Eastern Australia Agriculture donated $55,000 to Liberal Party before 2013 election

The company at the centre of a controversial multimillion-dollar water buyback deal donated $55,000 to the Liberal Party before the 2013 election. It comes as call grow for a Royal Commission into the management of the Murray-Darling Basin plan.

The company at the centre of a controversial multimillion-dollar water buyback donated $55,000 to the Liberal Party before the 2013 election.

The Coalition is under pressure to explain why former deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce signed off on the 2017 deal to pay $79 million to Eastern Australia Agriculture for water without an open tender process.

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The Herald Sun can reveal EAA donated to the NSW Liberal Party in 2012 and 2013.

At least one of the ­donations was made while ­current Energy Minister Angus Taylor was listed as a director of the company’s parent company, Eastern Australia Irrigation, which is based in the tax haven of the Cayman Islands.

Mr Taylor was a director of EAA from June 2008 until ­November 2009, and a co-founder and director of EAI until 2013, when he stepped down before entering parliament that year.

Calls are growing for a royal commission into the management of the Murray-Darling Basin plan, while Labor is demanding the government release documents that would shed light on its decisions.

The Coalition is under pressure to explain why former deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce signed off on the 2017 deal without an open tender process.

EAA was given the money in 2017 in return for 28.7 gigalitres of floodwater from two of its Queensland properties.

Mr Taylor has said he had no role in the water buyback decision, while Mr Joyce said he had no involvement in ­determining the price of the deal or the vendor when he ticked off the agreement as agriculture minister.

“Minister Taylor has never had a direct or indirect financial interest in EAA or any associated company,” a spokesman said.

Some water experts have questioned whether the deal was value for money, despite the government saying it paid a fair market price.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison said similar purchases were undertaken when Labor was in power.

He said the Murray-Darling Basin plan was bipartisan.

“It was a program that was started under the Labor government,” Mr Morrison said.

“No agreement is perfect but it (the Murray-Darling Basin plan) is one that enjoys bipartisan support and transactions have been undertaken by both sides.”

At least one of the ­donations was made while ­current Energy Minister Angus Taylor was listed as a director of the company’s parent company, Eastern Australia Irrigation.

Opposition water spokesman Tony Burke yesterday wrote to the department asking it to publish documents explaining the due diligence process undertaken before entering into the agreement.

“On the face of it, it looks like for floodwater that only exists in very rare circumstances that effectively they have paid top dollar for it,” Mr Burke said.

“You don’t pay Versace ­prices for water that you get from the Reject Shop, and that looks like what Barnaby Joyce has done. So we need that information to be made public.”

In an fiery interview, Mr Joyce said he signed off on the water buybacks because it was “not my job” to know who would benefit from the deal.

The former Agriculture Minister angrily dismissed suggestions he should have asked more questions and described criticism of the deal as “horse crap”.

“If you do not rely on the competent advice from the department, who on Earth are you going to rely on?” Mr Joyce said on ABC Radio National.

Asked whether he knew the parent company was based in the Cayman Islands and the profits would be going overseas, Mr Joyce said he trusted the department to “do the right thing”.

“I do not negotiate the price, I do not negotiate the vendor,” he said.

“These were the people who were offering water to us to buy.

“You ask whether they’ve got water to sell, you are not asking what clothes they wear, you don’t ask who they are married to.”

@Gallo_Ways