Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is a great pleasure to follow the member for Riverina on this Water Amendment (Water for the Environment Special Account) Bill 2012. This reform of the Murray and the Darling river systems has gone back a long time in history. It is not something that only this government has been dealing with. In fact, I well recall John Anderson, the former Deputy Prime Minister and the former member for Gwydir, introducing the National Water Initiative, which was instrumental in starting a very credible process that not only was designed to deal with reform of water and ensure environmental flows within the Murray-Darling Basin system but also acknowledged that we have got to look after the communities where there is a water buyback or a loss of allocation and what that might mean to some of the regional economies along the Murray-Darling system.

In relation to the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, I put a submission in to the initial inquiry of this government. One of the points I raised was that the Murray and the Darling are two ecologically different systems. The Murray is in southern Australia and it comes from more of a Mediterranean type climate. A lot of the water comes from winter rainfall patterns and it also comes from a lot of melting snow. I represent the seat of Maranoa, which has the entire Condamine-Balonne river system, the Warrego River system and the Paroo River system within its boundaries. They are all part of what we call the Murray-Darling Basin catchment area. I also have within my electorate the border rivers of the Macintyre, the Weir and the Moonie. The Macintyre is one that I share with my good friend Mark Coulton, the member for Parkes.

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