Media Release
850 billion litres of water purchased through Federal Government buybacks has not been used according to an Australian Audit Office report, Commonwealth Environmental Watering Activities, released today.
This is despite the Federal Government not expecting to acquire even half the Murray Darling Basin water it has deemed necessary for environmental watering purposes.
The Australian Government has bought an asset with borrowed money that the government does not know what to do with. This is a business plan very similar to that of the NBN. We are borrowing money from overseas to put people out of business, to make it harder to repay the money that Labor has borrowed.
850 billion litres is more water than what is in Sydney Harbour and was bought at taxpayer expense for billions of dollars. This unused water has simply served to deplete the economic base of rural communities, cut jobs and food production.
It begs the question of whether the Federal Government will attempt to find ways to utilise this water. Will consideration be given to ensure this water is used for the most environmental and economic benefit and not exacerbate flood events?
Regardless, for the Murray Darling communities deprived of billions of dollars worth of productive capacity, this water is just another example of Labor Government waste.
Barnaby Joyce
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
In 2009, The GreenLaboUr government bought Cubbie Station, “the world’s largest cotton farm” to “stop it sucking tens of millions of litres out of the Murray-Darling Basin.”
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/water-issues/cubbie-may-face-water-grant-buyout-20090817-enop.html
In January 2013, the sale of our nation’s largest farm to Chinese interests settles.
http://www.canberratimes.com.au/opinion/farm-sale-betrays-poor-judgment-of-lie-of-land-20130124-2d9yc.html
These people are crazy and in charge.
You have to agree with Joyce, but hopefully we only have another few months of these clueless fools wrecking our country.
But this over purchase of water is just sheer lunacy and fits in with all the other borrowings for dud causes promoted by this Labor/ Green coalition.
But what a mess the Coalition govt will inherit from these hopeless pack of wasters. Bolt has a post this morning that states that the 2015 -16 budget could easily become a deficit of 15 to 16 billion $ and not a surplus of 5- 6 billion $ as claimed by Swan.
What a pity we can’t have an election tomorrow and start the road to recovery 4 months earlier.
Good grief!
That’s 850GL or 850,000ML that they have got parked in storages and they don’t know how to use!
For some perspective. . . that’s similar to the ENTIRE MIA allocation and LARGER than the CIA allocation (Coleambally) or the NSW Murray allocation.
That’s almost enough water to fill Blowering.
No doubt irrigators will be told at the start of next watering season that they can’t be given much of an allocation because the storages are too full of ‘other water’ that isn’t being used.
I agree with handjive. . . THIS IS CRAZY!
No benefit. . . just cost, waste and OBSTRUCTION!
By the end of next summer you could literally claim “those billions simply evaporated into thin air”
No doubt the ALP-Green aliance will be proud of that achievement !
By the end of next summer you could literally claim “those billions simply evaporated into thin air”
No doubt the ALP-Green aliance will be proud of that achievement !
Neville,
I know I keep harping on about this but, Neville, better be prepared to be disappointed before than be shocked after the election!
I perused the coalition policies and tried to find out what is different in the lib’s approach to this problem and I tell yo,u they are probably even worse, if possible.
Johnathan, according to Sportsbet.com.au the Coalition are at $1.05 to Labor $8.00.
That’s tighter odds for the coalition than Black Caviar had on her last race. 🙂
“We are borrowing money from overseas to put people out of business, to make it harder to repay the money that Labor has borrowed.”
“This unused water has simply served to deplete the economic base of rural communities, cut jobs and food production.”
Too true and well said Barnaby.
This waste of resources hi-lights the difference between old time and modern Labor.
Ben Chiffley thought it was a good idea to capture some of the water that otherwise washed wastefully out to sea and use it to make the inland productive and prosperous.
Tony The Burke thinks it’s a good idea to take the water that makes the inland productive and prosperous and flush it wastefully out to sea !
How many people could be fed, clothed and sheltered with the renewable resources Labor has locked away from sustainable production ?
These anti productive and misanthropic attitudes should be too extreme for the Labor Party.
Barnaby should run with this all the way to the election and rightly so, this government is a disgrace.
Its powerful stuff, full of irony and he would be wise to exploit it. Windsor is still leading in the polls, probably because of the pork barrelling going on, but with wit and wisdom he could pip the incumbent at the post.
Well said Dave,
Not only does it highlight the differences in policy it also highlights how back to front the management of water resources has become.
We have our water management authorities trying to force our storage and regulatory systems to do something they were simply not designed to do….it truly is crazy!
I sincerely hope that Barnaby is not just making political mileage out of this and that the coalition will actually formulate sensible policy re water management/ river management and work closely with the States.
At the moment it is wasteful, expensive and highly obstructive.
I would also add that while we continue to ignore the management of the top and bottom of the southern section of the MDB (ie the Lower Lakes and SHL and Eucumbene)….because it is apparently so politically sensitive…. it probably won’t get any better…. regardless of the political party in power.
At the moment people like Barnaby and Cobb and Truss etc are saying what we want to hear….but words come cheap….we need sensible, iron clad policy!
here is some of the more recent information……
The Commonwealth Environmental Water Office has developed a fact sheet explaining how it’s watering, trade and monitoring activities will meet the obligations of the Basin Plan.
To view and download the factsheet see: http://www.environment.gov.au/ewater/publications/cew-and-mdb-plan-factsheet.html
Revised Framework for Determining Commonwealth Environmental Water Use
The Framework for Determining Commonwealth Environmental Water Use sets out an approach to decision-making on the use of Commonwealth environmental water. The Framework has been revised to reflect the requirements of Basin Plan.
To view and download the revised Framework see: http://www.environment.gov.au/ewater/publications/cewh-framework.html
Useless froth from Joyce. The 850 gigs is only a very small percentage of the total currently in M-DB storages,currently holding over 25,000 gigs.
So, are you saying it’s a good idea to borrow money to cut our productive capacity Poly?
Please explain.
For the first time in decades, the choice we make here in the New England electorate could determine the future of our country. I have been working hard to make sure that our local area has a strong voice in a new Liberal & Nationals government. I have travelled our region extensively and I keep hearing the same things – people want a strong, stable government who can keep our debt under control, repeal the carbon tax and take action to fix the live cattle debacle. They want a strong player in the Coalition to represent them. They are sick of the waste and the spin that has been the legacy of this Labor government. And they want a government that is serious about delivering a better deal for the regions, by protecting jobs and communities.
I am afraid that Neville has set the scene here with his very first submission – in the fervour of attempting to bag the federal government he gets his fundamental fact blatantly wrong – and no-one has apparently seen fit to correct him.
The Federal Government did NOT buy Cubbie Station and so could not possible have then sold it on to the Chinese. Big bad Cubbie Station was put up by the environmentalist lobby as representing all that was wrong with Murray/Darling Basin extraction – blaming the effects of extreme drought upon upstream extraction when in fact there was stuff all water anywhere to be extracted – and Cubbie Station went to the wall through lack of water – and was subsequently sold (rightly or wrongly) to the Chinese – but not by the Government.
As for Senator Joyce’s criticism that water saved had not been used – he is exhibiting a fundamental lack of understanding of the Basin Plan and the Basin itself. The water bought back and/or saved for the environment (up to 2,750GL per year) is a long term average and in this highly variable system there will be extreme highs and extreme lows – just as irrigation allocations vary according to what is available – and it is the major upstream storages that hold water from year to year to enable the highs and lows to be, to some extent, smoothed out.
Sorry to spoil a good ‘government bashing’ party but these are the facts of the matter – the water not used this year is there in the storages for use next year or the year after. Just as water in the storages is there for irrigation use next year and the year after. Not that hard really but if our main agenda is to slag the federal Government (as Senator Joyce understandably wants to do) it might be remembered that the current basin Plan was supported by both the major parties – so we can take our pick whether to blame Howard’s Water Act of 2007 or Burke’s tabling of the Murray Darling Basin Commission’s final version into law – at the end of the day, it is the environmental lobby that needs to be looked at with their ongoing blatant misrepresentation of fact.
If we get into the blatant falsehood game too, we will damage our cause. Let’s stick to the facts.
Cheers