TEMPERS flared as around 1000 people crowded CluBarham on Wednesday to vent their frustrations with the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, as the true human impacts of the policy framework were revealed.
Organised by Victorian independent senator John Madigan (who recently launched a senate inquiry into the impacts of the Basin Plan’s implementation), eight politicians attended the meeting to listen to the concerns.
Irrigators and community members spoke in the dozens, with representatives ranging from as far away as Wagga Wagga and Griffith to the east, Mildura and Balranald to the west and the Goulburn Valley to the south.
Many raised their qualms with the Basin Plan and Constraints Management Strategy, which they claimed were reducing water entitlements available to them while, in some cases, over-flooding their properties to send environmental flows through to South Australia.
Some irrigators even raised their suspicions that speculators were allowed to inflate prices on the water market, compounding the financial stress for individual farmers.
However, the most poignant message for politicians came through revelations of the social impacts occurring as an extension of the economic woes brought on by water reductions under the plan.
Riverina counsellor and family therapist Judy Trewin told the forum she has observed an increase in the prevalence of anxiety disorders, troubled relationships, family breakdowns and apathy since the implementation of the 2007 Water Act.
“Many farmers, their families and rural communities throughout the Basin are experiencing extreme hardships and difficulties; in stress-related illness, compromised mental health and financial viability,” she said.
“While a number of these issues are treatable and manageable… such long term exposure to unviable and continual hardship can and does allow for a number of people to slip into even deeper psychological and emotional problems such as depression and finally tragedy, which is totally unacceptable.”
New South Wales Primary Principals Association chair Judy McGuiness — who has been a principal at three different schools in Barham, Balranald and Deniliquin in the last two years — spoke about the “ever-widening gap in student outcomes” between regional and metropolitan schools.
“Right through the Murray-Darling basin, school enrolments are declining as populations are declining,” Ms McGuiness said.
“That means our students have less curriculum choices — we can’t provide a curriculum that our students deserve, particularly in our secondary schools.
“We have difficulties recruiting teachers and school principals. There’s a high school in our local area that has advertised for a principal three times and had no applications.”
For more on this story, grab a copy of Friday’s Guardian (July 10).
