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Legislative Council - Fifty-First Parliament, Third Session (51-3)
2009-05-13 Daily Xml
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Parliamentary Committees

NATURAL RESOURCES COMMITTEE: MURRAY-DARLING BASIN (VOLUME 1)

Adjourned debate on motion of Hon. R.P. Wortley:

That the report of the committee, on water resources management in the Murray Darling Basin, Volume 1: 'The Fellowship of the River', be noted.

(Continued from 29 April 2009. Page 2098.)

The Hon. C.V. SCHAEFER (16:38): I rise briefly to support Volume 1 of the report of the Natural Resources Committee on the management of the Murray-Darling Basin. This report was tabled on 26 March and is the first of a number of reports—certainly three, if not more. The Natural Resources Committee, a standing committee, has a watching brief over the management of the River Murray and water supplies as they apply in South Australia. We have taken it upon ourselves to travel pretty much the length and breadth of the Murray-Darling Basin in an effort to understand the intricacies, if you like, of the management of the system and why we find ourselves in the parlous state that we do.

I will quote quite a bit from the Presiding Member's foreword. I acknowledge the Presiding Member, John Rau; our staff, Knut Cudarans and Patrick Dupont; and the other members of the standing committee. I know that a number of us have said this previously, but I have been here a while now and have been on a number of standing committees and, without a doubt, this is the best standing committee I have been on. It is probably the hardest working, but it is also a committee that has managed to reach consensus on almost every occasion without fear or favour from within the political ranks of the various parties represented. Perhaps an example of that is that the Natural Resources Committee will have met three times this week.

The crux of what we learnt, I think, in our first trips which encompassed Deniliquin, Meningie and the Queensland-New South Wales beginning of the Murray-Darling system could be summed up by saying that, the more we know, the more we know we do not know, and that it is very easy to blame those upstream for the difficulties that we have down here and equally easy for them to blame us. In fact, unless we can reach a national solution, the entire system and the societies and communities based upon that system are doomed.

We learnt that there are communities along the length of the river who are suffering at least as much as we are in South Australia. We learnt that the systems used for allocation are vastly different. We are the only state which has what is called high security water which enabled us originally to have permanent plantings where the states that have favoured the growing of perennial and annual crops such as rice and cotton have been able to take water only when the river is running. In other words, they can take a proportion as it runs past.

We have enjoyed the fact that we have not needed to build storage because we have had high security water. Sadly, those days are gone and we must adapt as a nation and a society. As is stated in the Presiding Member's foreword:

...the Murray Darling Basin is a huge, but intrinsically interconnected ecosystem. Everything that occurs throughout the Basin has consequences both upstream and downstream...Agriculture starved of reliable inflows of water is going through dramatic and painful restructuring. Entire communities, whose long established prosperity relied upon horticulture (particularly citrus and stone fruits—

and I would add to that wine grapes, all of which are permanent plantings—

have been pushed to the brink, and in some cases beyond. The high security water licences, upon which these farmers have long depended, are no longer reliable...Rural communities and towns throughout the Basin are being squeezed, depopulated and impoverished.

We found that there was at least the same sense of desperate urgency in places like Deniliquin as there is in the Lower Lakes of South Australia. We found two reasons for that. One reason is the historical overallocation and the impacts of that.

Interestingly, we were accompanied on one of our trips by Professor Mike Young, who is considered to be one of the authorities on the Murray-Darling rivers. He showed us a series of graphs which showed quite clearly that, at the time that the allocation of most of these licences took place, they were probably the wettest 50 years ever in Australia; and so, again, no-one can be blamed. It is no-one's fault that there is overallocation. The overallocation took place at a time when we believed that it was a sustainable allocation.

The other cause, of course, is a prolonged drought. Some say that it is one of the worst droughts in 100 years and others say that it is the worst drought in 100 years. No-one knows whether this is a permanent climate change or whether, in fact, it will be broken by decent rain soon. One of the pieces of evidence we were given, however, is that, if flows are to return to what we would historically consider normal, we would require above-average rains over the catchment for something like five years. One hopes that will happen, but the chances of that happening are quite remote.

Another statistic which was presented to us and which I think is little understood or appreciated, is that small reductions in rainfall produce much larger reductions in inflow. The figure that was quoted to us is that 10 per cent reduction in rainfall results in a 30 per cent reduction in flows. As a committee we do not pretend that we have answers. As a committee, however, we do believe that our series of reports can bring a far deeper knowledge of the systems of what is necessary for us within this state and, indeed, within the whole system. It is summed up in the following words:

The present crisis in the Murray-Darling Basin is a product of prolonged drought magnified by a totally unsustainable water allocation across four states. To the extent that this problem is capable of rectification, the process will be long and painful. Communities and livelihoods will be devastated and perhaps destroyed. Farming families who have been on the land for generations will have to consider a new life. Towns and cities will have to consider alternative secure sources for potable water. Agricultural and horticultural production will need to change and in the Basin as a whole will probably have to diminish. None of these outcomes are pleasant or easy to manage either at a personal level or at a political level.

I wish that I could say something more positive than that. The only positive thing that I can say is that, when we returned to the Riverland, to Renmark and that area, a fortnight ago, we were all heartened by the positive attitude of those who have decided to stay on. Many of them have reduced the size of their crops so that they can water what they have left sustainably. They have a marvellous fighting spirit and a great community attitude.

Agriculturalists historically have been wonderful at adapting to hard times, and I believe that, with the support and goodwill of people up and down the basin, they will continue to survive and, hopefully, one day again they will thrive. Again, I would like to thank the staff and my other committee members. I commend this report.

Motion carried.

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