Mark Coulton (Parkes, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Hansard source

I think it's time for a bit of history revision in this place. I want to remind the members present that I actually voted for the Murray-Darling Basin Plan when it came through in 2012. I'll take the member for Makin up on his point that the 450 gigalitres of up-water was not part of the plan that was passed; it was a separate deal that was done by the Gillard government leading up to the 2013 election to help marginal seat holders in South Australia. I'm not here to attack South Australia, but it's important that we understand the history of what goes on. I supported the plan—I have always supported the plan—but the 450 gigs was not part of the scientific rigour of the plan. It was a political decision with a figure plucked out of the air to help marginal seat holders leading up to an election. I think it's important that we get that part of the history right.

With regard to the impact of buybacks, the member for Makin mentioned the fish deaths. The Parkes electorate is a third of the Murray-Darling Basin. I am the member in this place who represents more of the basin than anyone else. I was in Menindee five weeks ago in the middle of the flood. Now we have the fish deaths. To try and somehow obtusely link those fish deaths to buybacks or the Basin Plan is ridiculous. The reason the fish are dying out there now is because of the flood. The water has returned from the floodplain, bringing lots of organic material. An unseasonably hot couple of days has caused this organic material to deoxygenate the water, and the fish have died because over the last couple of years the river has been at such a high level that they have bred up to a very high number. This is a natural phenomenon, and no amount of political conversation could've stopped those fish from dying. I might remind people, too: when the fish died last time, in the drought, they died in the deepest waterhole in the Parkes electorate. You could ride a pushbike down the Gwydir, the Namoi, the Macquarie or the Macintyre. They were bone dry!

One thing that's been frustrating through the worst drought that we've had is this misconception that somehow the river went dry because of mismanagement. The river went dry because it stopped raining! The idea that we have a plan that's going to turn the ephemeral nature of the northern basin that I represent into Europe is ridiculous. What we've seen with the drought and with the flood is that Mother Nature is still well and truly in command, and what we're doing with the plan is tinkering around the edges.

In my electorate I have seen indiscriminate buybacks. When Senator Wong purchased water from the Twynam Pastoral Company, from Collymongle Station, the town of Collarenebri lost its major employer and 100 jobs. The cotton gin was dismantled and sold to somewhere else. The town of Warren lost a big proportion of its industry. We saw businesses close down and those towns suffer. When Senator Wong purchased Toorale Station at Bourke, the Bourke Shire lost 10 per cent of its rateable income. Those jobs that were supposed to flow from tourism or other things afterwards just did not happen. Those communities are shuddering and waiting for the next round of buybacks.

We have seen some great success in modernisation and efficiency measures. Indeed, the Macquarie Valley is a classic example, a modernisation project, lining the channels, shrinking back the irrigation system, putting some of the farmers onto stock and domestic water only. It took a big effort by that community and those farmers to do it, but it is now paying off, and they have much more reliability.

I'll finish off by saying that the farmers in my electorate are growing more food and fibre per megalitre of water than anywhere else in the world. The reason they grow cotton is that to grow it in an ephemeral system you can't have permanent plantings in the northern basin. Quite frankly, I am sick of my farmers being demonised as some sort of evil people with regard to management of this plan. (Time expired)

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