Dick Adams (Lyons, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is great to follow so much rhetoric about this water plan! Let us have a look at what this water plan is. I do not think it is much more than a water grants scheme to win an election. It has come along a bit less than a year out from the election because they realised nothing had been done, no vision had been put down after 10 years of failure. So they decided they had better have a fair bit of money over 10 years—a big figure; a billion a year—in a grants scheme to buy back some water, to knock off some irrigators and to try to make irrigation a bit more effective and efficient. I see that half the water will stay with the irrigators who can save a certain amount and the other half will no doubt go to environmental flows. But there is no detail on how they are going to achieve this. We all know that if the first six properties in an irrigation scheme sold their water back to the system and there was no more water going up there, the question then is: who is going to look after the ones on the other end? Who is going to maintain the long pipes, the improved water system? There is a lot of complexity in these issues and there has been a lot of time for this government to rectify the problems.

I am very pleased to have the opportunity to speak on the matter. Australia’s water resources are indeed very precious and vital to the agricultural industry and, more importantly, to local communities. We need clean water to survive. It is clear that the government has failed on water as an issue. There have been promises, a lot of rhetoric like we had today from the barrister, and grand announcements—yet we still see no firm outcomes on the issue of securing Australia’s precious water resources. After 10 years we should be able to see some outcomes. The Howard government has been dragging its heels on this matter for 10 years. For example, the recent activity of the government has centred on the plan to take over the Murray-Darling Basin. Today we have heard the rhetoric that this $10 billion is to go over all states and all irrigation. It is all about irrigation schemes, I understand. That is what it seems to be now. As it goes on, more and more words come out.

Most people in Australia would think that $10 billion is quite a lot of money. One of the most important issues that we face today did not even go through the cabinet—$10 billion. They did not worry about putting it through the cabinet; the Prime Minister did it up in his office. Prime Minister, you have given the job to manage the issue to a lawyer from Sydney who is a millionaire so I guess to him $10 billion is just pocket money. That suggests that you have not really taken the issue seriously. Or is it that you have suddenly realised that this is a serious issue and because you have done nothing about that you are now running scared? I believe that is what is happening to this government—they are now running a bit scared. Water has become an issue and there is an election coming up so they need a grants program to satisfy the rural seats. That is what this is all about—a grants program to satisfy the rural seats.

Even the head of the government’s task force preparing the water plan agreed that the government had done no modelling of any impact on employment, no assessment of the numbers of people who might have to exit the industry and no costing of the purchase of entitlements. So we do not know what it is going to cost, there is no marketing material and no modelling has been done. Nothing has been done.

Unfortunately, because of the lack of leadership on this issue it is the people on the ground who will suffer. It will be workers in the agricultural industry and people owning farms and properties who will get cut on this. It is the farmers, the agricultural sector and the communities that will suffer because the Prime Minister has given the Minister for the Environment and Water Resources some pocket money to play with. He will play with that and try to win a few Liberal votes out of his party room for when he bids for the leadership of the Liberal Party. It is grant money to the millionaire from Sydney to help him when he stands for the leadership of his party in the future.

Around Australia dams are at their lowest capacity in living memory. Farmers in particular are being hit. It is really tough out there. Farmers are unable to plant new crops and unable to plant new areas. Even if the rain comes there will not be too much water flowing. Others have had to cut back on farming as they have had less water to go into their traditional crops.

What about benchmarks and what definitions do we have? I can remember doing a water report some years ago. We were trying to come to grips with what benchmarks and definitions you need for environmental flows and healthy rivers. What do you need for water policy? I agree with the minister at the table when he said that the rivers of Australia are very different from those in other parts of the world. They do go up and down from great floods to very dry trickles. There are dry holes from time to time. We have to remember that we need to have definitions and we need to have benchmarks and by now we should know where we are going and what we are trying to achieve. I do not think that we do know.

The government has spoken about sustainability for irrigators and non-viable, inefficient irrigators but has not provided any definitions of these. I remember the Farmers Federation was concerned enough to raise this issue. I can remember a report we did here in a House committee some years ago. The Farmers Federation in evidence said:

I do not think we can actually say what a healthy river is. We are all looking for a definition of a healthy working river. We have asked our scientists and our research corporations to give us the parameters of a healthy working river … We are looking for that answer.

I do not think there is an answer yet. I would have thought that this government would have had an answer by now, after 10 years.

Small towns are also suffering across Australia. Local government infrastructure, including water and sewerage infrastructure, is becoming older and in need of repair. Over the last 10 years the proportion of local government’s share in tax revenue has decreased from 1.2 per cent to just 0.7 per cent. In real terms that means they are now $1 billion worse off. Funding to local government is now linked to the CPI, and not governed by a growth arrangement, and that means that any increase in funding does not reflect the increased costs to local government. So the infrastructure in this area is also in urgent need of being renewed to save water. So while farmers wait for certainty in irrigation, local government is faced with a crisis of infrastructure funding and the community will no doubt bear the brunt of government’s inaction in this matter.

There is some positive work going on in the area of water. When I look at my own state, the Tasmanian government recently released a discussion paper on reform of the Tasmanian water and sewerage sector with an aim to make the sector more sustainable through structural, regulatory and other reforms. It really is a good contrast to what the state government has done in Tasmania and what this federal government has put on the table.

The plan in Tasmania is to involve all stakeholders in the process. Submissions to this plan close next week. The Tasmanian Department of Treasury and Finance is involved—in fact representatives of that department are chairing the steering committees in this process. The task force is comprised of the Treasurer, who is the chair, the Minister for Primary Industries and Water and the Minister for Environment and Planning. So the federal government should see that everybody is at the table in this scheme. The Tasmanian cabinet made the decision and are aware of the details of the project, and the Tasmanian people have the opportunity for input. With the involvement of those with a responsibility for finance, I believe that the outcome will be okay. At least the departments responsible and the responsible ministers will be aware of what is happening. (Time expired)

See this speech in context