Member for Farrer says Murray Darling Basin Plan, water and MIA projects could suffer

"As a regional MP, the biggest thing I always look for is money coming directly to the bush. And what we see in this Budget is a huge delay in rolling out any dollars for important regional development projects," she said.

"By the time Labor gets round to it, there will be a two-year drought in funding. In short, they are spending less in the MIA, and taking longer to do it, which is hugely disappointing."

She specifically cited the Leeton Roxy theatre development as a project that could suffer.

"The ALP candidate committed to pushing for federal assistance to Leeton's Roxy Theatre development, but I guess if you don't have a regional fund to draw from yet, you can't really deliver.

"Labor's election commitments for Farrer are not listed but I will be watching closely to see where the local money for domestic violence crisis support lands in the Murray."

Ms Ley said the budget inclusion of delivering the latest climate science into the management of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan will see the plan muddied by bureaucracy.

READ MORE

"This additional $150m is aimed primarily at bringing in more Canberra-based public servants to swell the ranks of the MDBA and Minister Plibersek's department," Ms Ley said.

"Running the bureaucracy out of Canberra is not something we welcome - the recent so called 'consultations' on strategic water purchasing across the southern Basin is a clear case of how not to do things."

Meanwhile, she said a $302 million investment on climate-smart agriculture projects and plans to make the water market more transparent were existing coalition initiatives.

"The investment into climate-smart agricultural projects is money from the Natural Heritage Trust... the former Coalition Government supported the continuation of the National Landcare Program which supported on-the-ground environmental action. It is the same funding source, just under a different name," she said.

"In terms of transparency in the water market, this is an area the Coalition had already embarked on. Our hope is the cost of collecting the data and running the platforms are not passed onto water users, and that it actually contains information which is useful for end users."

Ms Ley raised concerns over Labor's ambition to raise welfare payments by $40 a fortnight, as well as increasing rent assistance by 15 per cent.

"I am sure there are many people who will benefit from the changes, but there is also an issue of robbing Peter to pay Paul. Our early analysis of the Budget suggests the average family (with children) could be up to $25,000 worse off per year," Ms Ley said.

Meanwhile, state member for Murray, Helen Dalton, has welcomed the initiatives in the budget.

"We need this statutory review of the Murray Darling Basin because the plan is failing right now," Ms Dalton said.

"We need to get the politics out of the rivers and we need to look at the environmental crisis. We have carp and water quality problems as well as the degradation of river banks.

"Farmers are the best environmentalists. The real experts live on the river, not in Sydney.

"In addition, I support Labor's goal to make the water market more transparent. I've been calling for a water register for years and it seems the Sydney politicians are starting to listen. We need real time reporting of sales and we need to end the control of our rivers by foreign companies," Ms Dalton said.

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can continue to access our trusted content: