Emergency dredging starts again with new funding

Emergency dredging of the Ettalong Channel recommenced on Monday, September 25, after the NSW Government decided to provide more funding.

Mr Crouch announced the latest funding for more emergency dredging following criticism by Member for Gosford Ms Liesl Tesch that the Government was trying to pin a recent grounding near the channel on a ferry captain.

"Safety is our number one priority," Mr Crouch said.

"The NSW Government has stepped in following reports of a vessel grounding and near misses in Ettalong Channel," Mr Crouch said.

"I strongly encourage the newly-elected Central Coast councillors to accept responsibility for the management of the waterway and work with the NSW Government to secure a long-term strategy to maintain safe access for the hundreds of thousands of tourists and residents that take trips through this channel each year."

Parliamentary Secretary for the Central Coast, Mr Scot MacDonald, said the NSW Government was committed to delivering a sustainable dredging strategy to improve the accessibility and environmental health of waterways.

"This is the second time this year that the Government has provided emergency funding for this waterway," Mr MacDonald said.

"In June, $150,000 was spent dredging a narrow section of the channel," he said.

"This month, more sand will be removed from the channel to secure immediate ferry and boating access."

Hunter Wharf and Barge Pty Ltd have been engaged to undertake the emergency dredging.

Work was expected to take up to three weeks, weather-dependent.

Newly-elected Central Coast Council mayor Cr Jane Smith said Brisbane Water was "a dynamic system so we are always going to have to maintain the channel if we are going to have the ferry services operating there.

"I am not interested in politicising that issue but I am happy to sit down with staff and councillors to work out a proper strategy for the channel," Cr Smith said.

"I appreciate Mr Crouch's efforts to help provide the emergency funding," she said.

"We clearly need to sit down and work out the long-term solution.

"It is the purview of the State Government," she said.

Mr Crouch said repeated earlier assertions that the NSW Government was not responsible for the maintenance of the Brisbane Water channel because there were no State-owned assets in the waterway.

He said the Central Coast Council needed to apply for the $6.9 million it had said would be required to properly dredge the channel under the NSW Government's Growing Our Local Economies program which had $500 million available that would be allocated until exhausted.

Mr Crouch said the money was part of the $1.3 billion the NSW Government had made available for regional infrastructure and that the Central Coast qualified as a region.

"It would be appropriate to apply under the Growing Local Economies program because the channel's maintenance would have economic benefits to the region due to tourism and the ferry services," Mr Crouch said.

He said he had already met with Mr Toole and both he and Mr Toole were prepared to lobby the Deputy Premier of NSW, Mr John Barilaro, who had responsibility for the allocation of the available $500 million for regional projects.

Mr Crouch said the "proper dredging of the channel was a major infrastructure job".

He said sand could then be redistributed to the beaches at Ettalong and Umina.

"I have then suggested that Council needs to set up an annual maintenance program, that would cost between $160,000 and $300,000 per year and they could apply for dollar-for-dollar funding under Rescuing Our Waterways for that maintenance program," he said.

SOURCES:

Media release, 21 Sep 2017

Ben Sheath, Office of Adam Crouch MP

Interview, 27 Sep 2017

Jane Smith, Central Coast Council

Interview, 27 Sep 2017

Adam Crouch, Member for Terrigal

Reporter: Jackie Pearson