My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Energy and Resources, and the action I seek is for the minister to join me to meet with communities who are very concerned about the impact of the south-west renewable energy zone and the western renewable energy zone.
These are communities that in many instances you could consider to have been taken by surprise when it came to the rollout and the announcement of renewable energy zones, particularly for those captured in the south-west REZ.
George Turner of Pigeon Ponds has specifically asked me to invite the minister to speak with the local community, and this is because it really was a surprise when this final plan was released.
There was no indication to the Balmoral community and the surrounding area, the Coleraine community, that they were even being considered for a renewable energy zone, and therefore they did not provide submissions at that point in time. It was an enormous shock to see that actually they were going to be within a REZ, and they have got some points that they want to raise around this.
This is an area which is renowned for its beautiful red gum country and its rolling hills. There are some beautiful waterways through that region as well and of course some incredible agricultural land, so they want to make sure that this is not real.
They cannot believe that anyone would think of putting a criss-cross of distribution lines in that area, or how you could potentially even connect to transmission lines, let alone through those beautiful red gums.
How on earth are the turbines going to turn? How are they going to capture solar energy underneath a red gum? They want to speak to the minister and explain what their concerns are, but they want to do it face to face.
Equally so, those that live in the western renewable energy zone were very, very surprised when the Grampians, Wimmera and Southern Mallee renewable energy zones were merged into one much, much bigger zone.
The thing that people do not understand is that in these local communities these pathways go through very important biodiversity links and they go through very important land, which is our reserves for very important flora and fauna. They want to make sure that these areas are protected.
We also want to see what comes back to our region: where are the community benefits? At the moment all we see when we have renewables is that we get trucks coming in, ripping up the roads, and we get no money back into our communities.
While we talk about jobs, they are not jobs for local people; they are coming in from Melbourne. No doubt they are staying in an Airbnb, which is putting pressure on our rental market. They are buying meals at the pub, which is fabulous, but they then leave town. Where are the legacy projects? This is what my people want to hear.
They want to know why our region, why are so many projects being approved outside of a REZ, why do you even have REZs if that is the case, and what is in it for our local community?