WA farmers accused of planting crops on public land

The state regulator is failing to deter farmers from planting crops on public land, documents from the Shire of Esperance claim.

There have been 39 reports of alleged unauthorised native vegetation clearing submitted to the Department of Environment and Water Regulation (DWER) by the Shire of Esperance since 2018.

Shire president and farmer Ian Mickel said that roughly equated to 78 kilometres of road verge, or 114 hectares.

None have resulted in fines or prosecution.

Many of the shire’s reports, seen by the ABC, allege the clearing is for “financial gain for cropping additional land within the road reserve”.

Some reports also allege the state regulator is failing to act.

“Unauthorised clearing of shire road reserves has become commonplace due to lack of prosecution by DWER,” one report written on February 16 this year stated.

Environment Minister Reece Whitby declined an interview about the issue.

A spokesperson for the Department of Water and Environmental Regulation said its officers would be on the ground in Esperance inspecting reported areas in coming weeks.

He said all reports and allegations of unauthorised clearing of native vegetation were assessed by the department.

He said exemptions could be provided that allowed native vegetation to be cleared, and these were considered when investigating reports of unlawful clearing. 

“Not all clearing is unlawful, and not all unlawful clearing results in a prosecution,” he said in a written statement.

“Each case is assessed individually, and when determining enforcement action the department considers several factors including the seriousness of the offence, behaviour of the offender and whether the offender has a history of non-compliance.”

He confirmed that no fines or prosecutions had been initiated as a result of allegations in the Esperance region.

‘Tip of a much larger iceberg’

Esperance Wildflower Society president Ken Mills wrote to Mr Whitby on June 30, calling on him to stamp out the practise, but said he was yet to receive a response.

He was concerned the clearing was destroying vital habitat for the region’s 2,500 species of wildflowers, some of which were only found in road verges.

“Being an agricultural area, enormous amounts of the original vegetation have been cleared,” he said.

“So those roadside reserves are really important reservoirs for a number of endangered species and they provide corridors for the movement of animals.”

He also feared the allegations to date were “just the tip of a much larger iceberg”.

“The response of the department to date has been underwhelming, with the only action taken being the issue of warnings to some offenders,” he said in his letter to Mr Whitby.

“Not only is this an inadequate response to what amounts to the sequestration of public land for the generation of substantial private profit, it serves as an encouragement rather than a disincentive to other farmers.

“Minister, we implore you to take strong action to ensure that this issue is effectively addressed before we see more avoidable additions to the list of threatened and extinct species.”

Call for education, not penalties

Mr Mickel, said there were other reasons landowners were clearing reserves, suggesting it could be to help manage pests or weeds.

He also said many farmers were trying to reduce fuel loads and clean up after previous bushfires, particularly deadly ones in 2015.

“I honestly don’t think they’re trying to grow more acres of crop,” he said.

He was also surprised the regulator had not been more active, noting the shire was fined $50,000 in recent years for clearing outside of a permitted area.

But he said he was “staggered” at the amount of clearing that was allegedly taking place and believed action should be taken.

“It’s disappointing to me … that we are facing this problem to this extent,” he said.

He said the government should address the issue by focussing on education rather than prosecution.

“I’m not encouraging [the government] to go and charge all these farmers at that level at all,” he said.

“I’m sort of keen to go and draw these people together and have a meeting and see if we can work out some way forward that we might be able to do some rehabilitation and help to redress the environmental issues that are there.

“And I can only hope that we can find some good solutions going forward.”