Do not wreck the river to save the paddock

I am not against irrigation. Farmers need water. That is not the fight. The fight is taking so much out of the Derwent that we wreck the river to save the paddock.

The Greater South East Irrigation Scheme is lined up to pull more than 14,000 Olympic pools a year out of Meadowbank from 2030. $150 million from Canberra, $75 million from the state, $75 million from irrigators. All sold as the $10 billion agriculture dream.

Christine Coughanowr built the Derwent Estuary Program. She wrote the rivers chapter of the State of the Environment report. She has said this river is already under the pump. The last independent look at extra summer take from the lower Derwent in 2002 said do not do it. Twenty four years later they approved the scheme and said they would study it later. Does this seem like a responsible plan?

We already know what this river does in a hot summer with low oxygen, algae and fish kills. Low oxygen around New Norfolk and Sorell Creek every summer. Blue green algae above town. Last year sardines washed up dead on the Derwent and the chief vet said they most likely swam through toxic algae. That was without another 14,000 pools coming out of Meadowbank.

So when we get a big algae bloom and the river goes green, you can’t swim, fish die, the whole valley stinks, don’t act surprised. And don’t let them tell you it was Super El Niño and climate change. El Niño is happening. A dry hot summer will make a sick river worse. That is the truth. It is also the easiest out in politics to blame climate change and walk away from the problems the government caused.

We caused the low flow. The 2002 advice is still sitting there. They approved it first and said they’d study it later. When the algae takes over they’ll talk weather. Remember who took the water.

Backing farmers does not mean we wreck the Derwent to do it. Growing more food while the river dies is not a win. Do the independent flow study before 2030 and publish it. It’s the sensible thing to do.