They've been told, but the f*ckers won't listen.

http://www.theage.com.au/environment/northsouth-pipeline-promises-undermined-20090607-bztg.html

NEW evidence of the dire health of Victoria's irrigation district has cast fresh doubt over whether the controversial north-south pipeline will deliver as much water to Melbourne as promised.

Just six months ago, Premier John Brumby predicted losses would be about 500 billion litres this year.

Ken Pattison, a member of the Plug the Pipe campaign and former director of Goulburn-Murray Water, said it was a "physical impossibility" to make the savings the Government had promised.

"The assumptions they based the project on are proving to be fundamentally flawed," he said.

He needs all the water to wash off the stink around Brimbank

Brumby keeps getting caught out with his porkies.

http://www.theage.com.au/environment/state-water-targets-rely-on-rising-rainfall-levels-20090614-c7f8.html

RAINFALL must increase in Victoria in coming years for water targets assigned to the north-south pipeline and food-bowl modernisation project to be achieved.

"The reality of the current situation proves to Victorians that the Premier has been misleading them when he has continually said the savings are there every year the system delivers water," he said.

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,25680056-2862,00.html

WATER wasters in Brighton have been given licence to spill by the Opposition, with residents advised to ignore the Government's Target 155 campaign.

In her June newsletter, Ms Asher told locals the campaign to limit daily water use to 155 litres a person was voluntary and the community couldn't be forced to comply just because the Brumby Government had failed to secure the city's water supplies.

It comes as data shows Brighton residents are among Melbourne's biggest water users with a daily average of 670 litres a home in the third quarter of 2008-09.

"The Government is transferring its guilt for its failure to secure a supply of water on to, in this instance, Melbourne's residents," she said.

"The end result is that gardens, both public and private, and sports grounds are dying

http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/denying-recycling-just-wont-hold-water-20090701-d55c.html

WATER Minister Tim Holding is a desperate man representing a desperate government. His press statement last week claimed that a business case undertaken by or for the Government found major recycled water projects too expensive. Rubbish.

Even so, avoiding recycling was part of the justification for the Wonthaggi desalination plant, which was sprung on the electorate just after the 2006 election. This is despite Labor campaigning on the promise of no desal because it was too expensive and no north-south pipe because it would take water away from the already distressed farmers in the Goulburn valley.

Irrespective of who wins the tender, it is clear that the decision to abandon Melbourne Water's economically and environmentally sensible plan to recycle water is connected with the desalination plant.

Bullshit rubbish wrote:
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/denying-recycling-just-wont-hold-water-20090701-d55c.html

WATER Minister Tim Holding is a desperate man representing a desperate government. His press statement last week claimed that a business case undertaken by or for the Government found major recycled water projects too expensive. Rubbish.

Even so, avoiding recycling was part of the justification for the Wonthaggi desalination plant, which was sprung on the electorate just after the 2006 election. This is despite Labor campaigning on the promise of no desal because it was too expensive and no north-south pipe because it would take water away from the already distressed farmers in the Goulburn valley.

Irrespective of who wins the tender, it is clear that the decision to abandon Melbourne Water's economically and environmentally sensible plan to recycle water is connected with the desalination plant.

u can bet that the firm winning the tender will be asked Pleez make a "Donation" to the ALP pre selection pork barrel.

The pay back - recycled water is too expensive, Desal is the go.

Poor Public Policy - ALP style

Poor Tim Holdings justification for not going ahead with the recycled project was based on the inability to install pipes through existing suburbs. Well, forgive me, but City West Water have been digging and replacing pipe for the last few months near me. How difficult to install another set of pipes as maintenance comes due? Even water pipes don't last forever Mr Holding as any western suburbanite can tell you based on the vast number of leaks sprung.

It wouldn't happen overnight but it would ultimately happen.

In the meantime there's a business opportunity for someone to haul recycled water to those who can afford a large tank in their backyard to provide for car washing, gardening and, one dear the government's heart - replacing the water used to flush toilets.

What a short sighted decision! Billions of near clean water flushed into the sea while the State bakes and its gardens and house foundations fail.

Only Labor....

http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/letters/not-too-late-to-change-strategy-20090702-d6ic.html?page=-1

Not too late to change strategy
July 3, 2009

IT HAS just been announced that the showpiece of the Queensland Government's $9 billion water grid, the Gold Coast desalination plant, is a $1.2 billion "lemon". The Government admits its problems might not be fixed for months and has threatened legal action against contractors if the faults are not fixed. In contrast, the state has a major new recycled water plant, which has not caused any significant problems.

In Victoria, the recent report into Melbourne's water supply provides great ideas for meeting our water needs. The Government has also increased subsidies for water tanks. These heartening moves show what is possible.

A hallmark of good leadership is the ability to admit when new ideas are needed and when bad decisions should be left behind. A major investment in recycled water and withdrawal of funds from the desalination plant and the north-south pipeline makes far more sense than ploughing on with unsustainable ventures.

Cam Walker, campaigns co-ordinator, Friends of the Earth, Fitzroy

More recycling planned

FOLLOWING on from Kenneth Davidson's article (Comment, 2/7), the Eastern Treatment Plant will be upgraded as planned to produce Class A recycled water by the end of 2012, independent of decisions on reuse. The main driver for the upgrade is meeting EPA licence conditions for treated effluent from the plant into Bass Strait.

Second, the upgrade opens the door to significantly more recycling. However, recent business cases show that there are significant costs associated with creating "third-pipe" infrastructure to deliver major recycling schemes. Notwithstanding this, a further 7 billion litres of water a year will be recycled from the new plant soon after 2012, with more schemes proposed.

Rob Skinner, managing director, Melbourne Water

In a state of panic

IT IS hard not to draw the conclusion that Tim Holding and the Brumby Government are in a state of panic over Melbourne's water supplies.

The Water Minister's continual refusal to enact cost-effective and high water-yield options such as recycling wastewater (200 gigalitres a year), capturing stormwater and more domestic water tanks (200 gigalitres), and stopping logging in catchments (30 gigalitres) is just not acceptable.

Recycling more water would have the added benefit of stopping partially treated sewage from going into the ocean at Gunnamatta beach.

Instead, Holding is intent on building a pipeline that will deliver very little water to Melbourne, and an extremely expensive privatised desalination plant that will belch out greenhouse gases and destroy a pristine coast. It's time to go, Tim.

Peter Campbell, Surrey Hills

Where is the opposition?

THE Government has not listened to critics regarding the pipeline and have consequently destroyed a swathe of pristine forest along the Melba Highway, and devastated landowners by cutting down trees and fences on their properties, and polluted dams and creeks through clay run-off.

Where is the Liberal Party, or the Greens? The Labor Party appears to be accountable to no one.

Phil Masters, Glenburn

The Eastern treatment plant has ooooddles of water and the government's too cheap to organise pipes to a)distribute water or b)provide water to the Yarra for environmental flows.

I challenge all local government in Victoria to bid for this water, which the government intends to flush into the sea, and use it to preserve our parkland and trees. Can you remember the smell of freshly watered grass on an oval?

Seems to me, the Western Region, if not already drawing from the Western treatment plant could organise transport for the water AND large water substations.

And we could have greener pastures, cleaner air, and maybe, just maybe, provide evaporation for rain!!

http://www.theage.com.au/national/desal-bidder-faces-legal-threat-over-lemon-20090704-d8hb.html

ONE of the two shortlisted bidders for Victoria's $3.1 billion desalination plant is being threatened with legal action by the Queensland Government after an investigation revealed its Gold Coast plant is riddled with problems, including rusting pipework and cracking concrete.

In April, the plant was named "desalination plant of the year" at a global water award ceremony.

The Government yesterday moved to assure voters that Victoria's contract with the winning bidder would be "quite different" to the Gold Coast plant. The Queensland Government will operate its plant once finished, while the Victorian plant will be operated by the bid team that builds it. "The winning bidder (will have) significant incentives to deliver a functioning desalination plant," said Michael Sinclair, a government spokesman.

Nudge Nudge Nudge.

http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/truth-lost-in-waves-of-obfuscation-20090708-ddcu.html

Truth lost in waves of obfuscation

Kenneth Davidson
July 9, 2009

The cost of recycling water is being inflated to justify a desal plant.

BAD government depends on secrecy and obfuscation.

A perfect example was given by Water Minister Tim Holding in response to a question from Greens MLC Sue Pennicuik in a Public Accounts Committee in May. Pennicuik pointed out that the budget papers said that the desalination public-private partnership, or any other PPPs, would only proceed if it could be proven that it provided better value than an exclusively government-financed program. She asked: "Can you inform the committee of any results from any cost benefit analysis that shows which option would save the most money over the longer term?"

Holding replied: "The basis for government being able to acquit that statement is the preparation of the public sector comparator … Because it is the subject of a competitive process at the moment it would be inappropriate for me to say more about it than that."

Rubbish. The comparator is a departmental concoction that purports to measure the cost of undertaking the investment to government, not the tenderers. The "commercial-in-confidence" excuse doesn't apply.

The only reason the comparator can't be released is because the figures are artificially inflated to ensure the cost of conventional government finance is always higher than the cost of a PPP.

Good government is concerned to get the best value for money for taxpayers and avoid the charge that the process is corrupt. This would require the Auditor-General to build the comparator for any large project and publish it before any decision is made to proceed with a PPP.

I don't think the Brumby Government has yet begun to understand the depth of hostility in the community to its water policies, which can only be rationally explained as part of a long-term strategy to make water into a tradeable commodity and in the process undermine the concept that access to affordable water is a basic human right.

Holding's argument that the Government couldn't go ahead with recycling water from the Carrum water treatment plant because it was too expensive compared with the Wonthaggi desal alternative is simply unbelievable.

Carrum cleans up 42 per cent of Melbourne's waste water and pumps it out into the ocean at Gunnamatta.

The "waste" water is already clean enough for recycling for industrial uses and parks and gardens. It could even be made fully potable if mixed with potable dam water and cleaned by natural processes.

The plan developed by Melbourne Water in 2002 was to pump part of this water to Yallourn where it could replace 100 gigalitres of potable water used in the production of electricity at Yallourn and also supply irrigators and wetlands along the 140-kilometre route. This would free up 100 gigalitres of potable water for Melbourne, adding about 25 per cent to the city's water supply and removing any need for desalination of sea water.

The Government's decision to scrap the pipeline to Yallourn on the grounds that it would cost $3.8 billion compared with the claimed $3.1 billion cost of the desal plant at Wonthaggi is silly. For starters the Government is required to upgrade the Carrum plant outflow to Grade A water by the Environmental Planning Authority. Due to currents, some of this water will flow into the Wonthaggi desal plant inlet pipe, which uses power to desalinate water from the Latrobe Valley, which in turn uses potable water that could be available for Melbourne's supply.

In response, one of my correspondents was moved to write that this was the ultimate irony, that the energy intensive desal plant will draw power from the water-drinking Latrobe Valley generators. Using water to make water is a scenario best contained in a Monty Python sketch.

But the sketch isn't funny. The north-south pipeline removes 75 gigalitres from Goulburn irrigators. Meanwhile, 100 gigalitres of higher quality water from Carrum will be pumped out to sea. This is the equivalent of destroying $900 million of farm gate revenue a year, increasing the price of Melbourne's food when world food prices are already rising due to climate change.

Another correspondent, a Victorian water expert with a first-hand understanding of Melbourne Water politics and history said: "The cost of installing a pipeline from Carrum to the Latrobe Valley to supply treated waste water to cooling towers and substituting for water that could be held back for Melbourne's use has been continually exaggerated in an attempt to kill the project.

"During the time of water minister Thwaites, an ex-CEO of Melbourne Water did a study, which reported to the Department of Sustainability and Environment that the cost would be $1 billion. Senior executives in DSE didn't like the concept, and were quick to double the cost estimates and shelve the plant. Later when this price wasn't high enough to kill the project, DSE pushed it again, to $3 billion."

Carrum is a growing source of water, needing to be treated to ever higher levels of purity to meet more stringent environmental standards. It is criminal waste to just dump the bulk of this enormous public resource into the sea.

After 35 years as a leading columnist, Kenneth Davidson leaves The Age this week, but he will continue to write for the paper.

His column will return in six weeks. His new email address is This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .

How can little Timmy Holding DARE to lecture us that the 'climate is changing' to explain why the Thompson Dam is at 16% and new pumps needed to be installed to capture every last muddy bit of water. Newsflash, we have told you for more than the decade your party has been in power.

Remind me again:
HOW MANY MILLIONS OF LITRES OF NEARLY POTABLE RECYCLED WATER IS HOLDING FLUSHING DOWN THE BAY?????

If they won't replace electricity plant water use with recycled water WHY NOT TOP UP THE DAMNED DAMS WE DO HAVE??? With sun, natural microbes it will be A grade in no time. Sorry, you people whose drip irrigations systems keep your gardens lush, drought or not, we have a water shortage and we need to get over the yuck factor fast. Or will a pipe to the catchments systems cost too much (compared with some other politically favoured BIG project!)

Besides, with climate predictions for another savage fire season the chances are that the forests around the catchments will burn this summer which will reduce run off from ever less rainfall for at least a decade to come.

My guess, a pipe redirecting the Eastern Outfall recycled water will cost less than another desal plant.

Victorians are being scammed once again by Brumby and his corrupt Labor goons.

http://www.theage.com.au/environment/brumbyx2019s-35bn-desal-gamble-20090730-e31h.html

VICTORIAN taxpayers could be asked to throw a financial lifeline to the state’s desalination plant, after the Government agreed to underwrite its new private partners in the multibillion-dollar project.

Crucial financial details — including how much taxpayers will pay at times when the plant is not producing water — will remain secret until the deal is finalised in September.

Desalination will be a major factor in household water bills rising up to 64 per cent within four years, but the Government’s surprise decision to act as the project’s guarantor means taxpayers could end up paying even more in the short-term.

Mr Shepherd said the project was "by far" the biggest public-private partnership (PPP) in the world since the global financial crisis began. Yet with the ultimate risk carried by the Government, Monash University expert Dr Graeme Hodge questioned whether it should be called a PPP at all.

"Having a background government guarantee puts a new label on the project. Is this a public-private partnership for infrastructure or is it an industry support mechanism, a donation to the construction sector?" Dr Hodge said.

---

Its a donation of course. Brumby has donated our money to his multinational party donors and associated crims and shysters.

Biggest scam of the century wrote:
Victorians are being scammed once again by Brumby and his corrupt Labor goons.

http://www.theage.com.au/environment/brumbyx2019s-35bn-desal-gamble-20090730-e31h.html

VICTORIAN taxpayers could be asked to throw a financial lifeline to the state’s desalination plant, after the Government agreed to underwrite its new private partners in the multibillion-dollar project.

Crucial financial details — including how much taxpayers will pay at times when the plant is not producing water — will remain secret until the deal is finalised in September.

Desalination will be a major factor in household water bills rising up to 64 per cent within four years, but the Government’s surprise decision to act as the project’s guarantor means taxpayers could end up paying even more in the short-term.

Mr Shepherd said the project was "by far" the biggest public-private partnership (PPP) in the world since the global financial crisis began. Yet with the ultimate risk carried by the Government, Monash University expert Dr Graeme Hodge questioned whether it should be called a PPP at all.

"Having a background government guarantee puts a new label on the project. Is this a public-private partnership for infrastructure or is it an industry support mechanism, a donation to the construction sector?" Dr Hodge said.

---

Its a donation of course. Brumby has donated our money to his multinational party donors and associated crims and shysters.

When is a PPP NOT a PPP?

When Brumby and his mates concoct one!

Heads the private company wins if all goes well (with no risk at all) - tails the private company wins if all goes pear shape (state government have guaranteed this with our money).

It's win, win all round for the private company. How easy is that? And they say big business is hard and risky work!

http://www.theage.com.au/national/protesters-to-renew-campaign-against-desal-plant-20090802-e5vp.html

ANTI-DESALINATION protesters jumped the fence and invaded the property of the Wonthaggi desalination plant yesterday in the first major protest against the project since the Government announced the consortium chosen to build it.

Mr Kentwell said he was scared, and didn’t want "to go to jail or anything like that", but it was time to make a strong stand against the project.

The protest came as the State Opposition vowed to examine revelations in The Sunday Age that a multinational company connected to the winning desalination bid was fined for illegally logging in the Amazon rainforest. Opposition scrutiny of government spokesman David Davis asked whether the Government had properly checked the environmental record of the companies involved in the bid.

"What due diligence did John Brumby undertake?" Mr Davis said.

http://www.theage.com.au/environment/coalition-aims-to-thwart-northsouth-pipe-rules-20090804-e8lx.html

PLANS to bring water to Melbourne through the north-south pipeline will face a new hurdle in Parliament next week, as the Coalition looks to put a dampener on the Government’s water-delivery regulations.

Legal permission for Melbourne to take water through the pipeline is outlined in a ‘‘bulk entitlement’’ that was formalised by Water Minister Tim Holding in May.

But the entitlement can be disallowed if voted down by one of the houses of Parliament.

Well, the entitlement was voted down by Victoria's Upper house. And litte Timmy Holding's 'scared infant' look was unmistakable when reporters tried to get him to guarantee 75 gigalitres of water from the pipeline for Melbourne.

Once again, we see an arrogant, bull-headed, 'I will not allow criticism of my idea' government delivering a project that fails to deliver any extra water to Melbourne, raises food prices for Melbourne, reduces food producers to poverty for another year, and kills the Victorian environment. And, quite possibly end Labor's term of office.

It's a crisis, Brumby, since you wouldn't pay for a pipeline to distribute recycled water, you'll now have to pay to have it railed or trucked into the main catchments.

If they don't, how soon will we see Labor MPs, their staffers and their outposted electorate officer staffers who double as Councillors, doing rain dancers, praying or bringing down incantations for rain. After all that's the only thing that will save them.

PS, don't tell them that both the SOI (Southern Oscillation Index) AND the IOD (Indian Ocean Dipole) predict a DRY, DRY, DRY Victoria.

http://www.theage.com.au/national/northsouth-pipe-laid-but-nothing-to-flow-for-it-20090826-ezrt.html

LAYING 70 kilometres of pipeline through hostile territory was the easy part.

Securing water rights for Victoria's controversial north-south pipe looms as the next challenge for the Brumby Government

.Water Minister Tim Holding celebrated the milestone by drawing two hands on the final piece of pipe; a gesture he said symbolised the people of country Victoria and the people of Melbourne "reaching out" to help each other over water issues.

dickhead

Despite the fanfare, the pipe remains without water.

Greens MP Greg Barber said his support would depend on Mr Holding delivering a warranty for environmental flows, not open-ended promises about the future.

Some people will do anyting for publicity.

http://www.theage.com.au/national/tim-holding-goes-missing-20090831-f488.html

Water Minister Tim Holding has gone missing on Mt Feathertop.

Mr Holding failed to return from a hike yesterday.

In the wild New England ranges came the word one fateful day
To every town and village that a boy had lost his way

All the townsfolk quickly gathered and the wild bush horses tossed
As they went to search the ranges for a little boy lost
They went out to search the ranges for a little boy lost

The blazing sun beat down upon the earth that final day
With heavy hearts they prayed to God above to show the way

When from a scrubby gully came the voice they've ne'er forgot
Where's my daddy, where's my daddy, cried the little boy lost
Where's my daddy, where's my daddy, cried the little boy lost