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House of Assembly - Fifty-First Parliament, Second Session (51-2)
2008-07-03 Daily Xml
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MURRAY-DARLING BASIN AGREEMENT

Mr HAMILTON-SMITH (Waite—Leader of the Opposition) (14:13): My question is again to the Minister for Water Security. Was the MOU signed by the Premier in March 2008 an historic agreement or a media stunt? At the time of the MOU, the Premier said it would deliver 'certainty for Adelaide's drinking water and a better outcome for the environment'. But when asked today on ABC Radio whether he would be demanding an immediate extra flow of water to the Riverland and the Lower Lakes the Premier said, 'We are dealing with different issues today. Today's about getting the intergovernmental agreement signed.'

The Hon. K.A. MAYWALD (Chaffey—Minister for the River Murray, Minister for Water Security, Minister for Regional Development, Minister for Small Business, Minister Assisting the Minister for Industry and Trade) (14:14): The memorandum of understanding was indeed an historic agreement, and it had the signatories of all of the Murray-Darling Basin states to work together to deliver an intergovernmental agreement which would, for the first time, introduce a new basin-wide plan and a new cap on both groundwater and surface water.

The Leader of the Opposition and, indeed, members on the opposition benches are totally misrepresenting the situation in relation to this intergovernmental agreement. The intergovernmental agreement is about the new governance arrangements going forward for the management of water in the Murray-Darling Basin. The drought is an issue that is being dealt with by all jurisdictions as well as and concurrent with the negotiations for the IGA.

We have a Senior Officials Group, established back in November 2006 by the former government, which is reporting to the Prime Minister and which is dealing with the contingency negotiations in relation to the current drought.

In the last 12 months, the Murray-Darling Agreement has been set aside and new water sharing arrangements have been put in place. For this year, we have returned to the Murray-Darling water sharing arrangements, and those are that the resource will be shared equally amongst the states. That is a different issue. It does not matter what the government's arrangements are, or how soon they come into effect, the fact is that, at the moment, we are managing a very small amount of water that will in no way meet the needs of all the communities or the demands on that water.

The memorandum of understanding was certainly an historic agreement. It will bring into play for the very first time a national approach to the management of the River Murray. It still does not fix the drought because, no matter how good we are at signing memoranda of understanding or bringing in new governance arrangements, it will still depend upon rainfall in the system to break the drought.

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