Debate over Wild Dog Barrier Fence cost overruns and future of the fence

According to a spokesperson for the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries, the department has been providing additional funding to support the operation of the fence for the last seven years.

While it gave no indication of the amount of the shortfall, Warrego MP Ann Leahy said a Synergy report highlighted a budget shortfall of $648,644 for 2023/24.

She called for the report to be made public, saying people had a right to know what the figures were, and to know what was causing the cost overruns.

"Is it an increase in wages and materials - what efficiencies could be made, and can the fence continue - at this stage everyone is in the dark," she said.

"There are also questions around whether the fence should continue and who should pay for it, if it does.

"Concerns have been raised with me by councils, and I'm saying, the government shouldn't be putting its hand out for more money until it shows the report, and its recommendations."

According to Maranoa Regional Council's 2022/23 revenue statement, it levied a precept on rural land that collected $408,204 for maintenance and renewal of the wild dog barrier fence, plus pest and weed research provided by DAF.

The Balonne shire's precept contribution is $283,000 for the 2023/24 financial year, and mayor Samantha O'Toole said there were mixed feelings among councils around the future for the fence.

The shire's resolution to last year's Local Government Association of Queensland conference calling on the state government to maintain and fund 100 per cent of the Wild Dog Barrier Fence, so that it is effective against wild dog movement and future biosecurity threats, was passed by the majority of councils present.

Cr O'Toole said the formula that calculated what the precept was each year was a complicated one, incorporating the amount of livestock a shire carried.

"In Balonne, 80 per cent of the shire is exclusion fenced at a significant cost to participants, which means stock numbers have gone up," she said. "We don't think that should result in the precept going up - we think that's unfair."

On the other side of the coin, Blackall-Tambo Regional Council mayor Andrew Martin said he'd spent most of his life on properties that were bounded by the fence, which he thought of as one of the great assets of the nation.

He said the argument about not accepting a higher precept was like the one councils gave for not increasing rates, that times were tough.

"A few years down the track, you're so behind the eight ball, you've got to increase the rate by a huge amount to catch up," he said. "We've got to bite the bullet. The government has got to understand that most rational people will accept a precept increase that keeps up with CPI."

LGAQ CEO Alison Smith will say only that her organisation is advocating for the resolution moved at the conference.

Cr O'Toole explained the rationale behind that motion, saying that looking at the fence from that point of view would see it retained and upgraded for a different reason, to help manage disease incursions such as foot and mouth disease.

"A cost benefit analysis, which we'd like to see, could indicate that was money well spent," she said. "Some councils are very protective of the barrier fence. I'm not saying we're not, but there's not a lot of evidence of it doing the job it was built for at the moment."

Cr Martin didn't agree, saying it was because sections of the fence were poorly maintained, and because of 'recalcitrant landowners' that they ended up with more dogs inside the fence than out of it.

"We've worked out who the recalcitrants are now, and done our own fencing, but if we go to a model where we're asked to maintain the barrier fence, if you get one cockie that won't maintain a section, it all falls down," he said.

He was responding to a suggestion that the government would say to councils that people had all built their own fences and so there was no need for the government to maintain an overall fence.

He said councils were at the consultation phase now, with a couple of models to consider, and said out-of-the-box thinking was needed, pointing to the model the South Tambo cluster, of which he's a member, adopted.

Undertaken in 2018, the government supplied the material to replace the barrier fence and the cluster members erected it.

"That saved more than a quarter of a million dollars," Cr Martin said.

The DAF spokesperson says the government has committed to undertaking further review of the wild dog barrier fence following the Synergy report, and that it "continues to work with participating local governments and the LGAQ on these matters".

More to come. If you want to contribute to this story, contact Sally Gall on 0427 575 955.