Hundreds of fire ant nests are infesting virtually every front yard of a new housing estate in Ripley, Ipswich: as well as kid’s playgrounds, footpaths and shopping centre car parks. People carelessly or accidentally moving fire ants in fire ant carriers like soil, mulch, compost and turf is the main reason fire ants now infest 500,000ha of south-east Queensland. Biosecurity Queensland has dumped it responsibility to stop the spread of fire ants onto the public. Industry representatives at a Fire Ant Program Stakeholder Forum in June 2018 said they were happy to accept their responsibility, but wanted Biosecurity Queensland to accepts it responsibility too by reintroducing approved risk management and biosecurity inspectors to audit those plans. Biosecurity Queensland hasn’t. Biosecurity Queensland continues to put the safety of thousands of residents of new housing estates at risk. Time for a Royal Commission.
The Queensland Department of State Development declared the Ripley Valley between Brisbane and Ipswich cities in south-east Queensland to be one of the largest urban growth areas in Australia with potentially 50,000 dwellings.
But since a massive fire ant infestation was found in nearby Swanbank in 2002, most of the urban growth corridor between Brisbane and Ipswich in south-east Queensland has become infested with fire ants.
Biosecurity Queensland reported fire ants infesting new housing estates in Ripley in 2017 and they’re still there. There are hundreds of fire ant nests infesting virtually every front yard of the new housing estate, as well a kids’ playgrounds, footpaths along Ripley Road, in the shopping centre carpark and between the housing estate and the shopping centre.
People carelessly or accidentally moving fire ants in fire ant carriers like soil, mulch, compost and turf is the main reason fire ants now infest 500,000ha of south-east Queensland: because Biosecurity Queensland has dumped its responsibility to control the movement of fire ant carriers onto the public.
Industry representatives at a Fire Ant Program Stakeholder Forum in Jun 2018 said they were happy to accept their responsibility for not spreading fire ants, but they wanted Biosecurity Queensland to accepts it responsibility too. They wanted Biosecurity Queensland to approve land development applications, to give industry more information on how to mitigate their risk of spreading fire ants, to update their Fire Ant Biosecurity Zones map, to reintroduce fire ant risk management plans and to train more compliance officers. It might be better if Biosecurity Queensland simply re-instated the large team of biosecurity inspectors who used to work with high risk businesses to develop risk management plans, who audited those plans and who prosecuted those who did not comply. Biosecurity Queensland has done none of those things.
Biosecurity Queensland continues to put the safety of thousands of residents of new housing estates at risk.
Time for a Royal Commission.