Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

) ( ): I move:

That the Basin Plan Amendment (SDL Adjustments) Instrument 2017, made under the Water Act 2007, be disallowed [F2018L00040].

I'm standing here today to, obviously, speak in favour of the motion to disallow the Basin Plan Amendment (SDL Adjustments) Instrument 2017. Of course, we've all seen the stories—there is story after story of how water is being stolen from the environment by greedy corporate irrigators. We know this because we've seen these reports in Four Corners and in numerous articles in the Fairfax newspapers. We've seen the stories written in local newspapers. We've heard the stories from farmers on small, family owned farms. We've heard them from members in the community who live throughout the Murray-Darling Basin. They are reports of corruption, theft, undermining and downright sabotage of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan. The file of these reports shows how appallingly the Murray-Darling Basin Plan has been managed and how it is being implemented. No longer can Canberra continue to turn a blind eye to what is going on in the Murray-Darling Basin.

In 2012, when the Murray-Darling Basin Plan was enacted, it was promised that this would be the plan that ended the water wars across state borders. This would be the plan that ensured that the water that the river needs would be returned to the river, to the environment, to ensure that the Murray-Darling had a fighting chance of survival.

What I have here is a file of all of the various reports of how the Murray-Darling Basin Plan has been misused: reports of water theft, dodgy figures, lack of water meters and undermining of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan. In this file are stories of millions of litres of water that were meant for the environment and that are now going to the big corporate irrigators, embedded with their mates—and I will say it here: their mates in the National Party. There are stories of water bureaucrats being pulled before ICAC in New South Wales for allegations of offering to share secret departmental files with irrigation lobbyists. There are stories of billions in spending achieving nothing at all, of senior water experts saying this plan is not working and then losing their jobs because they dared to speak the truth.

In the background of all of these stories is the sound of a dying river. What it takes to secure the river is more water, not less. This is what the expert consensus tells us. And yet we are here today to vote on whether we remove 605 billion litres from the river every year and pay $1.3 billion for the privilege. We're paying more than a billion dollars to vote on a series of projects that have not been scrutinised because they don't have a business case to scrutinise. We don't know the details of these projects, as outlined in these amendments that this disallowance attempts to deal with.

Apparently, this place is about to vote for them anyway. We've heard of the deal between the Labor Party and the Liberal Party. There is $1.3 billion on the table for 37 projects that this Senate has no idea about—whether they are going to work and what the details of them are. This is because the Labor Party has backflipped and backslid into supporting the coalition government with a handshake in exchange for a cut. Labor has achieved nothing in its dirty deal with the Liberal Party. In exchange, the Labor Party have sold out everything.

Of course, that isn't what Labor thinks. Labor is very good at spinning for all they are worth—you do a good job over there! Labor's spin would have us think that they've secured the world and then some. Let's have a look at how much it costs to buy Labor's vote.

Labor's environment spokesperson, Tony Burke, says that Labor has won the following commitments from the government to vote against this disallowance moved by the Greens today: (1) an expression of interest to commence the recovery of 450 gigalitres of upwater environmental flows; (2) an assurance that 650 gigalitres of downwater will be delivered by linking the payments of supply measures with efficiency measures for environmental water; and (3) a 'package of measures' which Labor says represents, 'A serious response to the allegations of water theft in the northern basin,' including daily extraction limits and embargoes on irrigators pumping during environmental water releases, as well as no meter, no pump rules and a northern basin commissioner.

That all sounds very impressive until you start to take a closer look. Let's just pull apart this dirty deal just for a second. Let's take the 450 gigalitres and start with the commitment to recover that inefficiency measure. The Labor Party says it has managed to extract a commitment from the government that is literally identical—literally identical!—to what the government was already saying. So they got the government to repeat themselves. In his first week on the job, water minister, David Littleproud, told reporters he would support the basin plan's recommendations in full, including the recovery of an extra 450 gigalitres of productive water to supply environmental assets. Of course he would say that, because that is what he had already agreed to do. The Intergovernmental Agreement on Implementing Water Reform in the Murray Darling Basin says at section 4.6:

The Commonwealth has committed a further $1.58 billion to recover 450GL of environmental water with neutral or beneficial socio-economic impacts …

It said that in 2013 when Labor was in government. It said it in 2017 when the coalition was in government. Labor's then water minister in South Australia, Ian Hunter, belled the cat the same way, saying:

The 450 gigalitres is not an optional part of the basin plan. It was agreed to in 2012 and we have to deliver it.

So, I don't know what Labor thinks they have secured but a reiteration of what they have already said. Labor's backflip has achieved an agreement from the government to keep saying what it's always has been saying. Labor has achieved a commitment to recover what Labor already committed to recover and what the coalition already committed to recover. Labor says this means the 450 gigalitre recovery target is back on the table. Presumably it was on the table when it was explicitly detailed in the Water Act. Presumably it was on the table when it was explicitly detailed in the basin plan itself in three separate sections. Presumably it was on the table when the water minister himself said:

We've made a decision to support the plan and that's part of the plan.

When you go into a negotiation and your big ask is to get the other party to not change a thing, it's hard to lose that negotiation. It achieves not a single drop of water. It achieves an expression of interest. That does not guarantee a single drop of water. There's no certainty that anything will eventuate other than a cut. That is all that has been achieved here—another cut.

Let's talk about the second point of Labor's dirty deal with the government on this issue: assurance—assurance that Labor is so proud of. Labor's assurance to link the 605 gigalitres with the 450 gigalitres is literally just what the government—wait for it—had already said. In an opinion piece in January 2018, water minister David Littleproud said, 'The 450 gigalitres for the river and the 650 gigalitres for irrigators are tied together.' In February 2018 he said the same thing, telling one reporter:

All players must understand the 605GL of 'downwater' and the 450GL of 'upwater' are tied together.

You would be forgiven for thinking that Labor has been scouring the water minister's media transcripts for things to demand in their negotiations, because Labor has sold its soul and they have sold out the river. They have sold out South Australia. Their greatest hit for this negotiation is the water minister's own media lines. What is worse is that this assurance is worth literally nothing. Labor says this government can't be trusted to keep its word. They say that when it comes to schools, they say it when it comes to hospitals, they say it when it comes to Medicare, they say it when it comes to the ABC and they say it when it comes to pensions. But, when it comes to water, all of a sudden the Labor Party is satisfied to take the government's promises at face value. Give me a break.

This really begs the question, if all it takes for the Labor Party is to trust the word of the Turnbull government on water, and what the water minister says he'll do, why did they bother negotiating at all? After all, Labor's demands were to just get Minister Littleproud to reiterate what he had already said. If you can trust the Turnbull government to do what they have said they will already do, then the Labor Party, really, has achieved nothing at all. That is what this comes down to: if you are content to believe that the Turnbull government will do what they say they will do, then Labor didn't secure any new commitments. If you don't think that you can trust the Turnbull government at its word, then the Labor Party has simply secured nothing. They've secured nothing. The 'trust us, she'll be right, mate' doesn't cut it, and this government has proven that when it comes to water, when it comes to the environment and when it comes to the health of the Murray River and the Coorong in South Australia the Turnbull government's word is rubbish. It cannot be trusted.

Let's talk quickly about the third point that Labor has apparently negotiated in order to sellout South Australia, the River Murray and the Coorong, at the lower end of the system and the Murray mouth. That third element, of course, is in relation to compliance measures. Labor has crowed about how it has achieved new compliance measures. Let's have a look at them. The key plank to the basin plan reform is to put a cap on the level of extraction. If there is no compliance there is no cap. With no cap there is no reform. That's why compliance has been at the centre of the plan since its inception. It's so important that compliance measures are strong and penalties are enforced.

Let's look at what Labor actually achieved. It says it's achieved a commitment to introduce a new rule in the northern basin: no meter, no pump. The New South Wales government announced it was already doing this in December 2017. It says it has achieved a commitment to daily extraction limits. This was also already achieved and flagged by the New South Wales government in February 2018—another reiteration of the minister's press releases. It says it's achieved a commitment to have embargoes on irrigation pumping during the release of environmental water flows. This was already put in place by the New South Wales government in April this year. In fact, the only thing that is new is the northern basin commissioner and it is also the only idea that was not mentioned anywhere in the Murray-Darling Basin review into water compliance. They didn't think a commissioner was going to cut it either. So everything that Labor went in asking for is what we already had. As for the one new thing, nobody liked the idea anyway.

Let me bring us back to why we are here today and the vote that we are going to be having. Labor says it has extracted a series of commitments from the government, but, in fact, Labor has achieved nothing. In exchange, it has agreed to throw $1.5 billion at a series of projects that have no experience of scrutiny. No-one's seen the details. Either the government have them or they don't, and if they have them why are they hiding them? If they don't have them, why on earth are the government asking the Senate to sign-off on $1.5 billion with a 'trust us' attitude? The business cases for these projects that form the basis of an amendment have been not finalised. They have not been made available to the public or to the senators who today will vote on this amendment. The Murray-Darling Basin Authority are now saying that is because the business cases have not been finalised. Even the Murray-Darling Basin Authority doesn't know what the final cases will look like. What this means is that there's not a single senator in this place today voting on this disallowance who knows what they are voting for. Not one person in this room will know what they are actually voting for.

Let's reflect on that. We are voting to spend more than $1 billion with no underlying information about what we're buying. This is from the party that prides itself on economic management. This is from the Labor Party that says it values transparency and accountability. Not a single person in this room knows which projects will deliver what outcomes. Not a single person in the country knows. What we are doing is voting to spend $1.3 billion of taxpayers' money on a hope that we will get something in return for it six years from now.

But what are we giving away as we do this? We're voting for the money to start flowing when the water won't be. What we're doing in the context of allegations of rampant water theft, of corruption, of mismanagement of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, of rorts, of rip-offs, of a royal commission, of an ICAC investigation and of fraud charges being laid in Queensland is handing off $1.3 billion while cutting 605 billion litres from the river and the environment.

I am a very proud South Australian. Last week I was down at the Murray mouth and the Coorong, and those places are sick. They need a drink. The whole point of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan was that this place promised it would give the environment back its fair share so that all the communities that rely on a healthy Murray-Darling Basin would have access to it—so that all communities who rely on the Murray-Darling Basin for their livelihood would know it would be there for generations to come. There was a minimum amount of water promised to the environment. It was even less than the scientists said would be needed. It was the bare, bare minimum needed to give it any kind of fighting chance. And here today this government, lining up with the Labor Party, is going to vote to cut the environmental flows from the river again. It can't afford another cut. The Murray mouth is being dredged; the Coorong is sick; and rivers die from the mouth up. If we don't give this river system the drink it desperately needs, it's not going to be here for future generations.

I implore the senators in this chamber today: don't vote for something you haven't even seen the detail of, don't saddle the taxpayer with funding projects that have no business case, and don't sell out future generations. The truth is: there are no jobs on a dead river.