Byrnes upsets all over water
LABOR councillor Reece Byrnes has defended a flipflopping position on water mining in the Tweed.
The issue has tempers boiling in the Tweed with protests, apprehended violence orders, allegations of corruption, court cases and various political manoeuvring.
Cr Byrnes has been at the centre of the furore as the deciding vote on whether applications have been approved or refused in council.
He has come under fire from both sides after supporting former Labor NSW minister Jack Hallam to start a water mining business in October and then refusing two applications this month.
“There is no question either side has been upset with me,” he said.
“The Hallam decision generated a lot of community angst and I received a lot of correspondence from people at the time.”
After the Hallam decision, environmental activist Jeremy Tager accused Mr Byrnes of a conflict of interest and declared Greens voters would vote against Labor at the upcoming election.
In response, Cr Byrnes said he was voting on the recommendation from council officers to approve a new water mining business.
But two months later, Cr Byrnes voted against officers’ recommendations and refused a separate water extraction application by the Karlos family.
“It is the Karlos family mission now to destroy his political career,” Matthew Karlos told the Bulletin.
“He approved the Hallam application because he was following the officers’ recommendation but then goes against that on our application.”
Cr Byrnes said the political environment around water mining had changed since the Hallam decision.
“I am sticking to the agreed ALP policy on this for now and that is basically putting the pause button on future applications,” he said.
On November 6, the NSW Country Labor Party called for a parliamentary investigation into the water mining industry and a pause on all new applications.
However at the same meeting on December 6, Cr Byrnes endorsed an application for the Mount Warning Spring Farm business.
“The Karlos one was a new development application whereas the Mount Warning one was about their shed they are building out there,” he said.
“The shed is going to mean 47 local jobs, a lot of them will be indigenous, and these guys will be bottling glass.”