Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities) Share this | Hansard source

The impact on how the opposition plan to pay for this is extraordinary, because they have decided to come up with this incredibly clever idea—that must have sounded really smart around the table—that industry will come in and it will be private investment that will pay. That way they do not need to put down the dollars to fund it. Often roads are done in this way. But when roads are done in this way, what does the private investor get back at the end? It is called a toll. That is how the return ends up being paid.

How do you pay the toll on private investment on a dam? It gets paid in one very simple way. What they have decided to launch in their policy is something that will be paid for every time someone receives a water bill. What they have decided in their policy is that if it is an agricultural area it will be the irrigators who pay for it every time they get their bill. So what we now have is that people will know exactly how they pay for the dams policy for the 100 different dam proposals. Let's not forget that in the whole of Australia we have only got about 500 large dams. If you add 100 to that, people will sure know it is being done; they will know it every time they buy fresh fruit, every time they see the outcome of the increased prices for the farmers and for domestic supply, and they will know every time they get their water bill exactly where the policy lands. (Time expired)

Mr Dutton interjecting—

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