What does Minister Tony Burke not understand about Swiss Cheese effects?
August 4, 2011
What does Minister Tony Burke not understand about Swiss Cheese effects?
According to Sharman Stone, Federal Member for Murray, the new Head of the MDBA Craig Knowles should ignore the threats and resist the attempts to bully him. These threats came from Water Minister Tony Burke after the MDBA announcement that more time was needed to get the MDBA plan for sustainable diversion limits exactly right.
“We are living with the most unfortunate consequences of the ill conceived Guide to the Plan which was put to the community full of errors and after minimal consultation with stakeholders,” Sharman Stone said.
Tony Burke is has now threatened that because the draft is delayed, he will ”restart buybacks” of irrigation water immediately.
“This is a very odd threat, given the Federal Government has never stopped the highly damaging water buy-backs for the environment, started under Minister Penny Wong. The buy-backs were not even stalled after the interim and final recommendations of the House of Representatives Inquiry into the MDBA Plan chaired by Tony Windsor and commissioned by the Gillard Government, “ Sharman Stone said.
“This Inquiry found that the so called “willing sellers” were in fact mostly financially stressed sellers who sold water off their farms at considerable cost to their neighbours and the local irrigation system’s efficiency.
“The effect on the Goulburn Murray Water Irrigation system in Victoria is so bad that the Victorian Government has introduced rules not allowing irrigators on main channels to participate in the Gillard Government’s buy-back scheme.
The Tony Windsor Committee call to immediately halt all non-strategic water buy-back was in response to overwhelming evidence submitted to the Inquiry about stranded assets and market price distortions as stressed irrigators were forced to sell their critical means of production.
Minister Tony Burke claim that the delivery of the MDBA’s report was intended to be the trigger for him restarting the government’s buy-back tenders also leaves you wondering why are we all wasting our time with the planning. Apparently the Gillard Government has no intention of considering the Plans recommendations before pursuing their own strategies, “Sharman Stone said.
Besides condemning the non-strategic buy-back the Tony Windsor inquiry was given strong and repeated evidence that significant additional flows for the environment were not needed. Instead it found that environmental flows should be and could be better managed, and environmental works and measures could make the Gigalitres already available significantly more accessible and effective in sustaining the environment, Sharman Stone said.
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