MANY farms will end up suffering from a "Rudd-made'' drought under the Federal Government's "grim reaper'' plan to conduct more water buy-backs in the Murray Darling Basin, the Opposition says.
The Government said yesterday it will spend $270 million in three water buy back tenders in the first half of 2010.The money will be offered to properties in three $90-million tenders for the southern River Murray system, while further announcements relating to other buy-backs in the basin will occur in early 2010.
But the Opposition has described acting Water Minister Peter Garrett, who made the announcement, as the grim reaper who has taken another hit to Australia's future food security.
Labor had already plundered regional Australia's lifeblood, water, to the tune of $1.01 billion without spending a cent on infrastructure that could increase productivity and food security, Opposition agriculture spokesman John Cobb said.
"The Labor Party's grim reaper actions will see many of the worst drought hit regions in the country go from a climatic drought straight into a Rudd made drought,'' Mr Cobb said.
Not one cent had been spent on water infrastructure in NSW, Queensland or Victoria.
"Yet people in my electorate of Calare have no access to water from the Lachlan River, which has been stopped below Condobolin,'' he said.
The only thing stopping communities from losing water altogether was the 4-per-cent trading cap, he said, which placed limits on how much water could be traded in a given period.
Trading caps are determined by each state and some states do not impose them.
"The cap should not be removed until the Basin Plan has been completed,'' Mr Cobb said.
