Build industry away from Tourism hotspots

Save Point Lowly group angrily rejected Member for Grey, Rowan Ramsey’s assertion that we should ‘build tourism around our industry’ saying get has got the concept completely backwards.

Group spokesperson Tom Cheesman said, “To suggest the natural environment must make way for industry, that we can build tourism around our industry is the total reverse of what is the best way forward. It is our natural assets that need to be protected and industry must be located away from our tourist hotspots.”

Tom said, “The Cuttlefish, Snapper, Whiting and Prawns, etc made Point Lowly their breeding grounds thousands of years ago. South Australia has 4,000 kilometres of coastline and many miles of marginal farmland. Industry has local alternative locations; but the Cuttlefish and our delicate marine ecosystem only have one home and that is Point Lowly.”

“We can’t tow the Great Barrier Reef south to be closer to Sydney, just because Coal companies want to export millions of tonnes of coal from Queensland, so the ships have exclusion areas so they are prevented from entering vital and vulnerable parts of the reef.”

“To try and palm-off the industrialisation of the Point Lowly peninsula as “perhaps it would be an opportunity to attach an underwater viewing platform,” is scary in its ignorance, very short-sighted and a dramatic over-simplification of the complex issues.”

“If Mr Ramsey’s plan is adopted and the Desalination plant goes ahead, his viewing platform will give us front row seats to watch the slow and agonising death of the Cuttlefish and other marine life from deoxygenated, acidic, anti-scaling flavoured, highly-saline water.”

“As a farmer, Mr Ramsey should know that if someone dumped an oil tanker of oil on his paddocks, he wouldn’t be able to grow crops for many years. What makes him think it is ok to leak oil and pump industrial effluent into the middle of a proposed marine park?”

“I suggest Mr Ramsey should consult Dr Jochen Kaempf and Dr Bronwyn Gillanders, the two university scientists in Adelaide who have expressed their deep concern about the Desalination plant, and get his facts straight.”

“Mr Ramsey is right to suggest, “artificial structures in the sea like jetties, oil rigs and sunken vessels provide ideal havens and breeding grounds for all kinds of marine life,” but that is only a small part of the story. We have to look at what industry puts into the marine environment in terms of emissions, effluent and spills.”

“I bet there was some nice communities of marine life starting to grow on the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf Of Mexico, which of course has been spewing oil and gas for 80 days at a rate of 1 Exxon Valdez tanker spill every 4 days. We can expect 20 of these ships every year to supply the Stuart Petroleum’s Diesel Refinery on the Point Lowly Peninsula. This is a massive risk that does not need to be taken.”

“What protection is Mr Ramsey offering the fragile Upper Spencer Gulf marine ecosystem? None!”

The Save Point Lowly group have stated that do not oppose industrial development. The group says they are committed to securing a future that retains the ‘Best of Both’ industry and the environment. They maintain the Desalination plant be sited on the West Coast of Eyre Peninsula.