Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for the Murray Darling Basin) Share this | Hansard source

I will be very brief. The opposition will be opposing amendment (R19) of the Australian Greens providing primacy of access agreements. We think that this is unnecessary. We think that it comes with a number of risks, a number of which have just been outlined by the minister. We think there are effective transitional provisions already within the bill that allow for the ACCC to be able to make decisions which prevail over access agreements if need be. As a result, we do not think this is a wise path for the bill to be taking.