By Rhys Williams
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The Murray Darling Basin Plan has hit boiling point after thousands of farmers descended on Albury’s CBD last week, highlighting poor mismanagement conducted by the Basin Authority (MDBA).
Close to 147 trucks and 1200 people took to the streets of Albury last Tuesday, as farmers and irrigators voiced their frustration over zero water allocation, and are calling for a royal commission into the Murray-Darling Basin Plan.
Among the indignant protesters was Southern Riverina Irrigation chairman, Chris Brooks, who says that the fallout of the poor management by the MDBA has led to an environmental and economic catastrophe that is severely affecting farmers in the region.
“The MDBA management is an environmental and economic disaster,” Mr Brooks told the Free Press.
“No water equals no money, no food and no security. Farmers are depressed beyond what their mental capacities can handle.”
The flow on effect of zero water allocation for Murray Irrigation results in billions of dollars in lost revenue, and cutbacks in production could continue to create a scarcity in the job market.
In November last year SunRice axed over 100 jobs at its Deniliquin and Leeton mills due to low water availability and high water prices.
“As far as productivity, $5 billion can come out of Murray irrigation at full production, but because it has no allocation you could say that the full $5 billion has been lost, “ Brooks said.
“If nothing changes, people will continue to be let go from jobs because employers can’t afford to keep them on. Hundreds of jobs were lost in Deniliquin because of this.”
Berrigan farmer Graeme Pyle, a longtime advocate for effective water measuring across the entire basin, recently attended a briefing with MDBA director operations Andrew Reynolds.
Mr Pyle said he was “absolutely staggered” at the admissions by Mr Reynolds, who revealed that total water volumes which flow down the Murray River are only measured to ‘plus or minus 20 per cent’.
“On four million megalitres of water, that could be a difference of 800,000 megalitres, and that’s a massive amount of water which is not accounted for.
“So is it any wonder we don’t have any water here in the Murray Irrigation region?” Mr Pyle said.
With instruments available to measure and transmit volumes in real time to anywhere in the world at plus or minus five per cent, Graeme said there should be no excuses for poor water measurement in the 21st century.
“You cannot manage what you do not measure, and it is clear the MDBA is not efficiently managing our precious water resources. We must highlight these inadequacies, because if we don’t the politicians and bureaucrats in ‘water world’ are none the wiser,” Mr Pyle said.
Albury mayor Kevin Mack, who is contesting the federal seat of Farrer at the upcoming election, stands in solidarity with farmers who aren’t having their voice heard and are fed up with the carelessness of the MDBA.
“This is just an ongoing issue for our local community who just want their river to be managed properly, and farmers who want allocation of water.
“It’s about pausing, reviewing and speaking to the community whether it’s meeting the bottom line, which at the moment it is not,” Mr Mack told the Free Press.
The Albury mayor, who will be running as an Independent candidate, says that the major parties continue to toe the political line when it comes to the plan, and that ultimately a royal commission must be launched.
“It was supposed to make things easier, but I think at the moment the plan is looking more political than ever.
“My ultimate aim is that we need to launch a royal commission into this whole fiasco because it’s an absolute disaster, and we need an independent to get it done,” he said.
Despite many angered protesters taking aim at Liberal MP Susan Ley at last Tuesdays rally, the member for Farrer insists that she agrees with a lot of the arguments that have been brought forward by farmers.
“Last week’s Pause-the-Plan protest in Albury was about the Murray Darling Basin Authority being too inflexible, with not enough give and take between environmental water and water for farmers, and I actually agree with that argument,” she told the Free Press.
The Liberal MP maintains that she has the concerns of her electorate at the forefront, and if everyone was in support of pausing the plan, then it would be something she would be campaigning for.
“If everyone of Farrer’s farmers and irrigators wanted to pause the Plan then I would fight for that - the reality is different.”
“Because if you either stop the plan or hold another royal commission, what happens next could actually be worse for us, and certainly will be if Labor, the Greens or Independents have control of the parliament.
The Australian Government has requested an independent assessment of the social and economic conditions in irrigated communities across the basin, which was a main objective of Ms Ley’s.
“My biggest priority was to secure an ‘independent’ review* of how our communities are being impacted by zero general security water allocations.
“The report will evaluate the current rules, water trading and outcomes affecting the basin plan, and I am confident it will lead to the common-sense changes the southern basin is crying out for,” she told The Free Press.
The assessment will be completed at the end of December, 2019.