It says the framework, which can deliver 450GL of additional environmental water under the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, has a “complete lack of information about what Canberra will do to replace, or at least offset, irrigation as a key economic driver for the region”.
SRI chief executive Sophie Baldwin said there was no way Water Minister Tanya Plibersek could deliver such a massive volume of water when it is “crystal clear system constraints make it impossible”.
“This farcical framework proves the 450GL is all about political gain and ideological fantasies and has nothing whatsoever to do with environmental outcomes and sustainable communities,” Ms Baldwin said.
“Irrigation generates wealth for the Australian economy while feeding the nation, but just as importantly, it also underpins the success of our rural communities and keeps families in the area and without it we are nothing.
“Plibersek talks about sustainable community programs as if they are the saviour for us all, while the reality is something very different.
“If you take away water, which is the key economic driver of our rural communities and replace it with nothing but a new park or football shed, it soon becomes pointless when people move away because there are no jobs and businesses close down.”
Ms Baldwin said the Riverina doesn’t want community adjustment.
“We want thriving rural communities and economic resilience which comes from a strong irrigation sector remaining in place.
“You only have to look at what happened to Wakool back in the early 2000s, when 34 per cent of the available water was purchased through buybacks.
“Total employment fell by 54 per cent and within a decade we had the closure of the Burraboi school, the local football and tennis club folded, we lost the dairy industry and enrolments at Wakool Primary School fell from 50 to under 10.”
Ms Baldwin said the lesson here is so simple it is glaringly obvious.
“Every single megalitre which leaves through buybacks impacts our community, making it financially unviable for those irrigators who want to continue because costs increase.
“They then become what Plibersek loves to call a voluntary seller, when in actual fact they are nothing but victims of a mismanaged system, disillusioned and distressed sellers.”
Ms Baldwin said it was equally interesting to note the draft also talks about value for money, and proper use and management of public resources, and yet under the recent Bridging the Gap tender there is not a single bit of information about the price paid per megalitre, total megalitres per valley or type of product purchased.
“This draft contains no detail, no substance and it does nothing but reiterate my view that Plibersek thinks the fairies are going to ride their unicorns into the supermarket and put staple food products on our supermarket shelves,” she said.
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