Australian Opposition Leader Sussan Ley during Tuesday's Question Time. Photo by AAP Image/Lukas Coch.
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LUKAS COCH
“Regional Australia is being hung out to dry once again by a Labor government that listens to green activists before it listens to the people who grow this nation’s food.”
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That is the message delivered by Federal Opposition Leader and Member for Farrer Sussan Ley in Parliament this week, as water buyback shock waves continue to ripple through the regions.
She has gone as far to say that taking more water from productive regions like the NSW Murray is “vandalism”.
Ms Ley has added her voice to the stakeholder associations who have opposed water buybacks since the start of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan process.
Like them, she was disappointed when Federal Water Minister Murray Watt confirmed his intention to step up the over-priced trade strategy from 170 to 300 gigalitres (GL), a 76% jump.
Federal Environment and Water Minister Murray Watt made the announcement at a summit in Adelaide on November 12.
He said the government was committed to a target of returning 450GL of water to the environment, purchased from farmers and irrigators.
Formerly the agriculture minister, Mr Watt said his political opponents had often told him to oppose buybacks to support farming when he held the portfolio.
“My view was that the best way to support the ag industry’s long-term future was to accept the scientific reality and help industry adapt to a more water efficient future,” he said at the summit.
Murray Watt.Photo by AAP Image/Mick Tsikas.
Photo by
MICK TSIKAS
“Sure, I could stick my head in the sand and pretend that nothing needed to change. But all that would do is condemn the (Murray-Darling) basin to environmental decline.”
Ms Ley again spoke to buyback plans - which she described as a “lazy, uncaring and taking enormous amounts of water for the environment away from farming” - while standing in Parliament on Tuesday.
“For more than three years, Labor has brushed aside the voices of communities who rely on the Murray-Darling Basin for their livelihoods,” she said.
“In its latest 130 gigalitre buyback, aimed squarely at the southern Basin and directly at towns across my electorate of Farrer, it’s not a policy for the environment.
“It is a political deal dressed up as reform.
“Places like Deniliquin, Barham, Wakool, Finley, Berrigan, Jerilderie, Tocumwal and Mulwala will carry the cost.
“These towns rely on irrigation for jobs, small business activity and the confidence that holds our local economies together.”
Ms Ley said when policy removes hundreds of billions of litres from irrigation, it is not just water that disappears.
“It’s harvests that never occur, investment that dries up, and families who are forced to leave.
“It is the quiet erosion of the very fabric of regional life.
“Labor claims the environment demands this.
“In truth, it is the Greens who demand this, and it is Labor who caves. That is not stewardship. It is vandalism.”
Ms Ley said the new announcement suggests the government is “out of ideas” when it comes to looking at other options for water recovery.
“The 2023 deal between Labor and the Greens for an additional 450 gigalitre environmental water allocation was supposed to be spread across a range of initiatives, including infrastructure projects, changes to water management, as well as state run partnerships.
“Minister Watt has not only doubled down on this buybacks plan, he won’t even take responsibility for it, indicating it was an idea from his department.
“And all this before they even consider balancing out water recovery in the north of Basin.
“Whether its water policy, the renewable energy rollout, cuts to local councils, pulling back on road repairs and regional development, the Albanese Government continues to fail the people of rural Australia.”
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