Historic moment for Murray Darling as water wars reignite

The nation’s water wars will be reopened for the first time in nearly a decade as the Albanese government starts a new round of controversial large-scale water buybacks in NSW and Victoria, designed to reduce irrigation and boost flows in the nation’s largest river system.

Governments started buying back farmers’ water entitlements in 2007, to boost the health of the Murray-Darling river system. Water recovery ramped up in 2012 after creation of the $13 billion Murray-Darling Basin plan, which warned that the environment was in dire straits because far too much water was being drawn from the river for irrigation.

Federal Environment and Water Minister Tanya Plibersek.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen/Janie Barrett

However, the former Coalition government paused buybacks in 2015 after furious campaigns from irrigation communities up and down the river system in communities such as Shepparton in Victoria, Griffith in NSW and Dirranbandi in Queensland.

Water Minister Tanya Plibersek overturned the buyback ban under new laws created last year and cut deals with state governments to extend the plan’s original deadline of June 2024 for water recovery to 2027.

“The Coalition spent 10 years letting down regional Australia and Basin communities – sabotaging water recovery, tying up programs in impossible rules, delaying the basin plan and prolonging uncertainty.

“The Albanese Labor Government is getting on with delivering the Murray-Darling Basin plan in full,” a spokesperson for Plibersek said.

The basin plan was originally funded with $13 billion from the federal government to buy water from irrigators and to build new large-scale water saving infrastructure – such as upgraded weirs or lining irrigation channels.

The goal was to recover enough water to boost water flows by 3200 gigalitres a year.

But despite the 2015 cap placed on buybacks, NSW and Victoria failed to make significant progress on water saving projects, which meant the scheme was left about 750 gigalitres short of its goal.

The government was committed to more water saving projects, Plibersek has said, but buybacks are also needed to reach the basin plan’s goal.

The first round of voluntary buybacks kicks off on Monday, July 15, aiming to secure 70 gigalitres’ worth of water entitlements, with farmers able offer to sell their water rights to the Commonwealth.

Plibersek’s move has been met with furious opposition from rural advocacy groups.

The current round of controversy echoes the initial protest movement, with multiple rallies held across the Murray-Darling Basin for several years before the plan’s inception in 2012, including a notorious meeting in Griffith where irrigators burnt copies of the plan.

Farmers argue that cutting the volume of water available for irrigation will shrink local economies along the river system, raise the price of water and ultimately push up food prices.

“This is yet another example of the devil-may-care attitude from the government on buybacks and its complete lack of understanding about the detrimental impact they have on cost of living and communities,” said National Farmers’ Federation Water Committee chair Malcolm Holm.

“Taxpayers will be hit twice – first bankrolling the government’s spending spree, then paying the price of inflation at the supermarket checkout.”

Plibersek has committed $300 million to fund community projects to help towns adjust to the reduction in irrigation entitlements, but has not detailed how those funds will be spent.

National Irrigators Council chief executive Zara Lowein said Plibersek’s plan was “a high-level wish list without any substance”.

“The framework relies solely on a vague claim to use a mix of tools and subsequently buy off communities with the $300 million sugar hit from the Basin communities fund,” Lowein said.

Plibersek has argued water recovery is needed to set irrigation levels on a sustainable path. River flows are already declining and the CSIRO has forecast they could fall up to 40 per cent in the next 50 years – driven by global warming.

Plibersek has said voluntary water buybacks do not significantly drive up water prices.

“A 70 gigalitre purchase program is not expected to have a significant impact on social and economic outcomes across the Basin,” her spokesperson said.

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