Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Change, Environment and Water) Share this | Hansard source

In addressing the Appropriation Bill (No. 5) 2008-2009 and the Appropriation Bill (No. 6) 2008-2009 I want to focus on two primary areas: water and energy efficiency in relation to climate change and the way in which these bills cost jobs rather than create jobs. I believe that the measures contained within these bills in relation to water and programs for energy efficiency cost jobs rather than create jobs.

Let me set this out with a very simple proposition. On 25 January 2007, the then Prime Minister, Mr Howard, and the current Leader of the Opposition, Malcolm Turnbull, laid out a $10 billion national water plan. That proposal contained at its core $5.8 billion for replumbing rural Australia—for piping, for the lining of channels and for the lining of dams. It provided for irrigation, whether it be drip or upgrades to the best 21st-century standards on farms. It contained measures for real water savings which could be shared between farmers, for their productivity and farm jobs, and the environment, for the benefit of those downstream, for the rivers and for the Lower Lakes at the mouth of the Murray. What we have seen since is a freezing of these plans.

I recently travelled from the top of the Murray-Darling Basin to the bottom of the Murray-Darling Basin, from Toowoomba down across to Dalby, St George, Bollon, Cunnamulla, Bourke, the Macquarie Marshes, Trangie, Nevertire, Dubbo and Parkes. I travelled down further to Condobolin and Lake Cargelligo. As you come towards the Victorian border you reach Deniliquin and Barham, then you travel along to areas such as Kerang, Swan Hill, Mildura, Wentworth and, ultimately, Renmark, Waikerie and the Lower Lakes. What surprised me was not the disagreement between farming communities up and down the river but the desire to make real savings to help the system, so long as there is Commonwealth investment in replumbing rural Australia. We have seen a buyout of rural Australia rather than a replumbing of rural Australia.

What impressed me along the way was the willingness of farmers to save well over 600 billion litres of water—that is, 600 gigalitres of water or 600,000 megalitres of water—on a per annum basis if the Commonwealth made the investment set aside by the previous government. It was for modernising our farms, for piping, for lining of channels, for lining of dams and for on-farm irrigation upgrades to things such as pressurised drip irrigation, centre pivots or inline pivots rather than flood irrigation. That is what the farmers themselves have said. Every year going forward 600 billion litres of water will be wasted as a consequence of the freeze imposed by this government and perpetuated in these bills. Instead there is a so-called buyout of farmers. The perversity in this bill is that buying out farmers does not create jobs in rural Australia. It destroys jobs. It was absolutely clear when I was in Griffith and Leeton recently that those farmers who had left the land—reluctantly—rather than been given help to stay on the land had taken jobs, had taken local economic activity and were sadly taking the life and heart of those areas.

The message is very clear. If we want water security, if we want food security, if we want rural jobs, then we do not buy out rural Australia—which is exactly what happens to the tune of an additional $250 million in these bills—but we replumb rural Australia. The way in which this creates jobs is twofold. Firstly, our action, our proposal, our funding—which is not additional funding; it was allocated in the budget over two years ago—very simply does this. It is the fastest infrastructure spending in Australia. It goes directly to rural communities. The people who will do the replumbing of rural Australia are doing moderate sized jobs. They are the suppliers in towns such as Bourke, Dubbo and Deniliquin. They are the contractors who carry out the work in Bourke, Dubbo, Deniliquin and Mildura. They are the people who will benefit immediately. These are plans that have been already approved and are ready to go. As you travel down the Murray-Darling Basin you see firstly the potential for the jobs to be created in the immediate delivery of on-farm water infrastructure. Secondly, you see that the alternative that the government has proposed, of a buyout of rural Australia, will destroy jobs.

It is not my view. That is the view of the NSW Irrigators Council. They have said that in New South Wales alone the buyback proposed in these bills will cost 2,800 rural jobs. A cost of the buyback will be 2,800 rural jobs of people on the land. There is a clear distinction here: create jobs through replumbing rural Australia or destroy jobs by buying farmers off the land. Any other analysis is Orwellian. There is a position which has been put by the government that, if you buy farmers off the land, it will somehow mythically create jobs in rural Australia. Of course it will not. There is no farmer who believes that. There is no rural mayor in Australia who believes that. There is no rural economist in Australia who believes that. What is proposed in Appropriation Bill (No. 5) 2008-2009 and Appropriation Bill (No. 6) 2008-2009 is to buy out farmers, to damage food security and to simply defer the necessary upgrade to Australia’s rural water infrastructure. It is real, it is important and it is needed. Again, do not take my word for it. The CEO of the National Farmers Federation, Ben Fargher, said recently:

Premised on the two simultaneous prongs of water buy-back and water efficiency working in tandem to achieve water savings, only buy-back has been on the Government’s radar—ignoring its own policy strategy of assisting irrigators and communities do more with less water through irrigation infrastructure investment …

In essence, the money which was allocated, the money which was promised, the money which was relied upon for investment in infrastructure has been frozen. Why would that be the case?

The answer is a very simple one, and it has come to me from farm groups and farmers repeatedly. That is, that they have been informed, by dealing directly with the minister, Senator Wong, or her department, that there is a philosophical opposition to investing public money in private farms. That sounds like a reasonable proposition on the face of it—although I disagree, and I will come back to the philosophical disagreement. But the underpinning proposition is flat, dead wrong. The reason I say this is very simple. If the farmers are willing to make a contribution to the health of the river by upgrading their systems and sharing the benefits, that is a public benefit. And that was the whole scheme: a once-in-a-century revolution in water; a once-in-a-century replumbing of rural Australia, so as to help the rural communities, the river, the environment and the Lower Lakes.

These are not mythical savings. The Queensland Murray-Darling Basin catchment management authority has offered up 120 billion litres. The little town of Bourke has offered up eight billion litres of annual water savings. Further south, Trangie-Nevertire, just north of Dubbo, has offered up 30 billion litres; the Griffith area, through the rice farmers, 23 billion litres a year; and Coleambally 30 billion litres a year. And then you come down to the Victorian border where, on the Kerang side, Goulburn-Murray Water is offering well over 30 billion litres a year—and I am told it could be as high as 70 billion litres a year, but the figures are not fully disclosed—and the Murray irrigation area, which is run by Murray Irrigation Ltd, the farmers cooperative, is offering 300 billion litres of water back to the Murray if they get investment in return. I met with the farmers from Wakool. They are willing to make real savings. I met with the CEO, with the chairman of the board. All these people want to make significant contributions to the river in return for investment in water security, food security and irrigation upgrades. These bills go in precisely the opposite direction. That is why rural jobs will be lost and why rural job opportunities are also being lost.

The second great area I want to focus on is that of the opportunities for jobs which could be created through a genuine energy efficiency program. What we see again here is the perpetuation of a myth. There have been three programs that the government set down in relation to environmental management, all of which have failed to effectively commence.

In October 2007 a Pink Batts program was announced by the new government. That program was re-announced in the May budget of 2008. As of February this year, not one pink batt had been installed anywhere in Australia under that program. Similarly, the rainwater tank program was announced in July 2007, re-announced on 13 May 2008 and re-announced again in January of this year, yet not one rainwater tank has been installed anywhere in Australia under the federal government’s program. So these are their programs. The solar schools program halted what was an active program at state level, of which we were very proud, which was putting different forms of energy efficiency and water saving measures into schools. Out of 10,000 schools, the latest advice from the recent estimates is that 99.8 per cent had had absolutely nothing done, leaving 20 schools out of 10,000. So 9,980 schools have had nothing done. That is the difference between the impression of activity and real jobs. There are real things that can be done. But we have seen not one pink batt or rainwater tank installed and we have seen 99.8 per cent of schools miss out on government programs supposedly designed to save energy and water.

What we propose is very simple. There must be two things. Firstly, a green carbon initiative, which will save 150 million tonnes of CO2 by 2020 on a per annum basis. The opposition leader, Malcolm Turnbull, has set out that we can do this through looking at soil carbons, biochar, revegetation of mallee and of mulga and of forestry. If people doubt that this is possible, the government should look at its own Garnaut review. The Garnaut review in chapter 22 sets out 800 million tonnes of annual CO2 savings from 11 different sources of potential on-farm CO2 work. This huge set of opportunities, with an abatement potential of 150 million tonnes a year, with an on-farm income potential of $3 billion a year, is almost completely excluded under the accompanying legislation to this, the draft environment trading scheme legislation. So the biggest, fastest single thing on a cheap basis which we could do in Australia has been ignored and cut out and is not contained in either this legislation or the complementary legislation. Similarly the 50 million tonnes from energy efficiency which could be contained if there were activities such as accelerated depreciation, which could be achieved if there were genuine incentives, has also been ignored in this and in all other government legislative programs. We can be more effective, we can do more but at a cheaper rate, if we have a 21st century system for Australia rather than a 20th century blueprint for Europe. That is what we have: we have last century’s model from Europe rather than this century’s model for Australia. The result is that we are wasting opportunities to improve the efficiency of Australia’s buildings, of Australia’s homes and of Australia’s communities.

There is a very simple comparison: programs which have not delivered one pink batt 18 months after they were first announced nor one rainwater tank and have skipped 99.8 per cent of schools, or a genuine attempt to give our farmers the opportunity to improve their land, to improve the soil carbons, to improve their on-farm productivity and at the same time help minimise the cost and maximise the number and volume of Australian emissions saved. That is the difference. We have a very simple proposition. We want to re-plumb rural Australia rather than buy it out and in so doing create jobs and protect against the job losses which the New South Wales Irrigators Council and others have pointed to, and we want to produce an Australia based on a green carbon initiative with energy efficiency rather than on phantom programs which have not delivered a pink batt or a rainwater tank and have ignored 99.8 per cent of schools.

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