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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2012-11-27 Daily Xml
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MURRAY-DARLING BASIN

Adjourned debate on motion of Hon. J.W. Weatherill:

That this house—

(a) acknowledges the commonwealth government commitment to return 3,200 gigalitres of water to the Murray-Darling Basin;

(b) welcomes the commonwealth government's decision to invest $265 million in water recovery and industry regeneration projects in South Australian river communities to ensure our irrigators do not bear the burden of adjustment in returning the Murray to health;

(c) notes that with 3,200 gigalitres returned to the Murray-Darling Basin, the following outcomes can be achieved—

i. an average of two million tonnes of salt exported through the Murray Mouth each year;

ii. salinity kept below dangerous thresholds for the survival of native plants and animals in the Lower Lakes and Coorong;

iii. a reduced risk of the Murray Mouth needing to be dredged to remain open;

iv. water levels in the Lower Lakes kept at a level to avoid acidification and riverbank collapse below Lock 1;

v. an improved ability for flood plains to support healthy red gum forests, waterbird and fish breeding and greater areas of habitat for native plants and animals;

(d) calls on all South Australian federal members of parliament to support a Murray-Darling Basin plan that—

i. returns 3,200 billion litres to the Murray-Darling Basin;

ii. provides for the healthy river outcomes set out above;

iii. ensures that the burden of adjustment does not fall upon our irrigators.

(e) that the time for the debate be limited to 20 minutes each for the mover and the Leader of the Opposition or one more member deputed by her and 10 minutes for any other member and the mover in reply.

(Continued from 13 November 2012.)

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (12:04): I rise today to make a contribution in regard to the debate on the Murray-Darling Basin. I want to go through the dot points in regard to this motion one by one. When the Premier moved this motion, he noted in (a) that this house acknowledges the commonwealth government commitment to return 3,200 gigalitres of water to the Murray-Darling Basin.

While returning 3,200 gigalitres to the basin may sound like a noble ideal, you have to wonder where that number came from in the first instance, especially when we had Premier Jay Weatherill come into this house saying that he was going to fight for 4,000 gigalitres and nothing less. That was the number that was proposed by the Premier to bring the river system back to health, with great chest-beating and excitement and carry on about high court challenges. Now we see the Premier quite happy to say that 3,200 gigalitres will be fine, if we can get to that.

The issue is that the 3,200 gigalitres, if it can be achieved, would not be achieved until 2024. I have lived not far from the river all my life, within 40 kilometres of the river, and I have had a lot to do with the river. As a member of parliament, I have the electorate at the bottom of the River Murray, and I have certainly seen a lot of the problems over the years. As the member for Hammond and shadow for the River Murray for several years during the drought period, I know that at my end of the river we are right at the pointy end of the argument.

The issue with the 3,200 gigalitres is about whether you can deliver that water, whether you can deliver it sustainably and whether or not you kill communities along the way. That is something we have to realise in this state: there can be vast improvements made in the northern waters above our state to get water back into the Murray. I know full well that we need more water at the bottom end of the river to improve our environmental outcome, but we also need to have social outcomes and we also need to have economic outcomes.

I have toured the northern and southern basins. I have been up there with the members for Chaffey and MacKillop; we have had some interesting trips. I learned a lot of interesting things. We have had a good look. I have also been up there on my own. I have been in Bourke and I managed to find someone to fly me over Cubbie Station to St George in a Cessna and bring me back. It was a very interesting flight back then. They were growing wheat on Cubbie, trying to make some money. The issue we have here with getting 3,200 gigalitres into the system is that, first, it is not going to happen for a long time—12 years, in fact.

Mr Whetstone: It's not in the plan either. The 2,750 is not in the plan.

Mr PEDERICK: Yes, for 12 years—and I note that the member for Chaffey reminds me that it is not actually in the plan. It is the 2,750 gigalitres. The simple fact is that there will be constraints to get that water down through the system. There will be bridges that have to be upgraded, there will have to be work on the banks of the river in places, there will have to be flood mitigation—a whole range of works to be able to deliver that amount of water.

What we have said—and I think we have been very realistic on this side of the house—is that the 2,750 gigalitres is a very good starting point for revival of the river. As I said, we fully understand that on this side of the house and those of us who live in this state and people like me with the seat on the bottom end of the river know darn well we need to get recovery. However, the problem we have is that the federal body, the Murray-Darling Basin Authority, has been taking the easy way out in getting water savings back into the basin. They have been doing water buybacks which are not that strategic, and I know that they are part of the scheme, but they are quick and dirty. They are the quick and dirty way to get water back into the system, and there is so much work that could be done with infrastructure upgrades.

South Australia has done excellent work over the last 40 years regarding its pressure-pipe irrigation system; it is the leader in technology managing water in the river. However, what we are seeing in the other states are communities looking like they could be decimated by this plan because, as I said, some ways of getting water back have not been too strategic. There has just been a scattergun approach. I think there are much better ways of getting some of this water back into the river system. I note that paragraph (b) of the motion moved by the Premier states:

(b) welcomes the commonwealth government's decision to invest $265 million in water recovery and industry regeneration projects in South Australian river communities to ensure our irrigators do not bear the burden of adjustment in returning the Murray to health;

I think that is another noble ideal, but why could South Australia not have some of these commonwealth funds that were announced by John Howard's team back in January 2007 to get the river back to health: $5.8 billion of infrastructure money as part of the $10 billion plan to restore health to the Murray? A lot of this money could have been allocated to South Australian irrigators, but the issue was, and still is, that we were too efficient. The authority could not work out how to make those funds applicable to South Australia.

I have had tours throughout the basin and I have seen the Eastern States. They look at an upgrade of the irrigation system as putting in electronically controlled gates on the channels. That is all fantastic, but we need to do a lot better. I note the works that have been done in the Victorian Wimmera, great works, where they have piped the hundreds of kilometres of water that was in small channels going around the landscape, making massive water savings. In touring some of these places in the basin, I noted that, to deliver three gigalitres to the end of the line, to the station owners who just basically need trough water for stock, you had to send seven gigalitres down these channels because of evaporation and losses. There are a lot of ways, especially with pipe infrastructure, to put water back into the system for our benefit.

I have mentioned several times in this chamber the story about the Rorato family up near Deniliquin. Glen Rorato and his family own 240 hectares—or 600 acres in the old language—of broadacre tomatoes. It is a huge operation; I have never seen anything like it. Previously, it was all irrigated with flood irrigation in small channels between the rows and, during the drought, the Roratos saw that they had zero allocation of low security water. They spent something like $700,000 to put in drip line on their 240 hectares. It was a massive expense for these private operators to make their farm more efficient; however, the beauty of what they did—and it was visionary work—is that it doubled the efficiency for the next season, when they got 9 per cent low security water to their property. They said that it actually doubled what they could do in their production. It made 9 per cent equivalent to 18 per cent.

So those infrastructure upgrades show what can be done to prevent communities being decimated, and that is what has to happen. The money has been there, and now we see money going in on-farm. I know that a lot of this is going to have to be spent in the Eastern States, and there is a lot of debate about that, but we need to make these water savings. We need to do it properly and we need to get all the communities on line.

I have spoken to interstate ministers and previously when they were shadow ministers about what they thought of this plan, because every MP along the river, no matter what colour, has to defend their patch for their constituency. I know that Victoria has argued that we need only 2,100 gigalitres, and New South Wales is not too happy about the legislation that has just been introduced into the federal parliament either, but we have to have an outcome, and we have to have an outcome for the sake of the whole basin, not just our end of the river.

I for one know full well the full effects of what happened in the last drought, when we saw massive problems right along the river. We saw issues with low allocation affecting our irrigators, when, during one season, our irrigators on high-security water were allowed only 18 per cent, yet we could look upstream and the Murrumbidgee irrigators were on 95 per cent irrigation. Where is the equity in that? If it is high-security water, I believe, right across the basin, there should be an equivalent allocation. I acknowledge low-security water is another story, but supposedly we are all high-security water down this end of the basin.

With respect to irrigators, we had a problem below Lock 1 with just access to water. I have seen pump sheds that fell into the river at Mypolonga. I have seen great holes in the bank; in fact, I was taking some photos one day by the bank at Murray Bridge and as Trevor, my assistant at the time, took the photo, he caught a piece of the bank slipping in the background behind me. We lost three cars into the river, and I think there are still two in the river there at Murray Bridge that probably will never be recovered, even though they searched for them.

So, there have been massive effects from this low water level. We have seen Lake Alexandrina, which is still essentially out of commission as a water source, go out of commission because of the low water levels. We have seen the bunds go in because the government could not negotiate enough emergency water just to cover the base of Lake Albert and Lake Alexandrina. We have seen the debate about the Wellington weir, which I have always opposed; I do not believe that it is any solution to the problems right throughout the basin. Why should the people below Wellington have to give up their part of the river?

When the water level was getting low—and that was part of the debate about the Wellington weir proposal—there was debate about the main access pumps for water, especially for Adelaide. The minister at the time, minister Maywald, said, 'Well, they can't be lowered.' I thought, 'Engineering will fix that; just lower the pumps.' Funnily enough, the pumps were lowered and access was made.

In fact, it got that bad along the system—and I lived with a just-in-time supply at Coomandook from the Keith pipeline and the Keith pipeline off-take—that there was talk of a desalination plant at Tailem Bend, which would have cost at least, from memory, $75 million, but they did not know where the salt was going to go. They looked at me one day in a meeting and said, 'What are we going to do with the salt?' and I said, 'It's your problem.' There have been some massive issues right throughout.

I want to note some of the ideals contained in the motion, and this goes to part (c) of the motion by the Premier. It states:

(c) notes that with 3,200 gigalitres returned to the Murray-Darling Basin, the following outcomes can be achieved—

i. an average of two million tonnes of salt exported through the Murray Mouth each year;

ii. salinity kept below dangerous thresholds for the survival of native plants and animals in the Lower Lakes and Coorong;

iii. a reduced risk of the Murray Mouth needing to be dredged to remain open;

iv. water levels in the Lower Lakes kept at a level to avoid acidification and riverbank collapse below Lock 1;

v. an improved ability for flood plains to support healthy red gum forests, waterbird and fish breeding and greater areas of habitat for native plants and animals;

I agree that all of these outcomes need to be achieved, but I think that we can achieve most of this with 2,750 gigalitres, because that is what can be delivered. We still have to get all of the states to agree to get these efficiencies into the system. Yes, I agree that there is an average of two million tonnes of salt, so we do need to have a flow to get that out throughout the Murray Mouth and out down to the lakes. The salinity does have to be kept below dangerous thresholds, not just for the survival of native plants and animals but also for all of our primary producers in the area who have been struggling for years now, since 2006, in regard to access to potable water to keep their businesses alive, whether they are a lucerne-growing business, a dairy, or they are running some other irrigation in horticulture, orange orchards or wine grapes. We need to keep the salinity down for that to work successfully.

We need to have less dredging down the bottom, but we need to make things work. I talked about the bunds that went in, for many millions of dollars. We were told that the money was there to take them out but, when it came to take them out, the money was not there. So, where did the money go? We were going to have 4,000 gigalitres to save the river but now 3,200 gigalitres is fine. It is a bit all over the shop. We have had the Narrung bund—

Mr Whetstone interjecting:

Mr PEDERICK: Well, that's what the Premier is indicating. The issue is about these bunds that went in. We see most of the Clayton bund has come out but there is still residue there. The Narrung bund has come out and over the years, since that has been in and now it has come out, there has been silt build-up. I know they had a dredge there the other day essentially to do, in the life of the river, five minutes' work in smoothing out some of the residue. They should have stayed there and done a lot more work to get it right.

Some work needs to be done at the Narrung intersection, I will call it, between the lakes (the Narrung Narrows) to make sure we get a flow into Lake Albert and back out to Lake Alexandrina so we can make Lake Albert useable for our irrigators and farmers in that region. It may need—and I think it does need—the causeway pulled out and the length of the ferry extended and all the silt that is there scooped out in the meantime. Certainly, Currency Creek I do not think has been pulled out yet—that is under water. What is out of sight is out of mind. I know initial work has been done in looking at how to pull that bund out but it needs to be got on with.

I look at the next dot point, dot point 4, which states, 'water levels in the Lower Lakes kept at a level to avoid acidification and riverbank collapse below Lock 1'. That is fine, but we need the river bank to be at 0.5. I note there is not a height level in the plan for that. We cannot go below 0.5 because, since the barrages have been in, the river is kept at an average of 0.7 positive AHD (Australian Height Datum), and that is how people have set up their infrastructure for flood plain irrigation, especially in the Lower Murray.

We have seen the demise of the Lower Murray swamps where we have seen flawed rehabilitation plans and the opportunity was not there to fix the whole swamp area. Some people took exit and it left another chequerboard approach. Thirty million dollars was spent there of federal, state and farmers' money. I note there is some excellent work going on with the CSIRO and others on what to do into the future, but there have to be some big decisions made to get that right in the swamps. I note the last dot point about 'improved ability for flood plains to support healthy red gum forests, waterbird and fish breeding, and greater areas of habitat for native plants and animals'.

That is a great ideal as well, but we also must remember that we have to get this right. We must support everything. It is not just the environment: it is the social and economic needs of our communities right throughout the basin. The Premier put out this call that it is 3,200 gigalitres or nothing, when it used to be 4,000 gigalitres or nothing or a High Court challenge, but he needs to get real and note the constraints that are in place and the realities of communities right up and down the basin so that we do get an outcome. I also note the Greens are talking about blocking this federally, and they need to get a life and get into the system because, if they knock this out, we will not have a plan.

Time expired.

Dr McFETRIDGE (Morphett) (12:24): I rise to support this motion. There would not be a person in this place who does not want to see a healthy Murray-Darling Basin and, particularly, the River Murray. Some of my earliest recollections of the river are from 1956 when my father, who was a fireman at the time, went up to Mannum to help sandbag properties during the '56 floods. Then, when I was about eight, I think, we went up to Red Cliffs near Mildura on a fishing holiday and I caught my first fish. The river was healthy, it was full of fish and yabbies, and we had a great time, and we want the river to remain healthy for perpetuity, for our generation, our grandchildren, and the grandchildren of our grandchildren.

To see the river recently and the parlous state that it was in, and to go down to Milang and Meningie and see the expanses of exposed lake bed because of the low river and no flows into the river was an absolute tragedy, not only for me personally but for the whole of Australia because the Murray-Darling Basin and the River Murray are national treasures. The good thing, though, is that we now have high flows in the river, we will have high flows, and we will probably even have floods at some stage, but we will also have droughts, so it is very important that we manage the river in the best way possible, and to achieve the aims that are in the motion is obviously in the hearts and minds of all of us in this place. At 11:28 today The Advertiser printed an article 'Federal Coalition backs plan to reform management of River Murray', and it says:

Tony Abbott has used the last Coalition joint partyroom meeting to commit the Opposition to support the Government's Murray-Darling Plan in Parliament guaranteeing it will now pass into law despite dissenters. The decision, a big win for South Australian Liberals who have backed the plan strongly and stared down various internal opponents, heralds the end of more than 100 years of interstate and cross-party bickering over the river and ensures the numbers in Parliament to protect the new plan.

Mr Abbott addressed the final parliamentary meeting for the year in Canberra this morning and told colleagues that while there were some reservations, the plan—securing 2,750 gigalitres for the Murray by 2019 and another 450 gigalitres by 2024—would get Opposition support.

With the new deal now before both houses of Parliament for a minimum of 15 sitting days—a requirement under law—at least three disallowance motions have been flagged: one from the Greens, one from Queensland independent Bob Katter, and one from coalition MPs Sharman Stone and Mark McCormack.

Mr Abbott said he understood that two of his backbenchers would break ranks because of the issue in their own Basin electorates but said the Coalition would nonetheless back the plan as signed off by Water Minister Tony Burke last week.

I will just repeat the second paragraph which says:

The decision, a big win for South Australian Liberals who have backed the plan strongly and stared down various internal opponents...

This is a good result for South Australia and, more importantly, it is a good result for the River Murray and for the future of the Murray. This motion is pointing out all the things that we want to achieve, hopefully by 2024, which is a significantly long time away, but at least we are working towards a target, we are working towards goals, and we will be achieving our ultimate goal, that is, to make sure that the River Murray and the Murray-Darling Basin are protected and going to be part of the future for all Australians.

Ms CHAPMAN (Bragg) (12:28): As the newly appointed opposition spokesperson for water and the River Murray and environmental matters generally, I rise to support the Premier's motion on the Murray-Darling Basin, and I am proud to do so. Today, the passage of legislation to support an environmental outcome for South Australia, to support the River Murray and Murray Mouth regions within South Australia, and the reinvestment of 2,750 gigalitres over a period to 2019 to help restore the health of our river, has been acknowledged in the federal parliament, so it is an important occasion on which we conclude the debate on this matter.

What is mischievous about the motion, however, is the assertion of there being a commitment to 3,200 gigalitres in total. As has been expressed by other speakers, it is now clear by the legislation that has passed in the federal parliament which supports an extra $1.77 billion in funding for projects to achieve this that, in fact, the 450 gigalitres extra over and above 2,750 is an aspirational target with an expectation that, hopefully, some of it at least will come into fruition by 2024, but with no security for one drop further.

The Murray-Darling Basin Authority has been an entity established to develop a plan. It has been a tumultuous gestation for the plan, and it has not been without fierce criticism in various districts around the states that support the Murray-Darling Basin areas—and it has been a pretty rugged period, I think, for a number of the federal members of parliament who have had to deal with this issue.

It is important, however, to recognise that in South Australia the Murray River has, of course, had its gestation as a contributor to South Australia's economy as a major transport facility since white settlement in South Australia, and the development of a number of the locks through the River Murray have predated even the famous Chaffey development (now acknowledged in the name of the Chaffey brothers in the member for Chaffey's region) and the development of food production in that area.

Its origins certainly live up to the Murray being the mighty force it has been for South Australia as both a transport corridor and for the provision of water supply for the development of the food industry, and in more recent decades a significant supplement to the water requirements for metropolitan Adelaide. There have been other developed contributions for major regional towns and areas, such as the Barossa, in the last 50 or 60 years, but very significantly has been the draw for the requirements of the metropolitan area of Adelaide, which is why I bring to the attention of the house the concern that I place on the record of this government's poor performance in actually delivering anything.

At least in the period of the Playford and Hall administrations, complemented further during the Brown and Olsen administrations, not only the development of pipelines but also major salt interception works and projects that had been physically and real contributions to the health and wellbeing of the river were demonstrably committed and actioned. This government, since its inception in 2002, has had a lot of talks, a lot of forums (even a River Murray forum I remember attending in about 2003 in this place), a lot of plans, a lot of reports, a lot of consultants and little delivery, unfortunately.

I can identify then premier Rann publishing a press release jointly with minister Hill and minister Weatherill on 11 February 2003 (and this is early in the time of the Labor government) when they announced that they would be waterproofing Adelaide 'to reduce reliance on the Murray'. They pointed out that, in an ordinary year, 130 gigalitres of stormwater and treated effluent were discharged into the Gulf St Vincent from Adelaide, equivalent to the volume of 37 Hope Valley reservoirs. They said, 'In any ordinary year, Adelaide uses 200 gigalitres of mains-treated water' and 'It makes absolute sense to be using more of our stormwater rather than drawing it out of the River Murray.'

We have had acts of parliaments, we have had stormwater authorities, we have had plans, we have had reports, we have had waterproofing, blah, blah, blah—what have we had delivered? Only just at the last federal election I recall trying to get up a small project in the eastern area, and I have enough water that runs off the area of Bragg, which I represent, each year to water most of Adelaide, yet we have had all the pronouncements, all the promises and all the expectation that even minister Weatherill, when he signed up to this, had bleated on about how important it was. We all agree that these things are important and that the commitment is necessary, but the delivery is critical.

Then we had back on 1 December 2009 again a press release issued by then premier Rann, on this occasion jointly with the Hon. Karlene Maywald (who sits on the SA Water Board) and the Hon. Jay Weatherill (who is now Premier), announcing that there would be a High Court challenge against the Victorians on water and that that would be some great panacea of protection for the river, that they would teach those Vics a lesson. They were obviously unhappy with the cap on trading that the Victorians had announced, which shamefully would have no impact until 2014. How the Premier can lie straight in bed when he talks about supporting something that will come into effect in 2024 now is beyond me, but in any event it suits to complain about these delays when it is someone else they are getting stuck into.

They said that this will be disastrous for South Australia, that they were going off to the High Court. They even tried to claim credit for causing Victoria to abolish its restrictive 10 per cent trading cap, as though they had any influence. We still do not know to this day what they have spent on High Court challenges, beating their chest, puffing out their boated claims of effectiveness and attempting to blame the overallocation problems entirely on Victoria by flexing their muscles and demanding that they would be meeting them on the steps of the High Court. Interestingly, minister Maywald in this joint statement said:

Water scientists have been telling us for many years that a minimum of 1,500 gigalitres and up to 3,800 gigalitres of flow needs to be permanently returned to the River Murray to ensure its long-term survival. So far under Living Murray Program 485 gigalitres of permanent water has been returned to the river and under the Water for Future Program a further 360 gigalitres in water entitlement has been purchased. That means a total of 844 gigalitres has in effect been restored...

But the reality is that that was just another expensive exercise of chest beating by the government and perpetuated into this current regime. We have had overlapping that the pick up of a desalination plant, water security proposal, that the Liberals had announced, and then we had this massive expansion, which has now been mothballed—what a disgrace!

Time expired.

Mr BROCK (Frome) (12:38): I would also like to speak on the motion moved by the Premier on the Murray-Darling Basin plan and the amount of water that has been coming back in. I was very proud to become an ambassador for the River Murray. I did a launch in Port Pirie, accompanied by mayor of the District Council of Barunga West, mayor Dolling, the Port Pirie Regional Council mayor, mayor Vanstone and the mayor of the Mount Remarkable council, mayor Walker. We did a launch in Pirie to highlight the necessity, demand and requirement that not only Port Pirie but other areas of the River Murray have as they are very reliant, 100 per cent, on the health of the River Murray.

We have conversations about waterproofing Adelaide, about looking after people on the River Murray and ensuring their existence, but we seem to lose the fact that at Morgan there is a bypass, the Morgan to Whyalla pipeline. That pipeline feeds not only across into Kimba and Whyalla and Port Augusta, but also up to Roxby Downs, down to the Copper Coast, through the Clare Valley, Port Pirie and surrounding regions. I remind members that, no matter how much water we say we will get put through for the environmental flow, whether it is 2,500, 2,700, 3,000 or 4,000, there is only the same amount of water coming down that river. Water is one of the most precious items we have.

When my late wife was alive and I was a councillor on the Port Pirie Regional Council, I had the opportunity to come down to Adelaide for a water discussion at UniSA. This was many years ago, but the speaker (Professor Mike Young) was then talking about salinity on one side of the River Murray, water wars between the states, and trading of water between the states and even across all of Australia. When I went home, my late wife said, 'How did it go?' Well, I thought it was a comedy show.

That would have been 25 years ago, and that reality has come to bite us now. We have been fighting other states, fighting amongst ourselves, and fighting amongst ourselves politically and across states, but we do not act as Australians. We only have so much water and the water is there not only for human consumption but also to produce food for ourselves, our nation and for export, especially into Asia.

As I said, everybody goes on about waterproofing Adelaide. I think it is time that we understand that we have to start waterproofing Australia, full stop. We are at the tail end of the River Murray, and we have seen before when the mouth of the Murray becomes clogged up that we have to manually dredge to ensure that the flow keeps going through, because if it does not the salt will continue to bank back up. It will hit South Australia first if we do not have that clear environmental flow going through, but the other states also need to understand that it will not be many years before that rust or decay will start to come back into the upper states and the whole of Australia's water system will be decimated.

I am very passionate about water. In fact, I have a meeting with the Premier and three other ministers this afternoon to discuss some opportunities, and I am very thankful for that. As Australians, we have to start thinking not only about the near future but also about 20 to 25 years down the track. We talk about different projects and this and that, but we have to understand that, if we do not have a continuous supply of water for the emerging resource opportunities in the top end of South Australia, we will not be able to extract those resources and grow economically.

We all keep saying that this state needs to get more money. Our credit rating has been diminished, so we need not only to explore opportunities in resources but also to realise that we are ideally situated to increase both our population and our food production. This will help to feed not only our increased population here but also in Asia. I refer to the Prime Minister's white paper on Asia that was recently released, which talked about feeding Asia.

Everyone in the community and in the house understands the importance of water. It is one of our most precious resources, and this water issue will hound politicians for generations to come if we do not get it right. This motion is to accept the amount of water, and hopefully the federal government will get it through. Comments have been made here about the Greens. We need to have a clean environment but we also need to balance that out with economic drivers and human consumption.

I hope the federal government will accept this plan. I hope that all South Australians will accept it. I hope that all of Australia accepts it and that we look at opportunities to improve it and at new ways of getting this out. As a representative of a regional area, as are my colleagues on this side, I am very passionate about this. We need to ensure that we do not divert water away from the Morgan-Whyalla pipeline, which gets water back into our area, to make certain that Adelaide is being well watered.

I think I was the only country representative who became an ambassador for the River Murray. I am very proud of that and I will continue to fight for the River Murray. I will continue to look at ideas and other ways to utilise water far better. I commend this motion to the house.

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