Mark Dreyfus (Isaacs, Australian Labor Party, Cabinet Secretary) Share this | Hansard source

The member for Murray mentions the fact—and everybody in all of the basin communities is aware of it—that we have had the worst drought in recorded Australian history over the last 10 years, and that dreadful drought has of course massively reduced the availability of water to irrigators throughout the basin. Indeed, it has reduced the availability of water to irrigators throughout the basin to a far greater degree than any of the proposed reductions that are mentioned in the guide to the proposed plan that is presently under consideration in communities.

Of course there is concern in the basin communities. Of course there is concern about any proposal which might see, through governmental action, a reduction in water allocations, just as in those same communities—and this was referred to by the member for Parkes, representing his communities—there has been concern about the lack of water that has been caused through the recent years of drought. I take all of these environmental concerns and indeed all of the concerns about continued viability of basin communities to be a given and, indeed, as having led to the passage of the legislation which established the process which is now being carried out.

We have a proposed plan that is being prepared by an independent authority. It is not a proposal from the government; it is a proposal from an independent authority. The way in which the authority is going about this process—a process envisaged by the legislation passed by the Liberal and National parties when in government—will provide an additional opportunity for consultation and engagement. It is actually in addition to the statutory process and is going to inform the drafting of the proposed plan.

Public community consultations for the guide will run until mid-November. There are over 12 months to run in this consultation before the minister is presented with the plan at the end of 2011. We have had an announcement from the Murray-Darling Basin Authority that it will commission work on the socioeconomic impacts of possible sustainable diversion limits, and that work is scheduled to be completed in March 2011. We have had the commissioning of the parliamentary inquiry, which is going to be chaired by the member for New England, and that of course is an inquiry that will be able to seek input from regional and small towns throughout the basin. It will have a strong focus on understanding the legitimate concerns that everybody in these communities have about proposed changes to water allocations. It is appropriate that the member for New England, whose community is in the basin, is chairing this particular parliamentary inquiry.

To go back to the process which is the one that is now in train, the authority will release its proposed basin plan next year. I repeat: the legislation that was supported by Labor in opposition and passed by the Liberal and National parties in government provides for 16 weeks of consultation following the release of the proposed basin plan next year, and the process continues. Every single one of these steps is an opportunity for everybody affected—for everybody in this place, for everybody throughout the Australian community and particularly for everybody in basin communities—to comment on and to participate in what will come to be the final plan.

The next step is for the authority to present a final plan to the ministerial council, which includes representatives from each of the basin states, and that ministerial council will then consider the proposed plan. At that point, the Minister for Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities can ask the authority to reconsider issues or make some changes. The minister then is required to sign off on the final plan. But that is not the end of the process. As the minister made clear in question time earlier this week, after signing off on the plan the minister tables it in the parliament, where of course it is a disallowable instrument—it may be disallowed by either house. In order to become the final plan for the Murray-Darling Basin, it needs to be signed off—and it will certainly be after debate—by both houses of this parliament.

It is hard to imagine a process more carefully designed—and this is why Labor supported it in opposition—to give every possible opportunity to basin communities and everybody throughout Australia who is concerned, as we must be, about the environmental sustainability of the Murray-Darling Basin and the continued economic viability of basin communities. It would be hard to imagine a process that gives more opportunity for consultation, more opportunity for participation and more opportunity to ensure an end to what the member for Murray, speaking not on the matter of public importance but just before question time on the address-in-reply when I happened to be here at the table, referred to as ‘governance failure for decades’. I take that to be an accusation she levels not only at Labor governments of the past but also at Liberal-National party governments of the past.

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