As long as water doesn't flow past Victoria!

Mr. Brumby is the main reason why management of the Murray has to be taken out of State hands.

If Brumby had his way, South Australia would get just enough water to maintian his opion of us as a 'backwater'.

"taking water for essential human needs away from rural communities."

One might well ask, "why then are you hell bent on taking water from the Goulburn, away from the farmers, to give to the city?"

You speak with a forked tongue.

Mr. Brumby was never voted for, ever! Now he has been foisted on us by Bracks resignation.
John Thwaites lost Victorians one million acres of native forest to fire because of his reliance on his green mates and their dopey ideas. Now Brumby is going to stuff the river systems. Give us all a break John and call an election so you can be rejected - again.

Some of you need to cool down a little. Perhaps you would care to offer a solution?

It certainly sounds as though you all would have Australia become a desert before you admit your wrongs (assuming I am making the correct assumptions), by which stage you would deserve a solid thumping and the ruination.

As a West Australian, the Murray is not a huge issue, however one fact is clear. There's only so much water to go around and the true measure of success is at the mouth of the Murray.

There are contiunual attempts convince us that somehow marginal farmland will continue to be viable in the drying climate. This is the worst form of self-delusion. All it does is delay the really hard, and politically unpopular decisions that need to be made about where and how water is best used. And what about measures other than direct water allocation.

I agree that small communities should be supporte. The decline of our rural areas and the consequent need to import more and more food cannot be good for us. So what about changing crops to ones that are more drought-tolerant, changing the basis of our agriculture, having government put serious money into agricultural research with incentives for farmers to change over to crops and practices more in tune with the environment.

Keeping agriculture strong and overcoming the barriers presented by a restricted water supply is essential to the future of this country.

Either Brumby is a twit or being disingenuous.

Reduced rainfall is certainly one factor in the reduced flows in the Murray, particularly downstream in South Australia.

But the absolute waste of water in such water-intensive agribusinesses as rice and cotton cannot be ignored.

So why isn't Brumby taking up the case against Queensland and NSW for their wasteful use of these waters? Maybe Labour mates are more important than the environment or Adelaide

Thankyou Mr Brumby for injecting some sense into an emotive issue, there really isn't water available to do all that we want for the Murray mouth, lakes and Coorong. The river has run short of water just as it has many times in the past, only storages like Hume and Dartmouth have ensured that the river has been able to supply water as far as Adelaide. Only the barrages prevent nature from replacing the water evaporated from the lakes with seawater as it used to, and I believe altering the tidal flux which affects the Coorong and mouth.
The barrages were built(1930's)long before cotton was grown in the basin, and the Murray had often run dry previous to rices introduction in the 20's.

geoffalford, thats an interesting supposition re:rice and cotton, but don't you think a farmer allocated water will use that water to his/her best return, and use all of that allocation for whatever crop they grow. If the farmer is entitled to say 200 megalitres of water does it really matter whether that water is extracted for rice or a timber plantation. What you should really be saying is that you think too much water is licensed for extraction, cotton and rice being an extraneous issue.

One might even go so far as to say that since Australian farmers are the worlds most efficient convertors of water to cotton and rice that more of them should be grown here and less of the things we are less efficient at. We grow more than twice the amount of both cotton and rice than the world average per litre of water, with the top ranking for rice(Australia uses 33% of the water per kg as Bangladesh, and only 20% of what Cambodia uses). Info from FAO via www.waterfootprint.org

1: The single authority could have been established during the Howard govt but Victoria refused, the situation was urgent enough then.

2:There is nothing to spare from the Goulburn River, all diversions South deplete the supply all the way to SA. Improvements to irrigation should have been done long ago. It is crazy to allocate an uncertain supply to a large city that is growing by 1400 per week. Remember the promises about the Snowy river back in the 50s? Melbourne would take more and more. As a Melburnian I want us to deal locally with our situation, tanks, nuclear, recycle, whatever it takes.

There is supposedly a lot of concern about water supplies drying up with climate change, yet the government and its corporate sponsors are aggressively increasing the size of the Australian population and the number and intensity of uses for water. They are allocating more to water intensive industry, much of it unhealthy for humans and cruel (feedlot farming); soil destructive (vineyards and agribusiness broadacre), AND subsidised byYOUR taxes.

They are effectively privatising water, both for its agricultural uses (The Foodbowl unlimited corporatisation of the Riverina) and for the power it produces (Rudd’s scheme to ‘lease’ the Snowy Hydro.

Water is extremely valuable because it sustains life, but the government is interested in the commercial value of water which can be obtained by commodifying it. The major steps towards this have been achieved already through the bundling of water titles separate from land-titles. Farmers in trouble during the drought have been so stretched for cash to survive that they have reluctantly cashed in their water titles. Portions of these land-titles have been made available by the government to investors who have no use for the water except to make money. These investors' speculatory activities, combined with the general greedy draw on water by agribusinesses able to pay big prices for it (which they pass on to you, my dears), have pushed the prices way beyond what ordinary farmers, let alone drought-affected ones, can afford to buy back the water. Now agribusiness and land developers are grabbing the land and the water.

We don’t just need to get our water back. We need to get our land and our democracy back.

Hey all,
I see that still no-one wants to administer the "hard task"

Remove all lochs and let it run.
You want water? then pump it and store it while its there.
What about the growers? Improvize,store more water, move on.

It didn't take many years to kill the Murray but it will take a lot longer to recover and many will have to move anyway.

I left the Murray back in the 70's because it was buggered then, talking to brick walls was well underway then too.

NT.

The scene....The banks of the Goulburn River near Seymour (Vic.)

The date....2047

The Father and his son

Son: Why are all the old trees(Red Gums) dead dad?

Father: Oh well son, years ago a premier decided to pump water to the city in a big pipeline (North South) and the River and its surrounding vegetation just died.

Son: Why didn't people do something?

Father: Sometimes politicians like power...look son some bubbles....it might be a lone surviving carp!

I would like to reply to the post by Judy Spence concerning the nuclear desalination of seawater. I'll state first, so you know, that I am Tony (Antony) Boys, one of the authors of the book the Final Energy Crisis, 2nd Ed. (Editor Sheila Newman) to be published by Pluto later this month, and I write on food and energy issues in Japan.

Firstly, desalination is not really all that "popular" in Japan. Please see:

Saturday, Dec. 14, 2002, Farm minister puts lid on 'wasteful' <a href="http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20021214a8.html">
desalination project</a>

The main reason is that Japan has (in MOST years) ample rainfall and there is really little call for it.

Secondly, if there is nuclear desalination in Japan I have not heard of it and cannot find references to it on Google and so on, so could you please furnish a concrete reference to such an example that is operating now? There may be one - more a question of my ignorance than me accusing you of a falsification - but it also strikes me as the kind of thing that is often thrown out as a justification for nuclear energy, that very few people actually want, rather than something that is really necessary, useful or advisable.

Thirdly, with respect to Australia, which you know far more about than I do, do Australians really want to get heavily involved in nuclear power just for the sake of desalination of seawater? Does the means really fit the ends, serious as the situation may be? Australia has uranium resources, but not everyone is happy about uranium mining (as in other countries). Nuclear power itself, especially the siting of reactors, can be an extremely difficult issue fraught with emotional complexities. If it's a choice between starvation and nuclear desalination, many may choose nuclear desalination. However, I suggest there are other technologies which result in the same ends, but in fewer problems farther down the road. What do you think?

Thanks, Tony

The URL for the story "Farm minister puts lid on 'wasteful' desalination project" was not completely correct the way Tony posted it. It had an extraneous "> due to the way the OLO content management software works. It should have been:

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20021214a8.html

If you see an authentication panel which requests your account name and password, just click 'cancel'.

Ever since Menindee Lakes were formed the huge drain of water out of the Darling River has been considered to impact the Darling and Murray River's downstream. The vast surface area of Menindee lakes allows for extraordinary evaporation.

Menindee Lakes originally provided for water skiing for Broken Hill people but skiing must now be limited due to fuel cost. Horticulture generally failed in the area, impacted by desert heat and long distance transport cost. Sheep and cattle do not need huge shallow lakes.

Broken Hill town water supply must be absolutely maintained but this can be achieved by deepening a smaller lake area to reduce evaporation and allow more natural flow to the Murray and ocean.

If climate change is already causing drought then immediate action should include diverting flow from the man-man area of Menindee Lakes. Bulldozers should be working on this right now, before the next big rain. There is an absolute crisis downstream.

Independent research indicates toxic algae particles from river water holes and associated coastal current is drying and becoming airbone in dust. At least one species of toxic algae (lyngbya masculata) is known to cause asthma-like attack on contact with human skin. Imagine a tiny toxic particle contacting lung tissue. Deterioration of water quality coincides with increase in asthma.

Surely Broken Hill and region residents will understand, especially impact of river and Coorong estuary water deprivation. Irrefutable evidence indicates sediment from the Murray Darling is being transported by coastal ocean alongshore current reaching the Great Barrier Reef and beyond. Wind piles heavy sand onto beach sandhills where lightweight toxic sediment can dry and become airborne, sometimes likely blowing back over Australia including to Broken Hill where pelicans and seagulls fly.

It is all very well to argue who will be charged and who will be paid from emissions trading but what about the actual state of OUR environment right now, be it from climate change or from natural drought water shortage compounded by man-made lakes and dams? Farmers can be compensated or water can be supplied by modern drains. See:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/07/08/2297176.htm

Do politicians suffer asthma?

My three recommendations for the Murray are;

1. Close the lochs and let the river run free
2. Stop farming cotton and rice now

When the Murray is back on track and running freely we can then talk about farmers' needs.

By the time that has happened, all the farmers will have packed up and left.

David

Marees ideas are sound.

THE murry is the river of life
special intrests have STOLEN all our waters
think councils put in meters THEN SOLD IT st the special intrests

so they can control us by controling our utilities
just burning coal uses masses of our water
yet with FREE energy
we can use that water for FOOD
or grow the tree of life [hemp] on the river of life

hemp uses no fertilsers or pestacides!
cotton alone uses half the WORLDS supply just for cotton
but lets look at whayt else govt is COLLUDING by treason to keep from ALL of US
try this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykGZ2tRY4kY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-ulOvJl46U
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqBWk9YRu7c
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czZ9kn70Y7I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zu8LaVH-pn0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6YYUOx6fBU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxZR4C9gqOY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgrDdJotz0A
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AU8PId_6xec
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8stApCmxYEM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHh5AqQ4_xw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U-Lnhs7caCo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-O7WNvKSvY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrMcBHGMZzc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCjM-ZOqQF0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTr3ZgKwsiU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXv6sO52xFY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAiTv0IpHWo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0FhADUZjx4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLev-ijMLME

as to how try this as to why they are being kept from our kids

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21D3ATgMHuE
http://www.youtube.com/watchv=zp_XHfylwPU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U4RZqQujqDQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YnnTzyidNI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGhPgEDcKXI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v76amxA9x1cA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6uTy9Uq0K0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSBxEZoNfQo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xq_APNsERXY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLqw59XfG04
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRLR7-jdF3M
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14yDP0GKrUA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muQRIUVd6Aw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Kp24ZeHtv4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_MHVw1Zz-I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLzUNDaF00U
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9MQ88NEO7Q

well
we could nationalise 'big oil [and big pharma
to free up our childrens minds
[then join the suppressed research to gether [AND HEAL THE WORLD}

but we wont [cause we cant]
because we arnt allowed to see the big picture
[because of privatised proffit's]

we are spending billions subsidising these multinationals with our taxes [every week ]

billions spent pills and potions that dont cure us
clearly big BUISNESS lobby is paid to stay on top of this info
to ridicule it where they can
or suppress it where they cant

but for the alternative of [free] energy
that is based on science

that your regular scientists are forbidden to explore
that of which you speak is thus unspeakable
so

[why are they controlled and owned by the same cartel's"]

[and are making us sicker ,by treating the symptom
[BUT NEVER actually even allowed to cure THE DISEASE]
why
because they have an active lobby
SPECIAL intrests have bought out govt into active treason

What a load of C R A P.

The South Australian Government should buy Cubbie Station and other properties further up the Darling, the Murray and the Murrumbidgee.

Cubbie Station and the Queensland Government should not be so greedy and ignorant of the environment and other people.

The downstream Coorong RAMSAR site is being damaged and destroyed. RAMSAR sites are declared because they are known to be the last significant remaining habitat that is vital to keep regional ecosystems and wildlife alive.

Ignorance of law is no excuse.