Murray-Darling Basin Plan

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK (14:25): I am not sure that answer bore a lot of resemblance to the question, but is the minister saying that there has been no action on the 23 gigalitres that I asked him about 12 months ago?

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation, Minister for Water and the River Murray, Minister for Climate Change) (14:25): Not at all, as the honourable member probably knows. These sustainable diversion limits will be agreed by the states and the commonwealth in 2015-16, or June 2016, but the problem is, as I try to tell her, that the federal government is trying to undermine that process by capping the amount of water that is put back into the system, by capping the amount of water that they will buy back.

If they bring down, to bridge the gap to 2,750, engineering solutions which are designed to bridge the gap from the 450, then the 450 will not be delivered. The 450 which has been legislated, budgeted for, sitting there in consolidated revenue, waiting to be delivered for engineering projects and on-farm efficiencies, won't be delivered because they are drawing it down to bridge the gap to 2,750. Then they will come to us and say, 'I'm sorry, there's no more that we can do to get you that 450. South Australia won't have the 3,200 gigalitres as promised returned to the river.'

There is one fail-safe in all of this, in that in agreeing SDLs next year every state must agree to the whole package, and if South Australia does not get what was promised in the Murray-Darling Basin agreement, South Australia will not be agreeing to those packages.