transferred to an upgraded Webb Dock.
Brumby has inherited decaying infrastructure of the sort that get-rich-quick private enterprise leaves for other people to fix up. One problem is that Webb Dock, which now handles only 20 percent of the port’s trade, lost its rail link to the Dynon rail yards in the 1990s when Jeff Kennett had it ripped up to make way for Docklands and the CityLink tollway. Rebuilding the line is set down for completion in 2017 and currently estimated to cost $100 million.
The government was forced to buy back the run-down freight-only regional rail network last May. It had been flogged off in the 1990s by Kennett for $134 million. Brumby has committed $25 million for rail improvements but that may not be enough. A review of the Victorian Regional Freight Network commissioned by the government and released last December concluded that the system was in "extremely poor condition". The drought and the poor grain harvest account for some of the low volumes being carried on the network but its decrepit condition and infrequent services are the bigger issues for producers. The state government target to have roughly a third of freight carried by rail by 2010 is looking a bit sick.
Victoria’s transport system and its freight-handling infrastructure are in urgent need of investment and well-considered upgrades. The expensive dredging project carries significant environmental risks and does not meet those needs. "It seems the only parties to reap any economic benefit from this stupid and unnecessary project are an overseas dredging company and presumably whichever financial institution loans the $1 billion dollars and rising to the Port of Melbourne Corporation to pay the dredger and other growing costs", Greens MP Sue Pennicuik said. "We can’t be sure because, despite the state government asserting that its support for the project depended on a sound financial strategy, none has ever been sighted."