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Legislative Council - Fifty-Third Parliament, Second Session (53-2)
2017-10-31 Daily Xml
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Water Security

The Hon. T.T. NGO (14:59): My question is to the Minister for Water and the River Murray. Will the minister update the chamber on how the state government provides water security for South Australians?

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation, Minister for Water and the River Murray, Minister for Climate Change) (14:59): Thank you very much to the honourable member for this excellent question. As we all know, in South Australia, water is a vital resource underpinning the livelihoods and wellbeing of almost every South Australian, and our capacity to support and grow our economy is based on the availability of water. This government knows that securing our water supplies and investing in water security measures are the only way we can secure the future prosperity of the state and the people who live in it.

Almost everything that happens in this state, in terms of manufacturing, particularly food manufacturing—and think about wool scouring and fabric preparation, think about washing down metal fabrication—requires at some stage in the process access to water, so it is disappointing that, after all these years in opposition, the Liberal Party still don't support ensuring that Adelaide and the rest of the state have a secure source of drinking water for our community. They come up with specious arguments that we should be doing better but, quite frankly, they just don't understand the challenge the state faces, particularly in dealing with the other states and the commonwealth in terms of the River Murray.

Last week, I am advised, a Liberal spokesperson for water, I suppose highlighting his inexperience in this area, attacked our investment particularly in the Adelaide Desalination Plant. This spokesperson for the Liberal Party clearly hadn't been around for the Millennium Drought and had any policy experience of grappling with those issues. He wasn't there when considerations were being made to purchase bottled water to supply the people of Adelaide with drinking water, dire as it was, so scarce was the state's water. Of course, the baseless and ill-informed attacks he made just demonstrate the Liberal Party's ignorance in terms of developing policy positions for the benefit of our state. As for the criticism that the ADP is a so-called white elephant—

The Hon. D.W. Ridgway interjecting:

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Well, the Hon. David Ridgway is talking about inadequacy to add up—

The PRESIDENT: I ask the minister not to get sidelined by the Hon. Mr Ridgway.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: It is such a good sideline, though, Mr President.

The PRESIDENT: I also say, if members of the opposition don't want a 10-minute answer, just let the minister finish without interruption.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Let me just sidetrack about adding up. It was the Liberals who promised in a panicked response in an energy plan that South Australians were going to get a certain amount of money back—$300 saved on their bills—and then 24 hours later, they backtracked. They rolled it back and now we hear that it might be as little as 50¢ a week. Talk about not adding up! The Hon. David Ridgway leads with his jaw. They can't add up to save themselves. They let the state down. They make these specious claims. They go to the heart of their own constituency. They just can't add up.

As for this criticism, the River Murray Water Allocation Plan pledges an extra 50 gigalitres of water for holders of irrigation and equivalent licences in years when allocations are less than 100 per cent on the back of the Adelaide Desalination Plant. Are we to say to the good people of the Riverland that the Liberal MP, Mr Whetstone, doesn't support the extra 8 per cent we have managed to be able to find for dry allocation years for our irrigators to keep their crops alive because of their jihad against the Adelaide Desalination Plant? Is that what we're supposed to tell them? These guys are a joke.

Does the Liberal Party support the extra 8 per cent in a dry allocation year that the Adelaide Desalination Plant has meant we can actually provide to our irrigators, or do they not? Yes or no answer, Mr Ridgway. It is a yes or no answer. You have no clue. You have absolutely no clue. Even a federal colleague of yours, Hon. David Ridgway, the now Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull recognised the importance of a desalination plant for our state. On 12 September 2007—

The Hon. J.M.A. Lensink: What size?

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: The Hon. Michelle Lensink wants a smaller desal plant, having less water for irrigators in this state. That's what she is saying: 'Let's halve the size of the desal plant and let's take away the extra water.'

The Hon. J.M.A. Lensink: You're not even using 50 gigalitres.

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Let's take away the extra water we found for our irrigators. That's what the Liberals are advocating: take water away from irrigators. No wonder our irrigators in South Australia don't support the Liberal Party in this state or at the commonwealth level. They have no clue about what they need, and now they are saying, 'Take away half their water.' I will be very pleased to let the people of the Riverland understand exactly what the Liberal policy means for them. The Prime Minister, back in 2007—not then the prime minister, of course—said:

It is vital to the water security of Adelaide. Adelaide needs a new non-climate-dependent water source. It needs a desalination plant and it needs it now.

The future of water security in our state is about more than politics. Surely to goodness, people in this chamber will agree that it is about the future viability of our state. It takes long-term planning, not short-sighted politicking—which is all the Liberals can do.

What is their water policy? They don't have one; they simply don't have one. They haven't provided any details of an alternative policy at all that would provide South Australians with essential water security, and that is simply unacceptable. It is simply unacceptable for those who pretend to have aspirations to government. Let's have a look at the significant investment that the government has made in securing our state's water future, in contrast to the Liberals' lack of any ideas whatsoever, other than attacking water security for irrigators. Firstly, our investment in the Adelaide Desalination Plant. We knew—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: —after the Millennium Drought that we had to build an independent, non-climate-dependent source of water for Adelaide's critical human needs. Is the Liberal Party now suggesting that they do not support such an independent, climate-independent source for critical human water needs for our communities?

The Hon. J.M.A. Lensink: When are you ever going to use 100 gigalitres?

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Is that what they are suggesting?

The Hon. J.M.A. Lensink: One in 1,000 years.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: The Hon. Michelle Lensink again drops in saying we shouldn't have a 100-gigalitre desal plant.

The Hon. J.M.A. Lensink: When are you ever going to use it?

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: We shouldn't have a 100-gigalitre plant. The desal plant, at the size that we have, has allowed us to provide 8 per cent more water for irrigators in dry allocation years. What is the Hon. Michelle Lensink saying? 'Reduce that.' 'Reduce it,' that is what she is saying. It is about 20 per cent to keep their critical crops alive, and the Hon. Michelle Lensink wants to take it away from them. She wants to take it away from the irrigators of South Australia. She wants to take away any benefit of factoring in the desal plant into irrigators' water allocations in dry allocation years.

This is what the Liberals have to promise: contrast it with what we have delivered. We take absolute and decisive action when the needs of the state demand it. We took that action to secure our water supply, not just for Adelaide but for the whole state. The Adelaide Desalination Plant is a key component in securing our water supply. The ADP has been operating since October 2011, as we know, and since that time it has produced about 140 gigs of water, which is, of course, shandied in with Adelaide's water supply.

Prior to the operation of the Adelaide Desalination Plant, on average, 40 per cent of Adelaide's annual water supply needs were met from the River Murray, with around 60 per cent sourced from local catchments. These supplies are variable, of course, and are heavily climate-dependent. In a drought year, for instance, up to 90 per cent of Adelaide's water was sourced from the River Murray. Our ADP is a much needed insurance policy that will be vital when South Australia is next faced with drought, as we will be.

The ADP is just one way that the government has secured our water supply. We have also formulated and invested in a policy that ensures that we can make the best use possible of water captured through rainwater harvesting, stormwater reuse, recycled water and water-sensitive urban design. Since 2014, the government has continued to support rainwater capture through our policy requiring new residential dwellings to have an alternative water supply, such as a rainwater tank system plumbed to toilets for example, or to laundry cold water outlets, or even to a hot-water service to supplement mains water.

To support the community during and following the Millennium Drought, we also provided rebates for rainwater systems and various other water-saving measures. During that time, nearly $17 million was invested in stand-alone or plumbed-in rainwater tank rebates, I am advised. We have increased Adelaide's capacity to harvest stormwater from around 1 billion litres per year in the early 2000s to almost 22 billion litres per year currently. In fact, I am advised that we lead the nation with stormwater harvesting.

We have also increased the amount of wastewater recycled. In 2015-16, SA Water recycled 33 per cent of wastewater from its wastewater treatment plants, equating to more than 31 billion litres. This is the second highest percentage reuse of any water utility in Australia with over 100,000 customers, I am advised. This year, the government has also committed to further increase our wastewater recycling capacity in the Northern Adelaide Plains via the Northern Adelaide Irrigation Scheme.

This project will deliver an additional 12 billion litres per year of high-quality, recycled water from the Bolivar Wastewater Treatment Plant. This is a 60 per cent increase, which will be used for commercial food crops to help expand the state's irrigated primary production industry. Economic analysis has shown that this 12 gigalitres of recycled water per year has the potential to create 3,700 jobs, attract around $1.1 billion in private investment and add $578 million a year to the state's economy. The state government is providing $110 million to the project, with the commonwealth investing $45.6 million.

In addition to large-scale stormwater and wastewater recycling, the government also continues to facilitate water-sensitive urban design at the local level; for example, water-sensitive urban design approaches such as rain gardens—specially designed vegetated areas that filter stormwater run-off and hold it in place for later reuse—and other techniques that capture and treat stormwater are being integrated into developments. Through the Environment Protection Authority we have also been implementing the Rain Garden 500 project, a three-year grant program where local councils, community groups, schools, sporting clubs or groups of motivated individuals can apply for funding to build a rain garden in the Adelaide region.

The Adelaide and Mount Lofty Ranges Natural Resources Management Board also actively invests in water-sensitive urban design in its region, usually co-investing with local councils. Investment of more than $710,000 in grant funding was recently awarded to a range of water-sensitive urban design projects, including:

rain gardens at the Flagstaff Hill School and at Tracey Avenue in the City of Charles Sturt;

water-sensitive urban design car parking in the City of Charles Sturt as part of a drainage system upgrade;

permeable paving in Kent Street, Hawthorn, in the City of Mitcham; and

water-sensitive urban design features for the Morton Road streetscape upgrade in the City of Onkaparinga.

The Liberal Party has absolute no credibility on water security and policy, just as it has no credibility on energy policy. There is barely a whimper out of the Liberals on standing up for the Murray, and we have heard today that in fact they support taking away the water we have discovered through the policy of putting the desal plant into the mix, finding that extra 8 per cent of allocation, opening allocation in a dry framework year.

Following on from the comments on the weekend, South Australians have every right to be concerned at the prospect of a Liberal government in the coming months, because they have no understanding of where the Liberals stand on water policy or, indeed, on energy policy. As we have heard from the Hon. David Ridgway, they cannot even count when they try to do their sums.

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