Environmental groups traditional owners near Queensland’s channel country say they have grown increasingly concerned their waterways are under threat.
The Queensland government promised to reinstate legislative protections for the state’s ‘wild rivers’ five years ago amid a proliferation of oil and gas drilling in the waterways.
Three rivers that feed into Lake Eyre – the Diamantina, the Georgina and Cooper Creek – were among those protected in Queensland under the Wild Rivers Act, a controversial law that mainly affected rivers in Cape York and the isolated channel country.
Cooper Creek, the Diamantina, and the Georgina rivers are among those protected in Queensland under the Wild Rivers Act, which was scrapped by the Newman government in 2014, and which Labor vowed to reinstate in 2015.
George Gorringe, a Mithaka traditional owner said the government had been simultaneously discussing protections and authorising natural gas drilling and fracking in large swathes of the channel country.
“We don’t want fracking on the floodplain or drilling on the floodplain. We’d like to be involved in the conversation,” Mr Gorringe said.