Ms Ley described the recently completed consultation process along the Murray River as a “sham consultation” and said the buybacks would engender a “serious threat of economic and social ruin” to communities.
“They need to return to the bipartisan policy we had prior to (this government) which ensured water recovered could not cause social or economic hurt to local communities,” she said.
The Federal Government plans to recover 450 gigalitres by 2027, largely through buybacks, to meet environmental water targets. Ms Ley said the reduced agricultural output would also add to the price of food and fibre at the checkout.
Local irrigators say there are other ways to deliver on the plan, such as building more dams to ensure environmental flows and irrigation modernisation projects.
Savernake rice, canola and winter cereals grower Sam Nixon said southern basin irrigators seemed to be picking up the slack for environmental flow failures in the northern part of the system.
“We are just the whipping boy from what’s going on up north; NSW Murray seems to be picking up the slack and they look to them first for all these projects and probably shouldn’t be,” he said.
Mr Nixon said irrigation modernisation projects were a more expensive way to deliver water savings to the river - $4000-$6000 per megalitre instead of around $2000 for buybacks – but were an investment in struggling communities.
“Government should really be looking at supporting projects that are saving water, a pipe can supply water to farmers and the community gets a benefit whereas a direct water buyback is all negatives,” he said.
“It also allows more water-intensive industries to be established here instead of downstream, and we’re seeing how those high water flows downstream have caused a lot of problems with the Barmah Choke.
Redlands farmer Murk Schoen questioned the evidence around the level of environmental flows that were needed, saying the lower Murray River lakes were historically tidal and that high flows were destroying redgum forests.
“They are going to accumulate all this water for the environment, with no idea how they’re going to use that water going forward,” he said.
Mr Schoen said consultations had been a waste of time.
“I’m disappointed in the dishonest nature of this government in how they conduct themselves, they’re not interested in listening,” he said.
“We need a holistic approach to the three pillars of the plan … we need to get back to the basics and really listen to one another and work out how much water we need and how much we need for the environment.”
Mr Schoen - who grows wheat, canola, barley, corn and adzuki beans – said farmers were always improving their water efficiency.
“There’s been massive water savings in my short time in this career; most farmers are heading that way,” he said.
He added that the effects of buybacks would be hard to measure with flooding more likely than water shortages in the short term, but the test would come in dry years.
“This region isn’t heavily reliant on irrigation, though,” he said.
Yarrawonga vegetable farmer and large irrigator Leo Kelly spoke openly about the basin plan which he described as a plan that is “not good for Australia”.
“In my view, we need to hold more water in storage by building more dams for environment flows,” Mr Kelly said.
“Instead of spending all this money on buy backs and insurance claims from floods we could be storing excess water in dams ready for environmental flows.”
Mr Kelly also expressed his frustration at the Murray Darling Basin Authority (MDBA) decision makers in Canberra about the questionable management of water flows.
“In the past few weeks, we have had very low levels in the river below the Yarrawonga Weir.
“They were letting out around seven thousand megalitres a day from the weir, it is normally around nine this time of year, this has caused pumping issues.”
Mr Kelly said he had spoken to local Goulburn Murray Water representatives who understand the need for higher river levels for local irrigators to effectively access their water allocations.
“It seems as though they (MDBA) are not taking the local advice in Canberra, and are just doing what they want,” he said.
Member for Indi, independent Helen Haines, supported the Restoring Our Rivers bill passed late last year but secured several amendments including installing reviews of compensation payments made to address detrimental social or economic impacts on communities from buybacks “to ensure they are adequately and meaningfully responding to community needs”.
“The largest amount of water that is delivered to the lower Murray Darling Basin flows from the Hume, Dartmouth and Eildon dams in Indi, and I am concerned about serious negative environmental and economic impacts for Indi farmers below the dams on the Goulburn and Murray Rivers,” Dr Haines said.
“If additional water is to be purchased, it must be from the where it is most effective rather than from where it is easiest.”
Dr Haines other amendments included strengthening the auditing powers of the Inspector General of Water Compliance to improve accountability and transparency when it comes to meeting MDBP targets and delivering projects as planned.
“This Labor Government doesn’t always get it right when it comes to regional Australia, so I worked hard to negotiate with the minister to get a better outcome for Indi and for regional Australia,” Dr Haines said.
Mr Nixon, who is also deputy chair of the West Courigan Private Irrigation District, said buybacks would also unsettle an already volatile water market.
“Reliability in the general security market has been eroded away to the point where people aren’t able to do jobs,” he said.
“Water was at $130 dollars a megalitre in September and now it’s $15-$20 - you can’t make cropping decisions in that sort of volatile market.
“There’s less water in the consumptive pool, so there’s a lot of pressure on the temporary water market – and it’s become unaffordable for most unless you’re growing those high value crops like almonds.”
Under legislation passed late last year, Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek recommitted to the Murray Darling Basin Plan’s objective to recover 450GL of environmental water, albeit at the later date of end-2027, saying the Coalition had saved just 2GL of water savings in nine years of government.
“I said from day one that I was determined to deliver the Murray-Darling Basin Plan in full, including the 450GL of water for the environment. That’s what I’ve done,” she said in November.
“The Liberals and Nationals spent a decade waging a guerrilla war against the Plan. They never intended to deliver the Plan, in fact they actively undermined it at every turn, and they lied to communities about it.
“In contrast, we’ve worked with people across the Parliament to strengthen this legislation and make it law.”
