STATE OF IRRIGATION INDUSTRY IS 'SICKENING'
As an ex-irrigator after 60 years it makes me sick at what is happening to the irrigation industry in NSW and Victoria. Most people know Burrinjuck and Blowering Dams were built for storage to produce food and fibre for our population and supply water to all towns till it ran into the Murray River servicing more towns and river pumpers to grow food for Australia to the South Australian coast, a great plan, what has changed?
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Who owns the water supplied by nature for free. We are being told the Federal Government bought a fair percentage for the environment but at what cost, we have learnt that most of this water has been wasted by massive flows that flood hundreds of farms, washed away river banks, and filled low lying holes where only European carp could survive.
These stuff ups were ordered by governmental pen pushers who have never been off a tar road. There are many others who own heaps of water who should not be allowed to. It has been reported that 10 percent of the water is owned by overseas companies, also some Australian politicians.
Many accountants and speculators who are hoarding water creating a shortage of water to increase the price for their sinister advantage. I must point out there is no GST payable on water sales making it easy for these professional clowns to operate.
When are the brain dead politicians, another left wing, loopy bureaucrats going to realise that to satisfy current our future water needs for these states.
They must harvest and store 100 per cent more water than we have now by building more dams, weirs and lakes along the river systems as quickly as possible, you don't have to be a Rhodes scholar to realise that this is needed. I have to point out that Lake Midgeon which has been dry, near Narrandera has the potential to hold one million megalitres of water which would top up both MIA and CIA water needs every summer.
This project could be done in 12 months time with a cost of just $500 million as the area assessed can be gravity filled with water, gravity released with regulated gates into the existing irrigation schemes.
This cost for both for both the federal and state governments is miniscule. What a wonderful project if it is implemented.
Eddie Salvestro, Hanwood
FARMER SNUB IN NSW PARLIAMENT
It is disappointing that so few MPs have offered to listen to a group farmers who flew all the way to Sydney to explain the devastating impact poor water policy is having on their communities.
Rob Roberts MLC invited the Southern Riverina Irrigators chair Chris Brooks and deputy chair Darcy Hare - representing more than 2,000 farmers - to NSW Parliament, to give a short presentation during the lunch break of NSW Parliament on Wednesday. Every single NSW MP was invited. We know Sydney MPs does like travelling out west. But I was saddened to see how few MPs showed up at their excellent presentation, especially after they'd travelled so far to get here.
Most people in Sydney think drought has caused all our problems. That's not true in the south. There's so much water being wasted along the Murray, Lachlan and Murrumbidgee rivers. We are losing jobs and lives due to the disastrous Murray Daring Basin Plan.
It was nice to see a few Liberals at the presentation. And a Labor MP. But not one National MP - the so-called party of regional Australia - bothered to turn up. I understand a few Labor and Liberals MPs will meet with the farmers on Thursday. But they still haven't heard from any Nats.
Helen Dalton, Member for Murray
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