Hon Colin Tincknell asks about the status of the Southern Forests Irrigation Scheme business case submitted to the federal government, including dates and publication plans. The Minister confirms submission of initial and revised business cases and discusses the process of releasing as much information as possible while protecting commercially sensitive data.

AnsweredQoN 934Legislative Council
Asked
3 September 2019
Portfolio
Regional Development

QuestionView source ↗

SOUTHERN FORESTS IRRIGATION SCHEME —
BUSINESS CASE
934. Hon
COLIN TINCKNELL to the Minister for Regional Development:
I refer to the federal funding
required for the southern forests irrigation scheme.
(1) Has the state
government sent a business case to the federal government for funding of the
southern forests irrigation scheme?
(2) If yes, can
the minister please provide the date it was sent and when we can expect the
business case to be published; and, if not, why not?

AnswerView source ↗

I thank the member for the question.
(1)–(2) The
initial business case was lodged with the commonwealth National Water
Infrastructure Development Fund on 14 January 2017, before we were in
government. A revised business case was developed and lodged with the commonwealth government on 1 April 2019. As I have
advised previously to questions by Hon
Diane Evers, there is some commercially sensitive material, obviously, in this
business case, but I want maximum disclosure, so we are working with the
commonwealth government and the Southern Forest Irrigation Co-Operative to
facilitate the release of as much of this document as we can. On balance, I think
this is a very good scheme. I understand that it has very much divided the
Manjimup community. I have gone over it and over it again and I still think
that it stacks up. I think it is important that we get as much information out
as we can, so I am hoping that over the next couple of weeks, we are able to
land on how much of the latest business case we can disclose.

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