[Greens-Media] Tas Greens_Answers Needed on Atrazine in Derwent_T Morris MP

[greens at parliament.tas.gov.au]

ATRAZINE CONTAMINATION OF HOBART'S DRINKING WATER

Ignorance is NOT Bliss for Hobart and Bothwell Residents - Minister Must
Apologise
  
Tim Morris MP
Greens Shadow Water Spokesperson

Thursday, 4 December 2008
Contact: State Parliamentary Offices of the Tasmanian Greens, (03) 6233
8300

www.tas.greens.org.au


The Tasmanian Greens today revealed that the recent positive test for
the triazine herbicide, Atrazine, in the River Derwent, taken by the
Department of Primary Industries and Water on 10 October this year, was
likely prompted by a report from Hobart Water that the chemical had been
discovered in drinking water supplies at Hobart's Bryn Estyn Water
Treatment Plant seventeen days earlier, on the 24th of September.

Greens Shadow Water spokesperson Tim Morris MP said the October DPIW
test identified that the Atrazine entered the River Derwent from the
Clyde River, and queried just how much Atrazine is actually flowing down
the Clyde (which supplies Bothwell's drinking water), given that the
poison was first detected in the River Derwent 30 kilometres downstream
from the Clyde River junction.

Mr Morris also demanded that the Minister, David Llewellyn, explain why
the Department has closed it's investigation into this incident without
identifying the actual source of the Atrazine contamination, without
comprehensively testing Bothwell's water supply which is sourced
directly from the Clyde, and without notifying any of the communities
drawing their water from the Clyde and the Derwent rivers.

"It now appears that the mysterious 'follow-up' test for Atrazine in the
River Derwent that appeared in the recent round of water testing
results, was prompted by Hobart Water discovering the herbicide at
Hobart's Bryn Estyn Water Treatment Plant in September this year," Mr
Morris said.

"I am calling on Minister Llewellyn to confirm that this was the
sequence of events, and to also issue an apology for the lack of public
notification of the chemical's presence in drinking water supplies."

 "Why did DPIW wait until seventeen days after Atrazine was found in
Hobart's drinking water supply before conducting their own testing, and
why have the Bartlett Labor Government and Hobart Water failed to bring
this contamination event to the public's attention?" 

"The residents of Hobart and Bothwell have the right to know when an
endocrine-disrupting chemical such as Atrazine is discovered in the
rivers that supply their drinking water, particularly when that chemical
is actually detected by their drinking water authority in the drinking
water."

"Atrazine is an endocrine-disrupting chemical that can affect subsequent
generations many years after an individual is poisoned - all people, but
especially pregnant women and children - need to be told immediately
when this chemical is found in their drinking water supply."

"Residents also have the right to know where the Atrazine is coming from
and who has applied it in such a way that it is running off into the
rivers that supply their residential drinking water, and the Minister
must front up to provide these answers," said Mr Morris.




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