When our rivers are healthy and vibrant, so are our communities – yet governments are failing in their duty to protect and restore our rivers and wetlands.
We have the opportunity to push our representatives to enforce the law, follow the science, and save our rivers.
Healthy Rivers Dubbo is calling on the NSW and Commonwealth water and environment ministers to:
#1 End Aqua Nullius
When Australia was invaded, the Country was illegally and immorally declared Terra Nullius (no-one’s land), and Aqua Nullius (no-one’s water). There has been some land returned, but there have been no repatriations to compensate for stolen water.
The principles of Free, Prior and Informed Consent are described in the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and require governments and agencies to consult and cooperate in good faith with Aboriginal People regarding large projects that would impact Aboriginal Land. Inadequate consultation has plagued all communities, and we would all greatly benefit if governments and agencies applied Free, Prior and Informed Consent when proposing major developments that impact everyone.
Consultation should be:
Free – The consent is given voluntarily and without coercion, intimidation or manipulation. A process that is self-directed by the community from whom consent is being sought, unencumbered by coercion, expectations or timelines that are externally imposed
Prior -The consent is sought sufficiently in advance of any authorisation or commencement of activities
Informed – The engagement and type of information should be provided prior to seeking consent and also as part of the ongoing consent process.
Consent – A collective decision made by the right holders and reached through customary decision-making processes of the communities.
Healthy Rivers Dubbo calls for:
- the commonwealth government to legally define Cultural Flows and mechanisms to deliver Cultural Flows to each Aboriginal Traditional Owner group in the Murray-Darling Basin.
- the principles of Free, Prior and Informed Consent to be embedded in all water sharing instruments.
#2 Only allocate water that exists
The rules that govern our water supply are dangerously outdated. Water is credited to water user’s accounts based on assumptions about future inflows, rather than on water physically held in Burrendong Dam. The assumptions about these inflows must be made only using drought data from before 2004, ignoring the severe droughts of this century.
This means in effect the state works on the assumption that the dam will fill every two years, when floods occur every ten years or so. Inevitably, Burrendong dam almost crashes to zero every decade.
Healthy Rivers Dubbo calls for an end to the allocation of predicted rainfall. Only water that is in the dam should be allocated to water users.
#3 Connect our Rivers
Our rivers and wetlands need more water so they stop their ecological decline and stand a chance of getting us through the droughts to come.
The Ramsar listed Macquarie Marshes were listed as an Ecologically Endangered Community in January this year. The Macquarie/Wambuul is a critically important source of water for the Barwon Darling/Baaka River, a river which nobody can deny must have more flows to survive.
These are clear indications that the Murray-Darling Basin Plan and the NSW water sharing plans are failing us all. Too much water is still being pumped from rivers and diverted off floodplains before it gets to the Marshes, and then through to the Barwon and Darling/Baaka rivers.
Healthy Rivers Dubbo calls for:
- Flow targets must be included in water sharing plans so the Ramsar listed Macquarie Marshes receive the water they need to no longer be listed as an endangered ecological community. These targets must be adjustable to compensate for the warming climate.
- More water to be recovered from irrigation through the Murray-Darling Basin Plan based on accurate and current science.
#4 Improve data transparency
ABC Four Corners program Pumped, 2017, exposed many scandals of NSW water management – data secrecy among them. In the decade since, access to data about dam releases, how compliance to extraction limits is calculated, and who is pumping the water has actually declined.
Healthy Rivers Dubbo calls for the NSW government to make all hydrological models available to be independently audited annually.
#5 Ban more water grabs
Irrigators’ schemes to blatantly grab even more water, like the Gin Gin super weir and increasing the storage of the dam into the flood management zone have repeatedly been rejected by the community and the government. These proposals waste the community’s time and millions of dollars of public money.
Healthy Rivers Dubbo calls for a ban on all new water grab schemes, and the protection of the last of the free flowing water of the Macquarie/Wambuul river.
