Water Allocation

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE (14:52): I note that the—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order! The Hon. Mr Brokenshire has the right to ask his question without interjection.

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE: Thank you, sir, and I note the government are getting ready and practising to be opposition, but at the moment they are still the government—

The PRESIDENT: Just asked your question.

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE: —and therefore my question is to the government. In particular, my question is to the Minister for Environment, natural resources and water. I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the question.

Leave granted.

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE: I asked questions of SA Water during evidence they gave to the Natural Resources Committee about River Murray water and whether or not the SA Water Corporation had the right to go onto the market when it came to surplus River Murray water allocations. They advised us that, under Schedule E of the Murray-Darling Basin agreement, they cannot use the 650 gigalitres over the five-year rolling average for any trading on the market. However, they then went on to say:

SA Water holds other permanent entitlements on licences with allocations that are tradable. The primary role of these entitlements is to support water security for both our non-metropolitan customers and metropolitan customers in combination with our other sources.

They then say:

In a year, when these allocations are not required for the public water supply, SA Water makes this water available for trading on the water allocations market.

My questions to the minister are:

1. Can the minister advise the house, over the last three years, how much water in megalitres or gigalitres SA Water has traded:

2. Can the minister assure the house that any water that has been traded has not been traded upstream of the South Australian border to interstate irrigators?

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation, Minister for Water and the River Murray, Minister for Climate Change) (14:55): I thank the honourable member for a very confused and nonsensical question. What is it about a water trading market the honourable member doesn't understand—what is it about a water trading market that the honourable member doesn't understand?

Water trading markets work to get the most efficient use of a resource in a system. It doesn't do to try to put artificial constraints on a water trading market if you want the market to work in an effective manner. This is the absolute incredibility of a questioner from Family First, the Hon. Robert Brokenshire, who is essentially a rural socialist. He is a rural socialist. What he wants is for the state to control the entire water market for the benefit of his constituency, and not to worry about anybody else.

The Hon. R.L. Brokenshire: I'm only interested in South Australia.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: He is only interested in his own constituency; he is not interested in the rest of the state. He is not interested in other irrigators; he is not interested in those people who depend on the River Murray for drinking water; he doesn't care about people in the River Murray-Darling Basin who depend on that water for irrigation purposes. All he cares about is his own little constituency. How remarkable is that: to have a person come in here pretending to be a conservative, but in fact all he is is an out-there rural socialist who wants to control the water market for his own purposes. It's just crazy.

He should talk to some of the Liberals who, apparently, are supposed to be free marketeers. What we do understand is that by putting up a water trading market, we have allowed our irrigators, our water licensees and those who utilise water either in terms of annual amounts or have an allocation, to more freely trade their water in an effective market-based system, which gives them the best value for that product. They can make rational choices about whether they utilise their water licence for that year, or their water allocation, to irrigate a crop, or to sell it upstream, within South Australia or into other markets interstate. That is a choice for them.

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE: Point of order: I have listened for four minutes to the wrong answer. My question is: how much water has SA Water traded over the last three years, and can the minister tell the house whether any of that water was traded upstream at the South Australian border? SA Water—nothing to do with irrigators and tradeability. I want to know what your corporation was doing, and I want an answer for a change.

The PRESIDENT: Will the Hon. Mr Brokenshire remember that it wasn't appropriate the way you were pointing then and desist from that in future. Minister.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: You've just got to shake your head at that sort of numbskull behaviour in this place, don't you? Here we have the—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Here we have the Hon. Mr Wade—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Here we have the Hon. Mr Wade shouting out across the chamber.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Minister, take your seat. 'Numbskull' is not the appropriate wording to use, I must say. He is a member of this chamber.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: I think I said 'numbskull behaviour', Mr President. I didn't call him a numbskull; that would be for someone else.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Allow the minister to finish his answer. I must say it is extremely disappointing to hear the interjections from the minister's own colleagues. Allow him to get on his feet and answer the question. Minister.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: We have the Hon. Mr Wade on the other side of the chamber having a little member for Dunstan moment when he says, 'What a joke of an opposition we've got in this state.' Well, of course, no wonder the minister next to meguffawed, with the Hon. Mr Wade confirming what we all knew: the opposition in this state is a joke, an absolute joke. Well, we've now got the Hon. Mr Brokenshire joining in on the joke. The Hon. Mr Brokenshire comes in here with the wrong question. He comes in here with a question—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: —about water markets, and when I give him an answer about water markets he pretends that is not the question he asked. Water markets work to the benefit of everyone in the water market, whether they are an incorporated body—as an irrigator trust, for example—whether they are an independent farmer, or whether they are SA Water. It makes no difference. A water market is open and transparent, as markets should be. The Hon. Mr Brokenshire comes in here thinking that we should distinguish between players in a water market. That is a numbskull sort of question, and it deserves to be treated in a numbskull sort of fashion. Unfortunately, I can’t. I have to give him information that I understand about how a market works.

The Hon. J.S.L. DAWKINS: Point of order, sir.

The PRESIDENT: Point of order.

The Hon. J.S.L. DAWKINS: You did indicate that the use of the word 'numbskull' was inappropriate, and the minister is getting around that by repeating it.

The PRESIDENT: I said it is inappropriate to call someone in this chamber a numbskull. He hasn't used it in that context, so, minister, continue.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Let me rephrase: the Hon. Mr Brokenshire comes in here with clown-like questions that really should be treated in a like manner, but I don't. I try to give him an informed response about how water markets work. It is not my fault that he doesn't have the first understanding of that.