Minister as Clear as Mud Over Irrigation Business Case Requirement

The Primary Industries Minister, Jeremy Rockliff, needs to clarify that a robust cost-benefit business case will be required before any of the State Budget’s 2014-15 $6 million for Stage 2 irrigation projects is released, said Greens Leader and Primary Industries spokesperson Kim Booth MP.

“Minister Rockliff did concede that the entire Stage 2 irrigation funding is contingent upon both federal funding and private sector contribution, and that without either of these contributions these schemes are not guaranteed,” Mr Booth said.

“However, he stopped short of clearly guaranteeing that none of the public monies will be released without there being a robust business case developed.”

“Given the lack of a timeframe by which either federal of private sector contributions are expected, and the apparent absence of a developed business case at this stage, it is highly unlikely that the 2014-15 allocation will be fully expended over the next seven months, before the next State Budget should be delivered.”

“This reinforces the position taken by the Greens in our Alternative Budget, which still supports all the other actual funded irrigation projects contained in the State Budget, where we reallocated some of the Stage 2 monies and deferred the rest to later years, when it will be clearer whether these proposed schemes will actually eventuate, as confirmed by today’s estimates hearings.”

“This demonstrates the Greens’ consistent and long-held position of supporting public monies being invested in appropriate irrigation projects which are based upon robust business-cases. This is essential to protect both public and private funding.”

“It seems odd and desperate of the Liberal government to try and interpret that as somehow irresponsible, and flies in the face of tripartite agreement on proper assessment being necessary, following the improper Meander Dam assessment which still to this day has a lot of public money tied up in unsold water allocations,” Mr Booth said.
Kim Booth MP | Greens Leader