Thursday, 9 February 2023

Water policy

Tim McCURDY (Ovens Valley) (17:28): (39) My adjournment is to the Minister for Water in the other place, and the action that I seek is that at the upcoming Murray–Darling Basin Authority ministerial council meeting the Victorian Minister for Water does not sell us down the river by agreeing to more buybacks. Further buybacks of irrigation water are just not on.

The Murray–Darling Basin Authority have traditionally used buybacks of irrigation allocation to solve many of the environmental problems throughout the eastern seaboard of the Murray–Darling Basin Authority. There was provision in the original plan for a clawback of a further 450 gigalitres, which will be debated at the coming MDBA ministerial council, which is scheduled for 24 February. However, this decision was to be made in conjunction with the knowledge that regional communities would not be compromised or jeopardised if any further water were removed from the irrigation pool. Let me be clear, further water buybacks from the southern basin will have a detrimental effect on local economies of regional communities and must be stopped at all costs.

I have grave fears that the federal minister for water may be using the upcoming New South Wales election to push back the MDBA ministerial council meeting in the hope of a new water minister in New South Wales that could be more amenable to the federal minister’s thinking. I am not sure whether there is substance to that rumour, but if this is the case, it is a shameful manipulation of power. My suspicions are compounded by the absence of the promised strategy for consultation on buybacks of irrigation water. When you see fluffy lines rolling out like ‘bridging the gap’, you can be sure that the spin has already begun. Minister Shing must say no to buybacks and give that guarantee to Victorians.