MEDIA RELEASE: Don't let One Nation destroy the basin

Yesterday’s media conference between One Nation and Murray Irrigation should send alarm bells to anyone who cares about the Murray-Darling Basin.

Barnaby Joyce is now on notice about the dangers of unpicking the Murray-Darling Basin Plan. There is no way of implementing the Plan without implementing all of it. Barnaby Joyce has been trying to pretend he that he can deliver the Plan and not produce the extra 450GL of water through infrastructure projects.

The 450GL is an essential part of the Plan and an essential part of restoring the basin to health. Acquiring that water through infrastructure expenditure is an important way of alleviating the pressure on irrigators themselves as the transition takes place.

Barnaby Joyce only has two options here. Side with Labor and defend all of the Plan, or go down the One Nation path and bring back the conflict that had been raging across the basin for more than one hundred years.

THURSDAY, 15 JUNE 2017