LANDHOLDERS be warned: the weed control authority for the Bathurst, Blayney, Lithgow and Oberon council areas recently issued a $1000 on-the-spot fine.
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Upper Macquarie County Council (UMCC) says it has issued more than 400 weed control notices to private landholders in the past year and is ramping up its enforcement activity.
"Unlike many fines, paying a penalty for not complying with a weed control notice does not make the control notice go away," UMCC general manager David Young said.
"The landholder must still do the required weed control work at their cost - and if they take too long, further fines may be issued."
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UMCC chairman Ian North, who is a Bathurst Regional councillor, said invasive weed control in the district "is part of a national effort to control serious invasive pest plants that, unchecked, will cause insurmountable damage to the productivity of agricultural land, country landscapes, and waterway environments".
"People need to understand that the cost of managing weeds earlier, before they get out of control, will always be less in the long run than trying later or not controlling them at all," Cr North said.
In 2017, the then new NSW Biosecurity Act imposed a strict "weed biosecurity duty" on every person who is the owner or occupier of any land.
UMCC is responsible for implementing the weed control elements of that legislation.
"The key aim of the local weed control authority is to get more weeds controlled sooner, and we prefer to achieve this in a co-operative and advisory manner," Cr North said.
"However, you can only ignore us for so long. Once you fail to respond to a weed control notice, you will soon get an enforcement direction and if you ignore that as well, you will attract on-the-spot fines of $1000 or $2000 per time and you might get more than one if you are too slow to respond."
If you ignore that as well, you will attract on-the-spot fines of $1000 or $2000 per time.
- Upper Macquarie County Council chairman Ian North
Mr Young said the majority of landholders do the right thing with invasive weed control.
"They either keep their property well-managed or respond quickly when we remind them of their responsibilities," he said.
"Of the 1200-plus inspections undertaken on private property so far this year, just over 1000 are now low weed-risk landholdings.
"We want landholders to know we will be fair and reasonable in our enforcement actions - we will be realistic about how long it might take to control the different weeds on an individual property and take such things as drought and other seasonal conditions into account when agreeing with a landholder what their control plan will be.
"But in the end, the landholder - whoever they may be - must control the priority invasive weeds on their land. There is no do-nothing option here."
Upper Macquarie County Council covers a region of approximately 13,500 square kilometres.
