TRANSCRIPT
The Murray Darling Basin is, for so many, a precious commodity, home to 35 endangered animal species, 120 different kinds of waterbirds, and over 30,000 wetlands.
The basin has also been described as the food bowl of the nation, with its agriculture industry worth around $24 billion a year.
With so much at stake, there have long been concerns about how the river system is managed, including for irrigation.
Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek has announced a revised plan that hopes to address those concerns, by extending the deadline and funding for water to be returned to the river system through buybacks.
"The Murray Darling Basin Plan is an incredible piece of cooperation between the Commonwealth and the Murray Darling Basin states and the ACT. It came out of a period of environmental catastrophe and it's designed to avoid another environmental catastrophe. We know that south-east Australia, in particular, is getting hotter and dryer and although we have had a few wet years recently, we know that the next drought is just around the corner."
Buybacks are when the government purchases the water entitlements of licence holders along the river system.
Entitlements give the licensees the right to take a certain amount of water from the system each year, but a buyback means the government can reclaim that water and send it back to the places and animals that need it the most.
Victoria is the only state that's decided against joining the revised Murray Darling basin agreement, and in a statement provided to SBS News, Victorian Water Minister Harriet Shing says buybacks are the reason why.
"Victoria has a long-standing opposition to buybacks and nothing we have seen in this deal has changed that position. Victoria has delivered more water than any other state towards the up to 450 gigalitres of additional water, and will support the return of water to the environment and the delivery of the Murray Darling Basin Plan as long as it meets the agreed socioeconomic criteria."
The Conservation Council, now known as Environment Victoria, says the state's opposition makes no sense.
Jono La Nauze is their CEO.
"Victoria's water policy was written at a time when the National Party was in power and held the water portfolio in Victoria. For some reason, despite being progressive on a number of environmental issues, has decided to maintain that position over the last decade... It doesn't make any sense to me that a government would stand in the way of a farmer who wants to sell their water to the Commonwealth."
But dairy farmer and Farmers Federation Water Council chair Andrew Leahy [[lay-ee]] says Victoria has done the right thing by saying no.
He says farmers and the government are keen to keep as much water in the Victorian part of the system as possible - because they've seen the social impact of insufficient water firsthand.
"I've got 15, 16 year old children. When I went to school in the local town there was a thousand kids at the high school, now there's only 200. So with water buybacks we see is we've just lost people out of the districts because there's no jobs and that... The local voluntary fire brigade has trouble getting members, you know. All the little things like the Lions' clubs. All those little community groups are struggling to get volunteers at the moment, because we don't have the people here anymore."
Indigenous communities have also long hoped for more effective action to save the river.
In Victoria, the Tati Tati people have been campaigning for an influx of water at Margooya Lagoon, a culturally significant site near Robinvale.
David Littleproud promised $40 million in 2018, when he was the relevant minister, to buy water for Indigenous communities to use and control in the Murray Darling system, a promise never really fulfilled.
Indigenous elders say there is a strong case to be made to include First Nations people on the board of the Murray Darling Basin Authority, and to provide for cultural flows.
Environmental Justice Australia lawyer Bruce Lindsay.
"Cultural flows is a concept that traditional owners have been developing for a number of years, especially in the southern Murray Darling Basin. It's essentially a tool to identify means of establishing far greater Aboriginal control and authority over water management, especially along the Murray River floodplain, such as sites like this at Margooya Lagoon."
It's unclear if the legislation on the new plan, to be put forward by Tanya Plibersek, will include money for cultural flows - and how Victoria will proceed without the funding from the revised agreement.
But what is clear is the river system is both a source of food and significant cultural practice for many First Nations communities, as Ngarrinjeri elder Major Sumner told the Murray Darling Basin Authority.
"It's a part of my life. It's a part of my parent's life. It's a part of my grandparent's life, part of my great great great great grandparent's life. We've always been connected to the river."
