NSW Floodplain harvesting deadlock: Licensing in disarray

Yet another bid to license NSW floodplain harvesting of water has hit a hurdle, despite political promises dating back to 2004 made by the former Labor state government.

Northern Murray Darling Basin irrigators have still not been able to get their floodplain harvesting licensed. Picture: Adam Taylor

NSW floodplain harvesting policy has been thrown into disarray, after the state’s Upper House Greens, Labor and Shooters Party MPs voted last night to disallow regulatory amendments that the Government had hoped would deliver greater certainty to irrigators and the environment.

NSW Water Minister Melinda Pavey took particular aim at MPs belonging to the Shooters Party, which has one member Roy Butler, representing Northern Murray Darling Basin’s irrigation communities in the seat of Barwon, while another, Helen Dalton, represents those in the southern seat of Murray.

“We have the Shooters member for Murray at the throat of the member for Barwon’s community, desperate to strip what water they have left off them,” Mrs Pavey said.

The Regulation, alongside the Floodplain Harvesting Policy, provides a clear framework that outlines the Government’s intent for floodplain harvesting licensing for water users and for the water regulator, the Natural Resources Access Regulator.

“It provides clear, enforceable rules that apply until licensing is in place which will reduce — not increase — the capability to harvest floodplain water in the Northern Basin,” Mrs Pavey said.

“The original Water Sharing Plans developed back in 2004 under the former Labor Government made it clear that Floodplain Harvesting was to be brought into the licensing regime within five years — this didn’t occur.

“Now that we are finishing the job and bringing floodplain harvesting into the licensing regime it is incredibly disappointing to see the Labor Party abandon their previous support.”

But Southern Riverina Irrigators say the amendment would have gifted northern NSW irrigators a bottomless well of untraceable water.

SRI chairman Chris Brooks said the disallowance was “not just a win for irrigators in the southern Riverina but for everyone across the southern basin; from farmers and flood plain graziers, the environment and indigenous community through to business.

“Decades of irrigators in the north helping themselves to thousands of unlicensed and unmetered gigalitres of water has finally been put to a stop.

“Our evidence is floodplain harvesting is unlicensed and therefore illegal. They don’t have works orders to build dams and to be granted a licence, they have to be compliant with an Australian standard meter, and an approved works order and fit inside each individual valley’s cap.”

But Gwydir Valley Irrigators Association executive officer Zara Lowien said disallowing the motion simply took everyone who uses water in the basin back ti the uncertainty of operating under the 1912 Water Act, the Water Management Act 2000 and transitional arrangements.

The amendment would have meant anyone who had completed or applied for or sought approval of floodplain management work prior to July 3, 2008, would be exempt from holding a licence to take and use water.

The move was in line with commitments previous NSW Governments made to licence floodplain harvesting dating back to 2003, which have still not been implemented.

Ms Lowien said failing to allow the amendment to pass through the Upper House meant a small group of northern basin irrigators, who had built infrastructure outside the five main valleys since 2008, would be able to continue taking water suing those works.

As for the Gwydir Valley Ms Lowien said all on-farm irrigation storages would be metered within 18 months and linked back into the NSW Government’s water information system.

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