Brendan Nelson (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

The Emergency Assistance Fund for the Lower Lakes and Coorong Region of South Australia Bill 2008 seeks to establish the Lower Lakes and Coorong Assistance Scheme, which will provide $50 million in emergency assistance to the Lower Lakes and Coorong region communities. The bill requires the responsible minister to determine written guidelines for operation of the scheme. In order to develop guidelines for the scheme, the minister must consult with the local people, local businesses and local communities of the region. This consultation will determine how to allocate the $50 million, ensuring that this assistance is for local people and driven by local people.

The $50 million assistance scheme will provide real and immediate assistance for local people, businesses, communities and wildlife to deal with the ongoing record low levels of water in the region. The local farmers can no longer access water for domestic and stock purposes, let alone irrigation, and many in the viticulture industry have been similarly affected. Boat ramps, jetties and moorings are stranded, posing significant challenges and hardship to the fishing and boating industries.

There is a flow-on effect to the businesses dependent on farmers and the boating industry, such as machinery and boat dealerships, boat builders and repairs, to mention but a few. There has been a substantial fall in visitors to the area, and consequently reduced cash flows to small businesses and local communities. Local wildlife is dying due to the associated impacts of the lack of water and declining water quality, such as the Murray turtles, which are being attacked by saltwater tube worms.

I have seen all of this firsthand and I, along with the opposition, have been calling for financial assistance for the local communities since my visit to the region in early April. These are communities who have for generation after generation provided the backbone of the region’s economy, who have asked for little to nothing from the Australian people and the Australian taxpayer. It is time to give them something back.

This assistance could be used for the carting of water for domestic and stock use; assistance to establish a rescue plan for the Murray turtles; assistance to schoolchildren who have been trying to save the turtles; a boat lift; assistance for small business in the form of rent relief, or in developing new markets or products and services; and assistance for retraining and skills development.

It is time for the Prime Minister and his government to stop watching and start acting. They can do this by supporting this bill and supporting $50 million of real and immediate action for the lower lakes and Coorong communities. Unfortunately, wall-to-wall Labor has meant wall-to-wall failure to take decisive action on the Murray-Darling Basin and on the lower lakes and the Coorong. Through a process of committees, reviews and political game-playing, Labor have stalled for nine long months, while the viability of the region slowly ebbs away.

The Prime Minister and those opposite need to support this $50 million assistance fund, and the Prime Minister needs to immediately convene an emergency COAG meeting to sign a fresh intergovernmental agreement that refers state and territory power over the Murray-Darling Basin to the Commonwealth, as the coalition first proposed in January 2007.

After all of the hot air, after all of the talk, we still in Australia in 2008—nine months into the Rudd government—do not have full Commonwealth control of the Murray-Darling Basin system. There is much else that the Prime Minister and Senator Wong need to do, not least of all to release the urgent advice on options for the lower lakes and Coorong region, which the minister sought on 18 June and yet it has not been released to the Australian community. In the interests of the Murray-Darling Basin communities, the environment and particularly the lower lakes and Coorong region communities, it is time to stop watching; it is time to act. It is time to put $50 million into the lower lakes and Coorong communities. It is time to make real decisions that deliver water, relief and much-needed assistance to these men and women, who are struggling in the midst of an environmental, economic and social disaster. (Time expired)

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