Wednesday, 28 August 2024

Ministers statements: water policy

Harriet SHING (Eastern Victoria – Minister for Housing, Minister for Water, Minister for Equality) (12:23): Last Friday the Premier and I joined more than 70 community and industry leaders from across Victoria’s basin communities in Bendigo to talk about a future for northern Victoria – Mrs Broad, Mrs Tyrrell and others. It was really wonderful to see a whole-of-Parliament representation from both houses, so thank you so much to the Goulburn–Murray irrigation district leadership group and to David McKenzie and Suzanna Sheed in particular for inviting me to join such an important conversation.

To be really clear, the Allan Labor government stands with rural and regional communities in northern Victoria as the Murray–Darling Basin plan implementation continues, and the Premier joining me on Friday at the summit is really testament to this. We understand how important it is to achieve environmental outcomes for our rivers, and nobody knows better about the importance of environmental outcomes than the communities who live in them, but we also know that open-tender buybacks will have a socio-economic impact in our basin communities. At the summit we heard from community leaders on the impact of non-strategic water recovery, and I want to thank all of the speakers – David, Charmaine, Paul, Carl, Jason and especially Ross Stanton, mayor of Gannawarra shire and chair of the Murray River Group of Councils, for his emotional and passionate speech about what the impact of this will be for basin communities.

We are incredibly disappointed that open-tender buybacks have recommenced, and we recognise how difficult this period will be for northern Victoria and the implications for the whole of the Victorian government and not just for the water portfolio. We have established an interdepartmental committee across government on the Murray–Darling Basin, and this will work across portfolios, including the Department of Premier and Cabinet, the Department of Treasury and Finance, the Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action and the Department of Jobs, Skills, Industry and Regions. I am looking forward to this work continuing so that we can achieve the objectives of the basin plan whilst also supporting our communities and healthy rivers and waterways now and into the future.