2019-02-22
No matter how many times the PM tells us to pray for rain, the catastrophic state of the Murray Darling is not the result of drought nor an act of God. It’s due to corporate greed and political incompetence – but it’s not too late to turn things around.
By Senator Sarah Hanson-Young
The images of millions of dead fish in the lower Darling have sent shockwaves around the country. It has been called a ’canary in the coalmine’ moment for our ailing river system.
The South Australian Royal Commission and the searing Productivity Commission Report into the Murray Darling Basin were clear on the ailing health of the river and the failings of the plan. The South Australian Royal Commissioner said negligence and gross maladministration is rife, that the plan is unlawful and the environment has been ignored.
In short, corporate and political interests have reigned while our river desperately needs a drink.
Billions of dollars have been spent but downstream the river has no water. People all throughout the basin know that water is being sucked out by greedy corporate cotton and dodgy overland water harvesting, with allegations and charges of corruption and fraud ongoing. The smaller farmers I’ve spoken with from Goondiwindi to Menindee are horrified that their neighbours are treating the environment and fellow farmers with such contempt.
We need a Federal Royal Commission into the Murray Darling Basin.
A failed plan
After decades of cross-border arguments, and state governments handing out water licences without a thought to what the river could sustain, the Murray Darling Basin Plan was established, and a national authority put in charge to manage it. And with $13 billion on the table to implement it, hopes were high that, finally, the water wars would end, and the system would get what it needed to survive. Sadly, six years on and billions of dollars in taxpayer money spent, the reality is far from what was promised.
$13 billion on a plan to save the Murray Darling Basin. A plan supposedly designed for the sake of the environment, communities and farmers alike to deal with events like our current drought. Despite these billions in taxpayer dollars, the plan is not working and now, thanks to the SA Royal Commission, we find it could be illegal. Is it any wonder that right before our eyes we are seeing an ecosystem in collapse, with unprecedented mass fish deaths from Port Macquarie to Menindee?
The state of the river is not, as miscellaneous ministers would have you believe, the result of drought, nor an act of God – no matter how many times the Prime Minister tells us to pray for rain. It is man-made; the result of cotton and corruption, and is only going to get worse with climate change – a future the basin plan doesn’t even account for.
We know there is not enough water in the rivers. We need to urgently reinstate water buybacks, as both the South Australian Royal Commission and the government’s own Productivity Commission recommend. Buybacks are proven to be the most economically efficient and environmentally effective way to restore health to the river. We need a ’no meter, no pump rule’ implemented immediately.
Asking the tough questions
So, where is the water? Why is so much less water making it downstream?
Why has Queensland skated through this crisis with seemingly no questions to answer?
How did cotton have a bumper crop last year?
Why isn’t anyone talking about overland water harvesting?
And why, when every other Australian has to account (and pay) for the water they use in their household, can big corporate irrigators pump what they like, and there’s no way to know how much they’re using? Why isn’t there a ‘no meter, no pump’ rule?
Why has a water management plan designed to deal with drought failed at the first hurdle?
These questions and many others must be answered. The corruption and pork barrelling of the National Party must be investigated. We need a Federal Royal Commission.
Systematic failures
The Murray Darling spans five states and territories, managed by a federal agency, state departments and local river managers. All this results in the buck getting passed and the facts obscured.
Scientists, ecologists, and water managers have consistently told us that not enough water has been dedicated to the environment. The SA Royal Commission has confirmed this fact and, despite not dedicating enough water to begin with, we’ve seen further reductions in the amount set aside for the environment.
In 2017, then-minister Barnaby Joyce bragged to irrigators that he’d taken water away from the environment. In NSW, Minister for Regional Water Niall Blair gave himself the right to retrospectively approve illegal floodplain works in the Barwon-Darling, even if they do not comply with the plan. Meanwhile Ernst & Young have found “unique fraud risks” in an analysis of the $3.2 billion fund set aside to purchase environmental water, meaning that money could be paid without any water ever being recovered.
A bigger problem
But it’s not just individual ministers. In 2018 the Liberal National government, with the support of Labor, passed a 70 gigalitre cut in the water recovery target for the Northern Basin – a move the SA Royal Commission urged should be reversed immediately.
In the Southern Basin, the decision to pay for ‘water efficiency measures’ instead of buying back 605 gigalitres also had bipartisan support. All this leaves less and less water for the environment.
Now we have millions of dead fish, and more expected over the coming weeks and months.
It’s clear the power and greed of corporate irrigators, and the politicians who are happy to serve their interests – coupled with a plan that leaves too much to chance, handshakes, and winks and nods – have combined to deliver less and less water to a river system already under strain. We are seeing the river system dying before our eyes for the sake of corporate greed and political power.
But it’s not impossible to save the Murray Darling. It’s not impossible to manage healthy, thriving river systems in ways that benefit the environment, communities, and businesses. It’s not impossible. But to get there we need answers – those responsible need to be held to account and we need to overhaul our broken plan. It’s time to take a look under the hood of cotton, corruption and climate change.
It’s time for a Federal Royal Commission. Without it, we can kiss the Basin and all the life it sustains goodbye.
Sarah Hanson-Young holds the Greens' portfolio for Water and Murray Darling Basin.
Hero image: Dwayne Madden via Flickr (Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic License).