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Legislative Council - Fifty-First Parliament, Third Session (51-3)
2009-02-04 Daily Xml
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WATER ALLOCATIONS

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE (15:45): I rise today to talk about the question of fairness for users of SA Water. It is a fact that the Lower Lakes are dying, despite the Premier's observation years ago that they were in a diabolical state. Residential users are struggling under category 3 restrictions, especially during the current heatwave, as most of them can water for only three hours a day on two days of the week.

The Murray River irrigators are on an 18 per cent allocation. Unfortunately, there are growing piles of fruit trees and vines that have been ripped up and are being prepared to be burnt. It is not just the crops but the livelihood and the social fabric of families going up in smoke. A vibrant and strong Riverland is paramount for the future of South Australia as a food bowl. Whilst homeowners face fines and are being dobbed in by their neighbours, and irrigators are called water thieves if they take more than their allocation, I was surprised to discover that the top 20 users of SA Water are only required to have a plan—a simple plan—for water savings.

Per annum, the top 20 users take 26.4 gigalitres of water, and the top four alone use 18 gigalitres; the top two each use six gigalitres. These users are represented by the mining and extractive industry, the food and beverage and manufacturing industries, and state, local and federal government entities. This is a situation where there is one rule for average taxpayers and irrigators but a different and more favourable rule for others: all water users are equal, but some are more equal than others!

The government said I was putting jobs at risk, but irrigation is also an industry that provides jobs and value-added jobs. When the government minister made these comments she missed the whole point, it seems to me. It seems that this government is preferring all other industry to irrigation and, to me, that is a tragic thing. We heard the rhetoric when the government opposed my amendments to the River Murray handover package—a clear preference under the concept of critical human needs for Adelaide industry. Permanent plantings were not a critical human need—permanent plantings, I might add, that feed our state. These were not a critical human need but Adelaide industry was.

Some ministers in the government have attacked me for criticising this unfairness, but they have not put forward any indication of the water savings that industry and government have made. I certainly hope the questions I have asked on this issue will cause the government to rethink the situation. I call upon the government to support my stormwater harvesting initiatives because industry can save a lot of water by using stormwater harvesting.

Family First is absolutely focused on keeping jobs in industry and manufacturing in this state, and we will work with the government of the day to ensure that that occurs. To put it into perspective, and to stop the spin, the rhetoric and the rubbish that I have heard on radio over the past 24 hours having a go back at me, I am simply saying that, if the government is serious about freeing up water, saving water, putting water into the dying Lower Lakes, allowing irrigators to have more water and possibly even some backing off from level 3 water restrictions, you have to wean the big users, those top 20 users, off the 26.4 gigalitres. It can be done.

G.H. Michell and Sons was one of the largest SA Water consumers in the state—certainly in the top 20, from memory. I do not believe it uses any SA Water now; it is all recycled water from the Salisbury project. What I am saying to the minister and the government is that we have an economic stimulus package demand in this state right now. We are coming up to winter, hopefully, in another three or four months. I am asking the government to give incentives to industry to be able to harvest and store water that runs off the massive roof areas and the bituminised carpark areas, and to recycle that water by putting it into the acquifer and pumping it back out, to wean them off SA Water.

The problem is that, because the top 20 users pay something like $36 million to the government, it wants the revenue but, in the longer term, we need to be much more visionary. It is easy to get industry, through partnership with the government, to harvest and re-use this water. Also, as new greenfield sites are developed, surely stormwater harvesting and reuse infrastructure should be mandatory, which is the case in America and other parts of the world. It is not rocket science; it can be done. I say to the government: get serious about better use of water opportunities in this state to help save jobs and industries and to grow our food bowl.

Time expired.

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