Murray Darling Basin: Water-trade tracking call after Dalton sells to Duxton

It’s time to track water trades after NSW MP Helen Dalton sold water to a speculator she has criticised, the state’s water minister says.

Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party MP Helen Dalton has accused Duxton Water of “profiting off our sick Murray Darling Basin river system”, after selling them water.

NSW Water Minister Melinda Pavey has called on Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party MP Helen Dalton to back legislation forcing all parliamentarians to publicly register their water trades, within 14 days of any transaction.

The call follows revelations that Ms Dalton, who is widely proclaimed Murray Darling Basin “water warrior”, sold allocation water to one of the nation’s largest speculators - Duxton Water.

As the Lower House MP for Murray in the NSW Parliament Ms Dalton has been a vocal critic of Duxton Water, accusing the ASX-listed company of “profiting off our sick Murray Darling Basin river system”.

But property records show Ms Dalton sold $7700 of temporary water from her Murray water access licence 36791 to Duxton Water on November 7, 2018.

Ms Dalton cancelled the WAL earlier this year as well as divesting her ownership of Murray WAL5817 this month, which had been used to sell water into South Australia.

When presented with a list of her trades Ms Dalton initially said the licence numbers The Weekly Times supplied were not on her “current” list of WALs.

But a March 8, 2020 property search from the InfoTrack system of state registers shows Helen Jennifer Dalton owned both WALs at that time of the Duxton and South Australia trades.

Ms Dalton said she had no idea her water was sold to, as she used a broker.

“We are not told the identity of the buyer,” Ms Dalton said. “NSW brokers have no obligation to reveal the identity of a buyer, even to the seller.

“The lack of transparency and regulation in our water markets is one of many things I am trying to fix.”

But it took The Weekly Times just minutes to type Ms Dalton’s WAL numbers into the search function on the NSW Water Register to see where and when she traded water within the Murray Valley.

A quick follow-up title search of the WALs was then used to identify who bought the water in NSW, but trades to South Australia could not be identified.

Ms Pavey said “this case highlights why it is so important the NSW Government works with our counterparts across the Murray Darling Basin to improve trading transparency.

Last year Ms Pavey introduced the Constitution Amendment (Water Accountability and Transparency) Bill 2020 to Parliament, stating it would require all MPs to “notify the Parliament via their pecuniary interest register within 14 days of trading water for any purpose, including any moneys made and the change to the net impact of their water holdings”.

However the bill was blocked in the NSW Upper House, with members of the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party, Robert Borsack and Mark Banasiak, voting against it.

Ms Pavey said “we need to do more to improve transparency in water trading in NSW and I call on the Shooters to reverse Ms Daltons’ opposition to the NSW Government’s water transparency Bill.

“This would have required Ms Dalton and other politicians to reveal all of their companies trades within 14 days of making the trade.”

But Ms Dalton and her party colleagues drafted and introduced an alternative Water Management Amendment (Transparency of Water Rights) Bill 2020 to the NSW Parliament last year, but it only required NSW parliamentarians to register their water entitlements, not their allocation trades.

Moulamein irrigator Jeremy Morton said he “found it interesting” that despite Ms Dalton’s demands for greater transparency there was already a register in NSW “where you can find out who’s trading, including Helen”.

However there are limits to the NSW system, given it does not track trades within state’s irrigator owned corporations Murrumbidgee Irrigation, Murray Irrigation Limited and Coleambally Irrigation.

It means it is almost impossible to track trades on Ms Dalton’s family’s Murrumbidgee licences, with her register of Parliamentary interest showing she owns 1383ML of high and 3324GL of general security entitlements within the local corporation.

Ms Pavey said transparency was the key to ensuring confidence in water markets that “treat everyone equally”.

“I continue to fight to ensure that water is recognised as a property right and able to be traded and delivered to all water users.”

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