Mackenzie Basin Call In

Almost everyone seems to think Nick Smith’s call in of the Mackenzie Basin dairy consents was a good idea. Any doubts I had evaporated when I read this:

Environment Minister Nick Smith today called in three large dairy effluent discharge consents in the Mackenzie Basin and established a board of inquiry to decide on the applications.

“I have called in these discharge consents as they are nationally significant due to their scale, the fragile and iconic nature of the Mackenzie Basin environment, the importance of freshwater quality to the Government and the high level of public interest,” Dr Smith said.

“The effluent from these intensive farms is equivalent to a city of 250,000 people and raises quite legitimate questions over the long-term impacts on the water quality in the Mackenzie Basin.

That is (literally) a shit load of effluent!