MAKE no mistake, Victoria has been sold down the river over the Albanese government’s new Murray-Darling Basin Plan.
I commend Victoria’s Water Minister Harriet Shing for standing her ground against devastating buybacks instigated by her federal colleague Tanya Plibersek.
Ms Shing understands the damage buybacks cause farming communities – it is just unfortunate she does not seem to have the ear of her federal Labor counterpart.
The states have now been given an extra three years to meet water recovery targets, but with buybacks all but set to resume it is not a cause to celebrate.
Ms Plibersek is also set to shut out extra farm infrastructure funding for Victoria that would provide sustainable measures to save water, opening scope for farmers to sell their water in order for Labor to charge ahead with its targets.
The last time buybacks were implemented they resulted in a patchwork quilt of properties with no water rights – not that Ms Plibersek will ever see this from her Sydney electorate office.
Her decision is in direct contrast to the former Water Minister Tony Burke, her cabinet colleague.
It was Mr Burke who wrote into the plan a social and economic neutrality test so that rural communities would not be adversely impacted by water buybacks – this test was solidified by The Nationals who secured the agreement of all basin states in 2018.
But now Ms Plibersek has ripped that up, all to appease Green voters and those downstream who want to see our community’s lifeblood flow out to sea.
Buybacks will hurt regional communities through lost productivity of prime horticultural regions with the flow-on to local economies, while the higher cost of producing fruit, vegetables, drinks, food and fibre will hit family budgets at the supermarket checkout.
