Lisa Singh (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to provide the house with Labor's position on the National Water Commission (Abolition) Bill 2014, a gratuitous bill in which I see no merit. Labor opposes it in its entirety without amendment. Mr Adam Lovell, the Executive Director of the Water Services Association of Australia, put it very well when he said:

The potential closure of the National Water Commission along with the abolition of the COAG standing council this year means that water management is, almost inconceivably, left with no focus at the national level. From an industry managing more than $120 billion worth of assets—at least in an urban sense—and $15 billion in turnover, it seems almost unbelievable that governments, both federal and state, would not see a need for national leadership.

On behalf of the Labor Party, I would like to assure Mr Lovell and his many constituent businesses that, at the federal level, there is a government in waiting at least that understands the need for national leadership and guidance of Australia's unfinished water reform process.

The government's moves to abolish the National Water Commission are nothing more—and probably less—than the latest absurd example of the Abbott government's bogus budget savings mantra. The government's rationale for abolishing the National Water Commission is that there has been considerable progress in national water reform and that there is an expected saving of $20.9 billion over the forward estimates. Despite this government's flexibility with the English language, even it could not argue that 'considerable progress' means all necessary water reforms in Australia have been achieved or even partially completed. Even Senator Birmingham—who, I am pleased to say, is taking this bill through for once; he has been given the role in his portfolio to do so—has made it clear that the National Water Commission is integral to getting water reform right in this country and that it must see through the unfinished National Water Initiative, see through the unfinished Murray-Darling Basin reform and hold governments to account to get sustainable management of Australia's water resources in a way that is market driven and that ensures that finite water is used for the best possible purpose at the best possible value and causes—be they in rural communities or urban infrastructure.

For all the successes of the National Water Commission, there remains much more to be achieved. Rural and regional towns and cities are, particularly in New South Wales, lacking water security and are likely to face severe water shortages before the end of the coming summer. Improvements in water efficiency and water conservation as well as new water resources will be required and without the National Water Commission there is now no clear avenue through which to drive and harness the benefit from national coordination in water reform. Water reform in the Murray-Darling Basin under the Basin Plan is only just beginning to take shape, with the full effect of the plan not expected until 2019 and a number of key milestones to be met by the states and the Commonwealth in the meantime—milestones which the Productivity Commission is not equipped to measure.

Under this legislation the Productivity Commission will take over responsibility for assessing progress on the National Water Initiative implementation, for weakened audits on the implementation of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan as required by the Water Act, for audits of the implementation of the Basin Plan and associated water resource plans, for monitoring water markets and payments to basin states and for the biennial National Water Planning Report Card. These are the most important responsibilities, which even the few stakeholders open to the abolition of the National Water Commission listed as critical. The National Farmers' Federation representative at the Senate inquiry said that holding the states and the Commonwealth to account for actually delivering on water reforms was critical indeed, and that the assessment and audit function—making sure that the states and territories do not mark their own homework—was No. 1 for them. I warn the National Farmers' Federation that it will be disappointed—

Bill Heffernan (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Acting Deputy President, I rise on a point of order. Obviously the senator is doing a great job—

Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What is your point of order, Senator Heffernan?

Bill Heffernan (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My point of order is that she does not know what she is talking about. The greatest fraud on the public purse in recent times was the Nimmie-Caira buyback, which was $185 million of federal fraud.

Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Heffernan, thank you. Yours is a debating point.

Bill Heffernan (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Oh, is it?

Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You can get onto the speakers list at any time, and we will enjoy listening to your contribution.

Bill Heffernan (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Singh, you are reading out a speech that someone wrote for you.

Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Senator Heffernan. Resume your seat—

Senator Heffernan interjecting—

Senator Heffernan, would you resume your seat, thank you. Get onto the speakers list.

Lisa Singh (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Acting Deputy President. You would think that Senator Heffernan has been in this place long enough to know what a genuine point of order is.

Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Please continue, Senator Singh.

Lisa Singh (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Nevertheless, it is 9.44 at night, and perhaps Senator Heffernan has lost sense of what he is in here for.

Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Do not be distracted, Senator Singh.

Lisa Singh (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I warn the National Farmers' Federation that it will be disappointed by the government because allowing the states and territories to mark their own homework is exactly what this government plans to do. This government will weaken the National Water Commission's formal assessment tasks into a far less rigorous procedure of voluntary self-reporting by the Commonwealth, states and territories—a procedure merely coordinated by the Productivity Commission. This far less rigorous process will ensure states and territories mark their own homework. The No. 1 fear of the National Farmers Federation will come true. Partly this is because the Productivity Commission simply is not an auditing agency. There are other bodies better equipped to undertake this kind of function like, for example, the National Water Commission itself.

Most submissions to the Senate inquiry dismissed the government's claim that dispersing responsibility for the administration of the National Water Commission's responsibilities between the Productivity Commission, the Department of the Environment and the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences would deliver anything like the effective and constructive contribution of the NWC to water reform priorities in Australia. And to quote the Australian Conservation Foundation:

To abolish the National Water Commission … and give responsibility of water management to the Productivity Commission would be a short-sighted and backward step, particularly in the absence of substantial changes to the mandate and operation of the Productivity Commission. It would likely result in another wave of conflicts over water due to the absence of what all sides regard as a well-respected expert independent body.

So the Productivity Commission is not currently equipped under its enabling legislation nor its staffing profile to deliver the kind of collaboration and stakeholder engagement needed on this unimaginably important social, environmental and industrial issue.

Ironically, in its 2012-13 annual report the Productivity Commission described the 'diminution of specialist public sector research bureaux' as a contributing factor to Australia's failures in the area of evidence-based policy development, which it describes as 'an essential element of all good policy'. But the government has given no indication that it will address the weaknesses in the Productivity Commission's legislation to better equip it to carry out its new responsibilities. By now, the government has admitted many times there is no budget crisis, there is no budget emergency. It should reconsider the necessity—

Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Education and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Sorry? I'm not admitting that!

Lisa Singh (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Well that is what Joe Hockey has made very clear, that there is no budget emergency.

Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Education and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You are verballing him somewhat, Senator.

Lisa Singh (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Birmingham, you may not be admitting that but your Treasurer is admitting that.

Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Communication will go through the chair, and Mr Hockey will be referred to as Mr Hockey. Senator Birmingham, please allow Senator Singh to continue.

Lisa Singh (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Acting Deputy President. The government should reconsider the necessity of its paltry and mean saving because there is no rationale behind it. The government will save slightly more than nothing—to be specific, 0.0001 per cent of government expenditure over the forward estimates—by abolishing the National Water Commission, but it will lose every dollar of the extraordinary value of the corporate knowledge, subject expertise and universally acknowledged independence of the National Water Commission. For a saving of one-thousandth of a per cent, the government endangers the more than $13 billion that has been invested in water reform, particularly in the Murray-Darling, that is delivering value for money. This is not a rationale. Just because the abolition of the National Water Commission is one of the few recommendations from the discredited Commission of Audit this government is pursuing to make this futile exercise appear worthwhile, that is no rational reason to cast aside the jobs, the people and the potential for ongoing water reform guaranteed by the existence of the NWC.

But I fear that, once again, rationality has played no part in a policy decision of this government. Instead it seems that, once again, ideology is what is trumping all. The abolition of the National Water Commission is perhaps the most illogical example of the government's pogrom against those Australian agencies and programs that have until recently been successfully tackling the impacts of climate change. This government has now attacked or destroyed: the renewable energy target, the Climate Change Authority, the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, the Australian Renewable Energy Agency, the Climate Commission, the Biodiversity Fund, the carbon price, the energy efficiency opportunities legislation and now the National Water Commission. All of these agencies and programs are, or were, successful at tackling climate change. None of them have been more successful over such a long period of time as the National Water Commission. Indeed, its proud record of achievement has been charted in Hansard numerous times by Senator Birmingham himself. One only has to go to Hansard to find Senator Birmingham on the record, proudly highlighting the achievements of the National Water Commission.

The vast majority of the 32 public submissions to the Senate inquiry into this bill supported maintaining the National Water Commission and its funding. That is something for the government to listen to—the vast majority of public submissions that were provided to its own Senate inquiry. The proposed termination of the NWC will see advice from the agencies diverted through the minister's political advisers, as the government desires. This outcome will disappoint many of those submitters to that Senate inquiry who emphasised the importance of the NWC's perceived and actual independence. The submission of Environment Centre NT noted:

Independent Federal oversight of the [National Water Initiative] is required to ensure water resources are far less likely to become depleted, that resource allocation decisions are made under a fair, transparent and informed process …

Importantly, research conducted and funded by the NWC has also been critical to building well-informed decision-making processes around water resource allocation and management.

Professor Richard Kingsford, director of the Centre for Ecosystem Science at University of New South Wales, said in his testimony to the inquiry:

I think that one of the great strengths of the National Water Commission has been that it has been at arm's length from government. Not only that: it has had expertise in the fact that the water commission is at the top, representing the different water sectors. That was very important in criticising, often, the way water was managed in the states and by the Commonwealth. My biggest concern, which I have articulated in my submission, is the opportunity for shifting responsibility across different parts of government if we do not have this function at arm's length of government, as it was for the National Water Commission.

I think that is my biggest concern about the abolition of the National Water Commission. It was a trusted entity by all parties: even though sometimes the states did not like what came out of it, everybody respected it as a sort of independent umpire.

That submission speaks for itself and it replicates so many submissions that were made to that Senate inquiry that this government now chooses to ignore through its abolition bill—something Senator Birmingham knows very well through his past involvement in this portfolio area, something I hope that he chooses to not ignore when he makes his contribution on this bill.

Australia's society, climate and reliance on water demands devoted, collaborative, whole-of-government and leading-edge management of Australia's most valuable economic, societal and environmental resource. Without an independent agency not only is there a risk of inefficient management and thus the prospect of increased bills; a significant and entirely unnecessary threat of jurisdictional and stakeholder backsliding on water reform and the multiparty support that has been a hallmark of the Nation Water Initiative is in jeopardy of breaking down. This risk has already become manifest, according to the submissions provided by the Water Association, the Water Services Association of Australia, Konfluence and Watervale Systems. They said:

Unfortunately we are already seeing backsliding from States in relation to implementing the National Water Initiative:

•   increasing politicised pricing determinations with rates of return that will not encourage private sector investment,

•   in many growing regional centres the transition to upper bound pricing is slow to non-existent, and

•   poor governance arrangements, for example some governments have not moved towards upper-bound pricing for utilities which is a clause stipulated in NWI.

There is no doubt that a national, coordinated approach to water reform is needed to deliver on the National Water Initiative to: give frank and fearless advice to governments of all persuasions across jurisdictions; engage Australians and promote the need for and benefits of ongoing water reform; ensure plans are made to secure Australia's economic future; improve vital economic regulation across the water sector; facilitate increased private sector investment; improve the robustness of urban water planning; and ensure the water sector maintains and improves its performance over the long term.

The rationale presented to justify the abolition of the National Water Commission lacks rigour. The National Water Commission has been very effective in promoting and progressing water reform, and preparing Australia for the impacts of climate change. It still has much critical work left to do, if only this government would allow it to do that critical work. Unfortunately, if this governments gets its ideological, denying way, it will succeed in abolishing a successful, respected and valuable government agency. I feel that the words of Professor Richard Kingsford offer the most accurate and the most appropriate testament to the work of the National Water Commission and its staff. Professor Richard Kingsford said:

I think the NWC has done a phenomenal task over the most extraordinary landscape of controversy in the period that it has existed ... I think what we have actually seen driven and very well formulated by the work of the National Water Commission is nothing short of probably Australia's most fundamental reform process in the last 100 years.

In the last 100 years, Mr Deputy President, and this is what this governments wants to abolish all for the saving of one-thousandth of a per cent for its budget bottom line. This is nothing short of an ideological position by this government. It fits very well with its ideological position in regard to climate change, in regard to pricing carbon, and in regard to renewable energy, and is another backward step that this country is taking in regard to water reform. It does nothing to advance Australia's interest in the water reform space or the climate change space, and that is why those of us of the opposition in the Labor Party will not be supporting this very disingenuous and short-sighted piece of legislation.

Debate adjourned.