A WATER trader says a legal challenge against him by the Stanley community was a “waste of money” and vowed to seek hundreds of thousands of dollars in costs via the Victorian Supreme Court.
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Stanley Rural Community Inc on Wednesday failed to persuade three Court of Appeal judges that water legislation did not allow Stanley Pastoral to extract water from its Cue Springs Road property.
The group had applied for leave to appeal a Supreme Court judge’s decision which endorsed an earlier approval of water mining at Stanley by the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal.
But the three appeal judges deemed the Supreme Court judge was “fundamentally correct” in his interpretation of the Water Act and “leave to appeal should be refused”.
Stanley Pastoral owner Tim Carey hailed the result.
“It brings an end to a ridiculous saga and in the end we’ve got what we asked for in the beginning when we went to (Indigo) council,” he said.
“VCAT agreed with us, the Supreme Court agreed with us and now three judges of the Court of Appeal have agreed with us.
“All the council and Stanley community have done is waste everyone’s time.”
Mr Carey said he would be seeking “full costs to be awarded to us” when the matter returned to court for the fallout from Wednesday’s decision.
“We’ve spent hundreds of thousands on this, to defend a position which was right all along,” he said.
Stanley Rural Community Inc president Ed Tyrie declined to comment on Mr Carey’s push for full costs.
Mr Tyrie said while he was disappointed with the result, he did not believe the court action was a waste.
“I think the Supreme Court hearing found that VCAT got it right for the wrong reasons and that was disclosed at the Supreme Court hearing and that wouldn’t have been disclosed if we didn’t go to the Supreme Court,” he said.
“It was a matter of public interest and we believed it had to be appealed to the Supreme Court of Appeal.”
Indigo mayor Jenny O’Connor said there was a need for political change.
“There’s not enough capacity in the Water Act to ensure water that is needed to be maintained for agriculture is not used for a purpose like bottled water,” she said.
“There is a deficiency in the Water Act and that’s why it has to be dealt with at a political level.”
Cr O’Connor said the legal outcome “allows for unfettered extraction of groundwater anywhere”.
