MEMBER for Mildura Ali Cupper says floodplain harvesting crackdowns, not water buybacks, are the key to getting the Murray Darling Basin Plan back on target.
“Any water that needs to be clawed back by 2024 to meet the environmental water targets of the Murray Darling Basin Plan needs to come from NSW, not Victoria,” she said.
“Victorian irrigators have done their fair share, and any further buybacks from our irrigators need to be categorically ruled out.”
Ms Cupper said the Federal Government should instead turn its water recovery efforts to stamping out illegal floodplain harvesting in NSW.
“Buybacks to recover the remaining 450GL aren’t the solution; what we need is comprehensive and accurate water accounting, something that NSW simply isn’t providing,” she said.
“Some estimates suggest NSW is surpassing its legal floodplain extraction limit by between 568 and 862 gigalitres a year.
“That’s somewhere around 311 thousand Olympic-sized swimming pools of water that goes unaccounted for annually; if the Federal Government is looking for water to recover, it should start there.”

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