Showing posts with label rivers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rivers. Show all posts
Wednesday 27 February 2019
Thursday 21 February 2019
There isn't enough water in the Darling River system to avoid catastrophic outcomes
Australian
Academy of Science, media
release, 18 February 2019:
Scientists lay out new plan to save the Darling River
Scientists lay out new plan to save the Darling River
Scientists asked to
investigate the fish kills in the Murray-Darling River system in NSW say a
failure to act resolutely and quickly on the fundamental cause—insufficient
flows—threatens the viability of the Darling, the fish and the communities that
depend on it for their livelihoods and wellbeing.
The multidisciplinary
panel of experts, convened by the Australian Academy of Science, also found
engagement with local residents, Indigenous and non-Indigenous, has been
cursory at best, resulting in insufficient use of their knowledge about how the
system is best managed.
The scientists say their
findings point to serious deficiencies in governance and management, which
collectively have eroded the intent of the Water Act 2007 and the
framework of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan (2012).
Chair of the expert
panel, ANU Professor Craig Moritz FAA, said the sight of millions of dead fish
from the three fish kills was a wake-up call.
“To me, it was like the
coral bleaching event for the mainland,” Professor Moritz said.
“Our review of the fish
kills found there isn’t enough water in the Darling system to avoid
catastrophic outcomes. This is partly due to the ongoing drought. However,
analysis of rainfall and river flow data over decades points to excess water
extraction upstream.”
The expert panel
recommends that urgent steps can and should be taken within six months to
improve the quality of water throughout the Darling River.
“That should include the
formation of a Menindee Lakes restoration project to determine sustainable
management of the lakes system and lower Darling and Darling Anabranch,”
Professor Moritz said.
The panel also
recommends a return to the framework of the 2012 Murray Darling Basin Plan to
improve environmental outcomes.
“The best possible
scenario is water in the Darling all the way to the bottom and in most years.
We are hopeful that this could be achieved if the panel’s recommendations are
implemented,” Professor Moritz said.
Australian Academy of
Science President, Professor John Shine, said the scientific advice of the
expert panel is a synthesis of the best available knowledge.
“In undertaking this
body of work the multidisciplinary expert panel has collaborated with other
relevant experts as required and received extensive data from a number of
Federal and State agencies,” Professor Shine said.
These agencies include
the Murray-Darling Basin Authority, the Land and Water Division of the NSW
Department of Industry, the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage, the NSW
Department of Primary Industries, the Queensland Department of Natural
Resources, Mines and Energy, and the Commonwealth Environmental Water Office,
in addition to data and information provided by researchers in many related
fields. The expert panel wishes to acknowledge the cooperation of these bodies
and individuals in promptly providing data.
The expert panel also
operated closely with the Independent Panel to Assess Fish Deaths in the Lower
Darling, initiated by the Government and chaired by Professor Robert Vertessy,
including sharing data and a reciprocal review of findings.
The expert panel report
Read the report: Investigation
of the causes of mass fish kills in the Menindee Region NSW over the summer of
2018–2019
The main findings and
recommendations are in the executive summary. The report was independently
assessed by seven independent peer reviewers, including one international
reviewer.
Related media releases
Thursday 14 February 2019
How the National Party of Australia attempted to ruin Australia’s largest river system
IMAGE: Murray Darling Wetlands Working Group Ltd. |
Former Accountant and banker, Nationals MP for New England (NSW) Barnaby Thomas Gerard Joyce was deputy Prime Minister of Australia from 18.2.2016 to 27.10.2017 and again from 6.12.2017 to 26.2.2018. He was also Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources from 21.9.2015 to 27.10.2017 and returned as minister once more from 21.9.2015 to 27.10.2017.
This particular politician is likely
to go down in history as one of the worst leaders that the National Party of
Australia ever had.
The
Northern Daily Leader,
9 February 2019:
BARNABY Joyce’s actions
as water minister have been singled out and savaged in the royal
commission into the Murray Darling Basin Authority, the report
suggesting he ignored the law.
The report pointed
to an “ill-informed letter” from Mr Joyce to the South Australian
water minister, as testament to the government’s lack of “any genuine
commitment” to the goal of recovering 450 gigalitres of water for the
environment.
The Leader has
contacted Mr Joyce for an interview and is awaiting a response.
In the letter, Mr Joyce
said he couldn’t see the water being recovered without “causing negative social
and economic impacts to South Australian communities”.
“I cannot foresee [the
other state governments] agreeing that the additional 450GL of water can be delivered
without significant social and economic detriment,” he wrote.
The report said there
was “no reliable evidence” to support Mr Joyce’s claim.
This is what the
South Australian Murray-Darling Basin Royal
Commission Report’s Final
Report (released on 29 January 2019) stated in part:
For
a number of years neither the Commonwealth Government, nor New South Wales or
Victoria, have had any genuine commitment to recovering the so-called 450 GL of
upwater for enhanced environmental outcomes. The ill-informed letter from Mr
Barnaby Joyce when he was Water Minister to his South Australian counterpart
dated 17 November 2016 — written as though the actual definition of
socio-economic impact in the Basin Plan did not exist — is testament to this…..
On
commercial radio on 29 August 2018, Mr Joyce, the Commonwealth Government’s
Special Drought Envoy — not a member of the Executive Council or a Minister of the
State under either secs 62 or 64 of the Constitution respectively — suggested
that environmental water held by the Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder
(CEWH) should be used to ‘grow the fodder to keep the cattle alive’ during the
course of the drought. He suggested that if this was not lawful, then the
relevant legislation should be changed. This suggestion is not in the interests
of the people who live and work in the Basin, nor in the interests of the
broader Australian public, or that of the environment. It is contrary to the
objects and purposes of the Water Act and Basin Plan. It is against the
national interest. It has been rightly rejected by, amongst others, the MDBA
and the CEWH. Adaptation to the challenges of a warmer and drier climate will
require a vastly more sophisticated approach. That approach must be based on
proper scientific research and analysis, as well as a basic level of common
sense.
For
example, in a letter dated 17 November 2016 from the then Commonwealth Minister
for Agriculture and Water, Mr Barnaby Joyce, to the then South Australian
Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation, Mr Ian Hunter,
Minister Joyce said:
If it was
genuinely possible to put an additional 450 GL down the river without hurting
people, then none of us would have a problem with it. The reality is that it
will. South Australia’s default share of the 450 GL target is 36 GL. Does the
South Australian Government have a plan for where this water would come from
without causing negative social and economic impacts to South Australian
communities? I believe that we are heading into an unprotracted (sic) and
unsolvable stalemate, where the funding will stay on the books for a recovery
that will be impossible to make in accordance with the legislative requirements
— that the recovery must has (sic) positive or neutral social and economic
outcomes
… My main concern is this — just as you have an
understandable desire for one outcome, your colleagues in other states have an
equally understandable desire for another regardless of what side of the
political fence they are on. I cannot foresee them agreeing that the additional
450 GL of water can be delivered without significant social and economic
detriment. The hard conversation has to happen about how we resolve this
stalemate. I look forward to discussing it with you more at the Ministerial
Council.
There
is no reliable evidence before the Commission that would support the assertion
in that letter that recovery of an additional 450 GL of water would have
negative social and economic impacts, or that its consequence would be ‘hurting
people’ either economically, socially, or otherwise. Minister Joyce offered no
such evidence. Leaving that aside, Minister Joyce’s letter ignores the test of
social and economic neutrality in sec 7.17(2)(b) of the Basin Plan. That is no
trifling thing, as that section was (and still currently is) the law. The test
is satisfied by participation, not the concept of ‘hurting people’. Leaving
this also aside, the gist of the letter was such that the Commonwealth’s then
position seemed to be that the recovery of 450 GL of upwater for South
Australia’s environmental assets was unlikely….
Mr
Hooper spoke of a shift in attitude, upon the appointment of the former
Minister, Mr Barnaby Joyce, to the water portfolio, away from a holistic, whole
of Basin approach to a focus on specific sites, namely Dirranbandi, St George,
and Warren, and the economics of irrigated agriculture in those towns.
Mr
Hooper recalled asking the MDBA for a socio-economic assessment of Aboriginal
people in the Northern Basin to which the MDBA responded by offering to provide
a more limited socio-cultural survey.182 Despite meeting with the MDBA, NBAN
was unaware of the intention to reduce water recovery in the Northern Basin,
which was only revealed once the proposed amendments were publicly released.183
Mr Hooper could not recall any explanation of how the toolkit measures could
substitute for water so as to justify the 70 GL reduction in water to be
recovered…..
In
an interview with 2GB radio, the Commonwealth Government’s Special Drought
Envoy and former Water Resources Minister, Mr Barnaby Joyce, said:
a national emergency requires emergency power. We have
a large water resource owned by the government. It’s called the Commonwealth
Environmental Water holder and it’s used to water environmental assets. In a
national emergency, which is this drought, surely that water should be used to grow
the fodder to keep the cattle alive to keep the cash flow in the town. When
people say, ‘Oh well, the legislation won’t allow you to do that’. Well, change
the legislation, that’s what we have a parliament for.
National
Party once again proving that it is the party representing mining interests
Climate change denialism is alive and well in the National Party.....
The
Sydney Morning Herald,
9 February 2019:
A Nationals MP's claim
that the Land and Environment Court's decision to block a coal mine in his
electorate reflected an "ideological position" and "smacked of
judicial activism" has prompted a rival MP to accuse him of contempt of
court.
After the court on
Friday rejected Gloucester Resources' bid to open the
Rocky Hill mine on the Mid North Coast because of "climate change
impacts", Nationals MP for the Upper Hunter Michael Johnsen hopped on
2GB to vent his fury.
The show's host Chris
Kenny said: "Here you have a judge in a NSW land and environment court
saying that he's protecting the planet from global warming, from climate
change".
Mr Johnsen replied:
"They are taking an ideological position, again it smacks of judicial
activism, and it has nothing to do with the merits of the proposal itself and
I’m very, very disappointed."
Labels:
climate change,
mining,
rivers,
water wars,
water security
Monday 4 February 2019
Friday 1 February 2019
Scott Morrison and his cronies want to buy your vote ahead of the May 2019 Australian federal election
Despite there being a growing urgency to invest in the full range
of climate change mitigation measures, in the face of evidence
that it is going to take billions of dollars to step back from the developing
environmental, social and economic disaster developing in the Murray-Darling
Basin, regardless of constant cost cutting in the welfare
sector leading to a fall in services for older Australians and those
with disabilities, while all the while failing to confront a growing
public debt which now stands at est. 679.5 billion, the Morrison
Lib-Nats Coalition Government intends to try and buy votes ahead of
the May 2019 federal election.
Brisbane
Times, 28
January 2019:
The Morrison government
is now more focused on protecting its electoral chances than the nation's
finances with claims it is going on a pre-poll spending spree based on a
short-term boost in tax collections.
Deloitte Access
Economics said in a quarterly report out on Tuesday that Scott Morrison is
looking to buy back disappointed voters, with the government sitting on $9.2
billion worth of tax cuts and handouts that were included in the December
mid-year budget update but not announced.
Deloitte Access partner
Chris Richardson said the government had promised $16 billion in extra spending
and tax cuts in the past six months, the biggest short-term spend by a
government since Kevin Rudd in 2009 in the depths of the global financial
crisis.
He said with the budget
in a reasonable condition on the back of strong global growth and a surge in
company tax profits, the Morrison government had made a decision to woo back
voters with taxpayers' cash.
"Of late, the
government has been busily taking decisions that add to spending and cut taxes,
thereby worsening the bottom line rather than repairing it," he said.
"After all, they've
got the dollars to do it, they're behind in the polls and the election is just
around the corner.
"That powerful
combination of motive and opportunity means that the government's focus has
shifted to shoring up its electoral standing rather than shoring up the
nation's finances."
News.com.au, 24 January 2019;
Pensioners and some
families could receive one-off cash payments from the Morrison government in a
pre-election sweetener.
Senior advisers are
looking at two one-off payments that could be included in the April 2 budget,
the Australian Financial Review reported on Thursday.
If the government
decides to go ahead with the plan, the payments could be distributed before the
federal election, which is due by mid-May.
The first option is a
one off handout to age pensioners and the second is a cash injection for
families.
It’s believed the single
payments would be aimed at luring those who won’t directly benefit from the
Coalition’s $144 billion personal income tax cuts being phased in over the next
six years.
Wednesday 30 January 2019
Murray-Darling Basin irrigator has cotton farm asset frozen under Criminal Proceeds Confiscation Act - required to pay back $15.7 million
People living along the major rivers on the NSW Far North Coast, particularly those on the Clarence River, will remember that it was irrigators in southern Queensland as well as other areas within the Murray-Darling Basin who made repeated calls to dam and divert one of more of these coastal rivers to fill heir greedy maws with additional water.
The
Courier Mail,
25 January 2019, p.27:
Authorities have gone to
court to force an award-winning Queensland cotton farmer to pay $16 million to
the state’s Public Trustee after a “covert source” told them the accused
water fraudster had sold his farm for more than $100 million.
John Douglas Norman, 43,
a former Australian Cotton Farmer Of The Year, from Toobeah in southern
Queensland, has been charged with defrauding the Murray-Darling Basin water program
of $20 million.
The charges are before
the Brisbane Magistrates Court.
Last week the State
Government was granted an urgent court order, forcing Norman to pay $15.7
million to the state’s Public Trustee, after the police received a tip that his
company had sold its Queensland cotton and grain farms to a global corporate
giant.
Norman must pay the
$15.7 million once his deal with the $43 billion Canadian giant Manulife
Financial Corporation settles, a Supreme Court judge has ruled. The order was
made under the Criminal Proceeds Confiscation Act.
The mega-deal was due to
settle last week, court documents state. Until the $15.7 million is paid,
Norman’s share of the giant farms, west of Goondiwindi, will remain frozen by
the Supreme Court.
The remaining share of
the business is owned by his mother Aileen Joan Norman. She has not been
charged with any crimes and has not had her assets frozen.
The farms, spread over
18,000ha, are mostly irrigated and run along or close to the NSW-Queensland
border, the court heard. They are in “a core crop production region” and with
“significant water entitlements”.
The farms and a $2
million riverfront Southport mansion, owned by Norman’s wife Virginia, were
raided and searched by police during the probe, court documents state.
BACKGROUND
The Land, 30 August 2018:
Meanwhile in Queensland,
a major alleged fraud in the cotton industry was uncovered by police, with two
executives from Queensland's cotton group Norman Farming charged over an an
alleged $20 million fraud involving federal funds earmarked for Murray-Darling
water savings.
Norman Farming CEO John Norman,
43, and his chief financial officer Steve Evans, 53, were granted bail after
appearing in Brisbane Magistrates Court over the alleged fraud.
Police allege the
director of the company submitted fraudulent claims, including falsified
invoices related to six water-efficiency projects on a property near
Goondiwindi, called Healthy Headwater projects.
Police allege the fraud
occurred over seven years.
In NSW, the Natural
Resources Access Regulator (NRAR) has issued a number of charges in the north
and south-west of NSW for various alleged water offences.
The NRAR is the new
independent water regulator in NSW. It started operations on April 30, after an
outcry over alleged water deals in northern NSW exposed by the ABC's Four
Corners program….
NRAR said it was
pursuing the following cases:
● A Moree company has
been charged with water theft offences. It is alleged the company, involved in
irrigation, took water from a river while metering equipment was not working,
an offence against section 91I(2) of the Water Management Act 2000. It is
further alleged they constructed and used a channel to convey water without
approval.
● A Carinda man has been
charged with using a channel to convey water without approval, an offence
against s91B of the Water Management Act 2000.
● Two men have been
charged with water theft offences on properties in Walgett and Mallowa.
● A 35-year-old man from
Carinda in Northern NSW alleged he provided false and misleading information to
water investigators.
● Two men have been
charged after they allegedly carried out controlled activities on the Murray
River near Corowa.
ABC News, 13 February 2018:
The Murray Darling Basin
Authority (MDBA) is powerless to prevent upstream farmers harvesting overland
floodwaters desperately needed to flow through the river system for the benefit
of all users, the authority's head has admitted.
It comes as details
emerge of massive earthworks built to enable upstream farmers to carry out
"floodplain harvesting"…..
Last week, MDBA head
Phillip Glyde travelled to Mr Lamey's farm to see first hand what was
happening.
"I've learnt a
lot," Mr Glyde told 7.30.
"For people like
the Lameys, it's very hard to negotiate through and find what's the best way to
make sure the problems they're experiencing don't occur."
Although he admitted
floodplain harvesting was a serious issue, he acknowledged there was nothing
the authority could do in relation to the approval and regulation of irrigation
earthworks.
"There's
overlapping responsibilities: local, state, different departments," he
said.
"Then you've got
the Commonwealth, then you've got the Murray Darling Basin Plan."
On Wednesday, the Senate
decides whether to pass a proposed reduction in the amount of water Queensland
irrigators give back to the ailing Murray Darling River system.
"We don't want the
irrigators to be keeping even more water, we want the banks pulled down in
Queensland," Mr Lamey said.
"We want the river
to run like it should."
Labels:
local courts,
Murray-Darling Basin,
rivers,
Supreme Court,
water wars
Sunday 27 January 2019
Five-year assessment of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan released
Shorter
version of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan five-year assessment – behind schedule, badly
managed by governments and agencies, based on too many false assumptions, evidence of unintended outcomes, not delivering on environmental needs, past excessive water extraction admitted, key risks not properly managed, expensive and no longer fully fit for purpose so in need of reform.
Australian Government
Productivity Commission,
25 January 2019:
Inquiry report
This report was sent to
Government on 19 December 2018 and publicly released on 25 January 2019.
The report makes
findings on progress to date in implementing the Basin Plan and recommendations
on actions required to ensure effective achievement of Basin Plan outcomes.
Most of our recommendations involve incremental improvements to the current
arrangements. Others are to provide the strong foundations needed for the Plan
to succeed — sound governance, good planning, and effective and adaptive
management.
Download the overview
Download the report
Labels:
governance,
MDBA,
Murray-Darling Basin,
risk,
rivers,
water
Wednesday 23 January 2019
Australian Water Wars 2019: how NSW rivers were running on 22 January
The news cycle is such that even the dire straits the Murray Darling Basin finds itself in, with regard to environmental, cultural and township water flow security, is already fading into the background.
If we let it do so then it will be business as usual for the Federal, Queensland, New South Wales, Victorian and South Australian governments and, it is business as usual which is causing an ecological crisis in Basin waterways.
This is a snapshot of an interactive map supplied by NSW Water showing river flows on Tuesday 22 January 2019.
Every red marker against a river or section of river indicates that at that point the flow was less than 20 per cent of the natural flow.
You will note that even the coastal rivers of Northern NSW are running at less than 20 per cent of their natural flow.
Along the length of the Darling/Barka River many points like Brewarrina, Bourke and Wilcannia recorded zero natural flow passing on 22 January.
This was also a day when land surface temperatures were still uncomfortably high, with parts of the Murray-Darling Basin predicted to reach temperatures of 42-45+ Celsius.
Remind your local MP that they still need to stand up and be counted when it comes to legislating measures to mitigate climate change and need to be persistent in demanding their political parties bite the bullet on water management reform.
Friday 18 January 2019
As the land grows hotter and drier, the storms and fires more violent, as we watch the rampant greed of the few decimate our forests and destroy our water sources......
..... there is some comfort in knowing that there are still some Australian communities trying to come together to care for country.
North East Forest
Alliance, media release,
30 August 2018:
Githabul Tribe and
Conservation Groups Reach Historic Agreement
The Githabul Tribe,
Githabul Nation Aboriginal Corporation, Githabul Elders and representatives of
conservation groups today launched their Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for
the management of Githabul Native Title Lands in the upper Clarence and
Richmond Rivers.
On 29 November 2007 the
Federal Court of Australia made a consent determination recognising the
Githabul People’s Native Title rights and interests over 1120 sq km in 9
National Parks and 13 State Forests.
The MoU proposes:
· Transferring
care and control of 29,700ha State Forests for which Githabul Native Title
rights are recognised, from the NSW government to the Githabul Tribe.
· Preparing
a comprehensive Plan of Management to safeguard conservation and cultural
values and prioritise rehabilitation works.
· Achieving
an adequately funded comprehensive 15 year rehabilitation plan to arrest and
repair forest dieback as part of a Githabul caring for country program.
· Creating
more NPWS positions and training for Githabul Working on Country in National
Parks in the Kyogle area.
· Transferring
the care and control of Crown lands around the Tooloom Falls Aboriginal Place
to the Githabul Tribe.
· Promoting
the establishment of a Cultural and Tourism Centre at Roseberry Creek.
· Obtaining
World Heritage Listing for the National Parks in the region.
30 August 2018 |
Githabul spokesperson
Rob Williams said:
It is important to
understand and acknowledge that the health of the Githabul people in general is
directly related to the health of the surrounding country and vice versa.
This philosophy
underpins the Githabul wish to immediately arrest what is seen as a decline in
the health of the forests and waterways over many decades now.
Such is our connection
to country that we all suffer - along with the plants and animals. We still
feel we have a direct responsibility to maintain the natural balance between
all inter- related species including ourselves, as was done for millennia
before the colonial invasion.
North East Forest Alliance
spokesperson Dailan Pugh said:
The Forestry Corporation
has already abandoned 11,000 hectares of these State Forests for timber
production because of the chronic dieback they are suffering from past logging,
and the balance of the Githabul lands are in an equally parlous state.
Already the Government
is proposing that 5,600 ha of State Forests around Mount Lindesay be
transferred to the management of NPWS as a Koala reserve, but without the
massive funding needed to rehabilitate the forests.
The Githabul have a
proven track-record in rehabilitating dieback areas and we are excited by the
prospect of supporting their native title rights while helping to obtain the
funding needed to scale up their rehabilitation works to stop the ongoing
degradation and begin to restore the health of these internationally
significant forests.
National Parks
Association CEO Alix Goodwin said:
NPA is committed to
protecting NSW public native forests for their biodiversity conservation values
for future generations. Working with the Githabul to rehabilitate and restore
almost 30,000 hectares on the north coast is a great start to achieving this
vision.
The MOU also marks an
important milestone in achieving the protection of important koala habitat in
the Western Border Ranges, the connection of seven existing World Heritage
properties and a recognised biodiversity hotspot under the stewardship of the
local Aboriginal community.
We look forward to
working with the Githabul to implement this MOU, the first NPA agreement with an
Aboriginal community in over a decade.
Nature Conservation
Council CEO Kate Smolksi said:
We believe that
effective nature conservation and land justice for Indigenous Australians go
hand in hand.
We welcome today’s
announcement and hope this proves to be a successful model that can be adopted
in other areas.
The MoU is an agreement
between the Githabul Nation Aboriginal Corporation and Githabul Elders, and the
North East Forest Alliance, North Coast Environment Council, National Parks
Association, Nature Conservation Council, Nimbin Environment Centre, Lismore
Environment Centre and Casino Environment Centre.
Tuesday 15 January 2019
Ecological Disaster in Murray-Darling River Systems January 2019: Trump-lite Scott Morrison blames Labor and the drought
@michaeldaleyMP, 13 January 2019 |
In March 2012 it was the O’Farrell Liberal-Nationals Coalition Government who received the above Memorandum on the Water Sharing Plan for the Barwon-Darling Unregulated and Alluvial Water Sources which covered both the Barwon-Darling unregulated river water source and the Upper Darling Alluvial groundwater source.
This NSW water
sharing plan was clearly prefaced on creating a market for the sale of water
rights and the needs of commercial irrigators and the mining industry:
2.0 Purpose of the plan (at Page 3)
2.1
Why are water sharing plans being prepared? Expansion of water extraction
across NSW in the 20th century has placed most valleys at or close to the limit
of sustainable water extraction. This has seen increasing competition between
water users (towns, farmers, industries and irrigators) for access to water.
This has also placed pressure on the health and biological diversity of our
rivers and aquifers.
Plans
provide a legal basis for sharing water between the environment and consumptive
purposes. Under the Water Management Act 2000, the sharing of water must
protect the water source and its dependent ecosystems and must protect basic
landholder rights. Sharing or extraction of water under any other right must
not prejudice these rights. Therefore, sharing water to licensed water users is
effectively the next priority for water sharing. Among licensed water users,
priority is given to water utilities and licensed domestic and stock use, ahead
of commercial purposes such as irrigation and other industries.
Plans
also recognise the economic benefits that commercial users such as irrigation
and industry can bring to a region. Upon commencement, access licences held
under the Water Act 1912 (WA 1912) are converted to access licences under the
Water Management Act 2000 and land and water rights are separated. This
facilitates the trade of access licences and can encourage more efficient use
of water resources. It also allows new industries to develop as water can move
to its highest value use.
In
conjunction with the Water Management Act 2000, plans also set rules so that
commercial users can also continue to operate productively. In general,
commercial licences under the Water Management Act 2000 are granted in
perpetuity, providing greater commercial security of water access entitlements.
Plans also define the access rules for commercial users for ten years providing
all users with greater certainty regarding sharing arrangements.
The warning
in the Memorandum was ignored by the O’Farrell. Baird and Berejiklian Coalition Governments and, by the Murray-Darling
Basin Authority when it drained 2,000 gigalitres of water from the Menindee
lakes in 2017.
Obviously
fearing the electorate will remember: a) that when the Abbott Coalition Government
came to power it handed even more power over water resources back to the states & abolished the independent National Water Commission1 and b) then recall the rampant abuse of water resources under then Deputy PM and
Nationals MP for New England as Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources Barnaby Joyce as well as multiple allegation of water theft; Prime Minister and Liberal MP for Cook Scott Morrison sought to wrongly blame first Federal Labor and then the drought for the
ecological devastation which is occurring in the NSW section of the Murray-Darling river systems.
ABC News, 14 January 2019:
The State
Government is bracing for another mass fish kill in the Darling River this
week, with soaring temperatures forecast in western NSW.
The mercury is expected
to reach up to 46 degrees Celsius in the town of Menindee, where up to 1 million native species were killed in an
algal bloom over the New Year.
The Bureau of
Meteorology said a heatwave, caused by hot air being blown from Central
Australia, would persist until Saturday and could break temperature records
around Broken Hill.
Primary Industries
Minister Niall Blair said state and local governments would work with the
community to manage the possibility of another ecological disaster.
"Well we know that
we've got high temperatures right across the state and a lot of poor water
quality situations particularly brought on by the extended drought so
unfortunately we are expecting that we may see more fish killed," Mr Blair
said.
The warning comes
as contractors prepare to clear the 40-kilometre stretch of
the Darling River of dead fish before their rotting carcasses compound the
situation.
Federal Agriculture
Minister David Littleproud will convene a meeting of State and Federal
environmental and water stakeholders working under the Murray-Darling Basin
Plan.
Mr Littleproud proposed
using $5 million for a native fish recovery strategy and will seek agreement
for the money to come from Murray-Darling Basin funds.
"The reality is
we're in a serious drought and the only silver bullet is rain," he said.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison refuted a report released
by NSW Labor at the weekend claiming the Liberal Government ignored warnings
about low water levels.
"I'm concerned today that some might want to play
politics," he said.
"There were reports done by scientists under Labor's
contribution to that plan back in 2012, the plan has been operating in
accordance with that advice and so we need to just keep on working on the
issue."
Mr Morrison said the fish kill was because of the
drought.
"It's a devastating
ecological event, particularly for those all throughout that region the sheer
visual image of this is terribly upsetting," he said.
However, that is
disputed by many people in Menindee, who argue poor water management has
compounded the mass kill. [my yellow highlighting]
Morrison in blaming everyone but successive Federal (since September 2013) and NSW (since March 2011) Coalition governments forgets that Australian voters can read and, as late as June 2018 the Commonwealth Environmental Water Office as part of the NSW Interagency Working Group for Better Managing Environmental Water offered advice on the Barwon-Darling which both the current Australian Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Drought Preparation and Response & Liberal MP for Maranoa David Littleproud and current NSW Minister for Primary Industries, Minister for Regional Water & Nationals MLC Niall Blair appear to have ignored until it was too late.
Footnote
1. One of the last things the National Water Commission (NWC) did before then Liberal Prime Minister Tony Abbott abolished it was to inform the Abbott Coalition Government that:
"Ten years on from the
signing of the NWI, water reform in Australia is at a cross roads. Many reform
gains are now taken for granted and the multi-party support that has been a
hallmark of this historic agreement is at risk of breaking down.
Given the substantial
government investments and hard-won progress so far, and the valuable but
challenging gains yet to be realised, it is critical that there is no
backsliding from reform principles.
Strong leadership is
essential to realise the full benefits of water reform and to embed proven NWI
principles into the decision making of all Australian governments."
NWC also wrote to the prime miniser warning of the perils which lay ahead it governments didn't learn from past mistakes.
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