Thursday, 27 August 2026

 Tim McCURDY (Ovens Valley) (17:33): (1815) Speaker, can I echo the comments of my colleagues and congratulate you on your contribution to Bendigo West and to this place. My adjournment is to the Minister for Environment in the other place, and the action that I seek is that the minister instruct the North East Catchment Management Authority to take some action against farmers who live on or close to creeks and rivers that flood. From time to time we find people disposing of rubbish, and for the want of better words, dead animal carcasses that are not buried but put in a hole somewhere, and then when places flood, these carcasses float to the surface and start going downstream and end up in vineyards and orchards and everywhere else, which is not a very pleasant occasion, I can tell you, because carcases can hang around for two or three months.

Peter Bettio owns a property near Edi Cutting on the King River. During flash flooding of the river, which occurs usually once or twice a year, he is constantly inundated by rubbish and the occasional dead cow from upstream. As I say, these may have died two or three months earlier but have not been disposed of properly, and during flash flooding these animals float downstream and get wedged amongst his grapevines and trees, and when the water subsides, these animals become his problem. The action that I seek is that catchment management address this problem, which has been going on for years, and stop rubbish and dead animals floating downstream in flash flooding occasions.