After days of battling behind closed doors, Labor helps Greens gazump Government

A MOVE to let upstream communities keep an extra 70 gigalitres from the Murray-Darling river system has been dumped by the Senate after days of tense arguments and negotiation.

• Murray-Darling explainer
• Crucial vote on the Murray
• Basin Plan failing, experts say

A MOVE to let upstream communities keep an extra 70 gigalitres from the Murray-Darling river system has been dumped by the Senate after days of tense arguments and negotiation.

The vote risks an interstate battle that puts the future of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan – and water entitlements for South Australia – in jeopardy.

The result of the vote will be seen by many as a win for South Australia over the other states. But the Federal Government warned that it could spark an interstate war that will unravel the plan.

If the New South Wales and Victorian governments follow through with their threat to walk away from the plan if the 70GL was blocked, the Federal Government has warned that will ultimately cost SA hundreds of GL, which would be catastrophic for the River Murray, the Coorong, the Lower Lakes and the Murray Mouth.

The Greens moved a disallowance motion on a regulation to let irrigators use that water, and won the support of Labor and NXT (SA Best) to beat the Government.

The Government had hopes of convincing Labor to vote with it, but Labor was holding out for certain conditions, including protecting SA’s interests.

If the 70GL is returned to the river, as it should be now, about 4GL will flow down to the Goolwa barrages.

The Greens, Labor, NXT and a range of academics say the water is needed and it is the wrong time to mess with the plan because of concerns about water theft and rorting.

On the other hand, the Northern Basin Review found giving up the water will cost jobs up north. That’s why NSW and Victoria threatened to quit the plan if the Greens’ disallowance motion works.

Senator Hanson-Young said last night there was “no compliance” throughout the Basin, with water being siphoned off by “big, corporate, greedy irrigators” and that the process to let the irrigators keep the water was “corrupted”.

She wants an audit of how the Plan is being carried out before any changes are made.

SA Labor Senator Penny Wong said trust in the Plan needed to be rebuilt.

“I am not going to stand by and see a plan delivered under legislation – that a Labor Government delivered – wrecked by this Government,” she said.

“You can’t deliver half a plan. We have had extremely serious allegations of water theft, of corruption, in the northern basin. They confirm SA’s worst fears.”

She said Labor has talked to Water Minister David Littleproud about the changes to the Plan, but that core issues have not been resolved.

Assistant Water Minister Anne Ruston said it was possible to fix the problems and go ahead with the whole Plan, calling for everyone to come back to the table and save the plan.

“What a shame it’s come to this,” NXT Senator Rex Patrick said, adding that the Plan had to be fixed before any changes were made.

The Murray-Darling Basin Authority said yesterday that it was improving transparency in the Plan with regular reports on how each area of the system was managed