Friday, 14 August 2026

 Sarah MANSFIELD (Western Victoria) (18:38): (2712) My adjournment is for the Minister for Water, and the action that I am seeking is for her to take an urgent meeting with the members of the Friends of Nyah Vinifera Park regarding the imminent start of Victorian Murray Floodplain Restoration Project construction along this floodplain. For the last 84 days the gates to Nyah-Vinifera Park have been host to a blockade. The community has been standing watch, monitoring and bearing witness, with machines at the gate ready to bulldoze hundreds of trees and begin construction of levee banks and regulators. The community holds serious concerns for the future of this beloved habitat.

The Vinifera forest is the latest victim of this Labor government’s stubborn commitment to giant infrastructure projects at any cost. The park is one of nine projects making up the government’s Victorian Murray Floodplain Restoration Project, or VMFRP. These are select projects that will re-‍engineer ancient forests along the banks of the Murray in order to offset Labor’s commitment to returning much-needed water to this precious river. Vinifera forest is beloved by the community, who relish early morning walks along its trails, bathing in the sounds of birdsong and admiring giant river red gums. The forest is a unique habitat, home to carpet pythons, sugar gliders and the grey-crowned babbler, among many other species. Their only wish is for it to be protected so that it may be admired well into the future by the many generations to come.

Why is it, then, that the government is stubbornly steaming ahead with this project? They have acknowledged that it will have a potentially catastrophic impact on fish populations, that the clearing of 27 hectares of forest will destroy many large hollow-bearing trees and that similar projects place sacred sites and cultural landscapes under threat. Project alternatives that are supported by both the community and the federal government are now already on the table. The Victorian government could take steps to relax constraints along the entire river system, allowing more frequent and natural flooding of many unique river wetlands, not just a highly altered few. Let us be clear: this is an engineering project, it is not restoration. Viable alternatives exist, but they need to be actioned and fast. I urge the minister to meet with the Friends of Nyah Vinifera Park to stop this project before it is too late.