John Cobb (Calare, National Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to bring the attention of the House to the fact that, after three months in government, the new government has pretty much ignored what is for Australia one of the biggest issues it has, and that is the state of the Murray-Darling Basin and its water and the fact that Australia gets over 40 per cent of its food product from the people of that region. And this is a government that, on 25 January 2006, when in opposition, backed then Prime Minister John Howard and our government when we launched the National Water Initiative.

In the last three months, the only way in which this government has acknowledged the issue of water and the problems associated with the Murray-Darling Basin has been to cut $50 million from that program. Some of it was money that could not be spent this financial year, which is fine—it was about setting up the Murray-Darling Basin Authority—and some of it was money to set up a structure within the Bureau of Meteorology to monitor what happens with water in Australia as part of that initiative. But if you have a look at the forward projections, you see that that money has not been put back.

It is very good to see some new members of the new government here today, because in the next 10 minutes they will learn more about water than any of their senior executive know about it. The fact is that, in all the time that Labor has been in government—three months—not once has the Minister for Climate Change and Water allowed anyone from the irrigation industry to see her or her staff. In fact, the government has been deadly silent on this issue and the National Water Initiative, which was backed by the Labor Party at the time it was launched. The people in the Murray-Darling Basin still do not know one thing about how this government is going to proceed with it. Is the restructuring money going to be put in? Is the money to create efficiencies in the transfer of water in the Murray-Darling Basin going to go ahead? Is the money to create efficiencies on farms going to go ahead? There has not been one word.

The issue of Victoria is very interesting in this. For a government who have said that they are getting rid of the blame game, that they are going to work with state governments, that they are all kindred spirits of a socialist bent and that they are going to sort it out, why have they not already got Victoria signed up? They will say that they had a meeting with Premier Brumby on the water issue. I could not believe it when the person who said that Victoria wanted nothing to do with a national water plan—that it did not want to do it—then said that he had always believed in a national water plan. That is quite unbelievable.

The failure of state Labor governments right around Australia to ever pay for what they have taken from irrigators is a path that this new federal government, it would seem, is going to follow. If you listen to one of the new members of the new government—the member for Maribyrnong, a former heavy, and probably still very much a heavy, in the union movement—it would seem his idea is that the government should compulsorily acquire water from irrigators and shut down the rice and cotton industries because they are using water. This is about ignorance. The fact is that the cotton industry is, by and large, an extremely efficient user of water. If you know something about it, you realise efficiency is the issue, not what is grown. The cotton industry, like other industries which are horticultural, uses around eight megalitres of water per hectare per crop. That is what they need to concentrate on, not what is growing. In the past some people have simply not liked an industry.

All the states have worked under the national competition policy. New South Wales, in particular, and Victoria have in the past taken water from irrigators despite taking federal money under the national competition policy, and they have never given any of it back. The new government has to learn that the National Plan for Water Security acted like it did because of production and food prices and helping industry help itself. A small part of the $10 billion was to buy water, some of it was for restructuring but most of it—almost $6 billion—was there to help industry become more efficient and to help water transfer become more efficient. That has to happen.

The Leader of the House said that that money simply had to be spent on buying water, not on creating efficiency and getting water back that way. He simply wants to buy water. We have a mixture of the member for Maribyrnong wanting to compulsorily acquire water from irrigators, and the former shadow minister for water and the present Leader of the House wanting to do nothing but buy water. They have to understand that it was no accident that the National Plan for Water Security was put there like it was. If you simply take water, you are going to cut production. If you simply take water from people when they are at their most vulnerable, physically, financially and mentally—and we are talking about irrigators and farmers who have gone through six years of drought—then probably some of them will sell water, but they will regret it as soon as things get better. It is taking advantage of people when they are at their most vulnerable.

The government have to accept that they are totally ignorant about water and the effect of taking it away. They will cut production. What happens when you cut production from an area as important as this? Up go food prices. If you put up food prices then the Treasurer, who is having so much trouble grasping the subject, will realise that suddenly up goes inflation, and it has a bad effect on the economy. The things that have to be learnt have to be learnt by going and talking to the people involved with them. Do not do what the government in Victoria are doing. They are stealing water, which is going to have the same long-term effect as what the member for Maribyrnong and the current Leader of the House want to do in taking water without making efficiencies.

The Victorian government are focused on pinching water out of the basin and giving it to Melbourne. They want to take over 100 gigalitres of water a year—and I am sure the member for Murray will touch on this—but over twice that is currently being put into the sea from Melbourne as waste water. Why don’t they concentrate on that? But no, they cannot get it around their heads that by flogging water out of the basin and taking it to Melbourne they are creating greater pressures on the Murray-Darling Basin.

We all know that water is under more pressure than it has ever been. Look at the storages. Both the Dartmouth and the Hume reservoirs—the two biggest reservoirs—are under 20 per cent still, and it is not looking good at the moment despite the rain. The rain has not been in the catchment, and that is something you can tell your leaders. Look at the facts, the figures and what is happening and, for heaven’s sake, go out there and tell the people in the towns, not just the farmers or the irrigators who are so dependent upon this system. Ask people in Adelaide what they think about the need for water in the Murray River and I think you will find that they are pretty interested in it.

When you have the minister for water and even her staff refusing to talk to the people most concerned with what happens to the irrigation industry, it is a worry. That she has not given any indication of where she wants to go in the future is a worry, because if they take that water without letting people make efficiencies on farm infrastructure or whatever it might be then they are going to create higher food prices, more inflation and a bad effect on the economy, as I said before. Our plan was going to help the irrigation industry, make savings, help their production, increase their efficiency and, at the same time, look after the nation.

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