Federal Labor is coming under fire from its own side of politics, with the Victorian government slapping down a commitment to return 450 gigalitres of environmental water to the Murray-Darling Basin.
Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese and shadow minister for environment and water Terri Butler presented a five-point plan for the Murray-Darling Basin in Adelaide on Friday morning.
Top billing was given to 'working with Basin governments and stakeholders to deliver on water commitments, including the 450GL of water for the environment'.
"We think that the best way to deliver that is for all the parties to work together with good will," Ms Butler told the ABC.
"We would prefer not to have to have any more interventionist means, but if we need to, that's something that will have to be considered."
Under the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, all water savings, including the additional 450GL, must be delivered by 2024.
But the projects designed to deliver the additional water, including removing constraints that would allow for higher water flows, have barely started.
Ms Butler said those projects, as well a water recovery project designed to deliver a separate 605GL, represented a "vacation of leadership" from the federal government.
"[The federal government] has sent all the wrong signals to the Basin states in relation to delivering those projects, and we think it's important that the leadership vacuum be filled," she said.
In 2018, Basin state governments placed a strict socio-economic test on measures designed to deliver the water, such that any water recovery project must have a neutral or improved impact on Basin communities.
Soon after announcing the commitment to the 450GL, Victorian Water Minister Lisa Neville labelled the policy "disappointing".
"We have agreed as a ministerial council on socio-economic criteria which is is in the legislation, and framed out what that means," Ms Neville told the Victorian Country Hour.
Ms Neville said projects that improved the efficiency of the system and removed any leakages were examples of water recovery that would meet the socio-economic criteria, and they were the preferred method of water recovery for the 450GL.
No change to deadlines
The Murray-Darling Basin Plan has a strict 2024 deadline for water recovery, but the Productivity Commission has warned for years that many of the projects that are supposed to deliver water savings are risky and running well behind schedule.
Victorian water minister Lisa Neville has called for an extension of that deadline, to a more realistic time frame.
But Ms Butler said Labor would stick with the deadline.
"That's the promise everyone was making back a decade ago, and no government, including the national government, should be walking away from those targets," she said.
Under the legislation, if the projects are not completed, a federal government would be forced to re-enter the market and buy water entitlements off farmers.
"We want to see alternatives to buybacks being the way in which water is recovered," Ms Butler said.
"So let's avoid that if we can by getting our foot on the accelerator and actually delivering on the Plan."
Coalition divided on 450
Following Labor's announcement, the Federal Water Minister, Nationals MP Keith Pitt, called on the opposition to clarify its plans about buying back water from irrigators.
"Anthony Albanese is sacrificing communities and jobs throughout the Murray-Darling Basin to chase a few extra votes in Adelaide," Mr Pitt said.
But the federal coalition is also divided on the return of the 450GL of environmental water.
In a move that embarrassed Liberal Senators, the Nationals parliamentary team last year attempted to re-write the Coalition's own legislation to alter the Murray Darling Basin Plan.
The Nationals were unsuccessful in their bid to eliminate the 450GL commitment from the law.
Greens senator for South Australia Sarah Hanson-Young pledged her party would ensure buybacks were used to recover water in the Basin.
"The 450GL promised to SA cannot be delivered without restoring voluntary water buybacks. This is critical to ensuring the longevity of the Murray and those who rely on it,' Ms Hanson-Young said.
"In Senate balance of power, the Greens will push to ensure this is included in Labor's plan."
Five point plan
Federal Labor's Basin policies also included increasing legal compliance through an additional $35 million of funding to improve metering and monitoring of water take across the Basin.
In addition, there was a pledge to update the scientific knowledge of the Basin through $8.5 million funding boost for an upcoming review of the CSIRO Sustainable Yield study, and a $3.5 million study of how climate change was impacting RAMSAR-listed wetlands in the Basin.
In 2018, the federal government committed $40 million to increasing First Nations ownership of water in the Basin, but none of that money has been spent so far.
Labor committed to increasing both the ownership of water by First Nations, as well as increasing their participation in decision making.
