Mr Pitt said there were no matters for ministerial decision, but the observation has been met with dismay by Member for Shepparton Suzanna Sheed.
“We do have serious concerns around the failure to meet water recovery targets by the 2024 deadline and we want to ensure the recovery of the additional 450Gl does not come from buybacks,” Ms Sheed said.
“We want the promise of no further buybacks to be legislated by the Federal Government, otherwise our irrigators are left vulnerable to future water recovery because of our secure high-reliability water.
“It’s well and good for Minister Pitt to tell the media that further buybacks to meet the recovery target will be ruled out, but we need this to be enshrined in legislation — and that alone is worthy of discussion at a MinCo meeting.”
In parliament, Ms Sheed asked Water Minister Lisa Neville how the Victorian Government would ensure Victoria’s water issues were heard in the absence of a meeting of state water ministers this month.
Ms Sheed aired her concerns about how water recovery would not be completed by the 2024 audit of water recovery under the Murray-Darling Basin Plan.
“It is clear to the states that the water recovery projects will not be completed and that there will be a shortfall in recovery targets,” Ms Sheed said in parliament.
Southern Riverina Irrigators vice-chair Darcy Hare said it was no surprise Mr Pitt cancelled the MinCo meeting.
“Refusing to host MinCo illustrates the current government’s disdain for agriculture, community, Indigenous (concerns) and the environment, who have all been heavily impacted by implementation of an inflexible basin plan based on what is now apparent — a set of essentially unachievable numbers,” Mr Hare said.
Mr Hare said using the excuse there were no matters for ministerial decisions was disingenuous.
“I can think of $4 billion matters,” Mr Hare said.
“The southern basin has 23 of 37 projects to make up the 605Gl of the sustainable diversion limit adjustment mechanism, and the communities meant to deliver these are not happy with a single one — MinCo could have had a whole meeting dedicated to just delivering SDLs if there was nothing else to discuss,” he said.
Federal Member for Nicholls Damian Drum defended Mr Pitt’s decision and told Country News not all the states were ready with their water savings projects.
“Right now, they're looking for ways to bring new projects in to create water savings. And that will mean there'll be less water needed to be taken away from irrigation.
“So because the states weren't ready the minister has given a couple of those states some extra time and he's asked them to put in place a MinCo early in the new year,” Mr Drum said.
“So, whilst it's not going to be approximately around in the next week or two, it looks like it’s going to be in the next couple of months.
“Victoria is ready to go.
“But it's not much point having a meeting with Queensland, NSW, Victoria, South Australia and the ACT and more or less having (only) one of those states ready to go.’’
