Thursday, 5 March 2026

 Gabrielle DE VIETRI (Richmond) (14:49): (1554) My question is for the Minister for Water. The Birrarung weaves through my electorate. In parts it is so polluted you would not dream of swimming in it. But what if we could make the Birrarung swimmable again? Our updated flood maps have caused distress for businesses and households, but there is another silent victim of increasing flooding. Stormwater is the number one threat to the health of the Birrarung. It drowns platypuses, it sweeps pollutants into the water and it strips banks bare. The drains beneath our cities are not just concrete channels for waste, they are capillaries of a living system. We can do more to stop flooding and to filter the water that returns back to our rivers. While the planning scheme provides for new private developments, there is no consistent plan or funding for retrofitting our public system at scale – rain gardens, water tanks, permeable paving. Will the minister commit to ongoing funding to make the Birrarung swimmable again?