Ms TRISH DOYLE (Blue Mountains) (19:02): On more than one occasion I have spoken in this place about the New South Wales Government's proposal to raise the Warragamba Dam wall. With the release late last year of the environmental impact statement [EIS] I must speak up again. I know I am far from a lone voice in my opposition to this ill-conceived plan. There are many others—experts in the field of science and the environment—who continue to express profound concern about the potential impacts of raising the dam wall. I am sure most members are aware of the resignation of one of the ecologists involved in the assessment and analysis processes for the EIS. Along with other ecologists working on the project, she claims that threats to endangered species have been either ignored or diluted in the EIS. It has since come to light that the New South Wales Government has been told by official assessors of the project that it is time to go back to the drawing board.

I am furious with this Government's track record of dishonesty and manipulation, all too often at the cost of our environment and under the guise of so-called necessary progress. My idea of progress is not the destruction of ancient Indigenous cultural sites or precious and vulnerable plant and animal species. When is this Government going to be held accountable for dangerous, destructive and irresponsible decision-making? Let us not forget that the traditional owners do not give their consent for the dam wall to be raised—a far from trivial aspect of this proposal. This country has a shameful history of ignoring the wishes and the wisdom of our First Nations peoples. Is that what will to happen again this time—more desecration of recognised Aboriginal heritage sites, more irreparable damage, more loss of country and more prioritising of development over this land's priceless and irreplaceable cultural history?

The raising of the dam wall crosses a few different portfolios, so to each of the Ministers concerned—Ministers Anderson, Roberts, Griffin and Ayres—I say this: You all have a role to play in how things unfold from here. If the Blue Mountains is negatively impacted because this project has gone ahead, each of you has blood on your hands. For the person amongst you who has made no secret of his pro-development agenda and his blatant disregard of anything that stands in the way, here is his chance to do better. Minister Ayres needs to do better.

Since I was elected in 2015 to represent the Blue Mountains community, I have had to remind the New South Wales Government many times what a precious place our region is. It would seem that I need to do that again. In the year 2000 the Blue Mountains was inscribed on the World Heritage List. For members who may not understand the significance of that, let me quote a few words from the UNESCO website that outline the essential criteria for a place to be deemed so important and so special that it is worthy of inclusion on that list. A site must "bear unique or exceptional testimony to a cultural tradition". It must "be an outstanding example of … land use which is representative of a culture … especially when it has become vulnerable". It must "contain superlative natural phenomena or areas of exceptional natural beauty and aesthetic importance".

We know the gist of the lies about raising the dam wall: the claim that it will be a silver-bullet solution for western Sydney flood mitigation. That rationale has been debunked, though, because there is mounting evidence that raising the dam wall will not offer adequate protection to those living on the flood plains. Those who hold the Blue Mountains dear have had the same concerns about this proposal for years. Just one or two flood events will see the biodiversity and ecological, cultural and World Heritage values of the Blue Mountains totally lost. But what has changed, or intensified, is Minister Ayres' spin around the necessity of this project—the false narrative that raising the dam wall is the only way to keep western Sydneysiders safe from flooding events.

Government members have not explored other options. They are not listening to the expert voices and they are disrespecting the traditional owners of the land, whilst hiding behind dangerously flawed "reasoning". How is this for a stark reminder? As much as 45 per cent of flooding in the Hawkesbury-Nepean Valley comes from rivers not controlled by Warragamba Dam. When Minister Ayres stood up in this place last November and spoke as if he were some messiah for the people of western Sydney, he was once again withholding his true motivations for the project. Shamefully, he was happy to bargain with the safety not only of the existing population of western Sydney but also of the additional 130,000 or so people that will settle on the flood plains if his dreams of overdevelopment are ever realised. Minister, just do not build on the flood plains. What a disgraceful legacy for him to leave behind. The Minister needs to follow the advice of The Guardian and reassess. Go to it.